Is the Universe Sending You These Secret Signs?
Questioner: Namaste Acharya Ji. My question is, why certain people experience universal synchronicities, like in forms of numbers, places, or specific signs. And people might call it like, “You are delusional,” but they are experiencing it. And how it is related to our spirituality and our scientific point of view.
Questioner: The question is: how do certain people experience synchronicity? You understand synchronous happening at the same time without any apparent connection between the two. How does that happen?
All of you just imagine any number between 1 and 20. Any number, a single number, right? And you are not telling your neighbor, which means the event happening inside you is localized, right? You are a closed system. The neighbor does not enter your mind, right? Any number between 1 and 20. How many of you thought of 15? Raise your hands. Synchronous events! Spiritual miracle or pure randomness?
Listener: Randomness.
Questioner: No.
Acharya Prsahant: I’m on your side. I assert this is a spiritual miracle. Get up, all of you. You are all cousins of the previous birth. Meet and greet each other. Come on, embrace. What?
Questioner: Sir actually, while this talk is going on, every time I was getting, actually I’m talking about myself only, this has been happening with me since last three years. And in between this talk also, every time I got a message or call, it was like 1919, 1818. And my battery is 22. So this kind of thing happens with me very frequently, which means it’s very frequent, but I am not able to get…
Acharya Prashant: All right, let’s take this example itself, right? How long did this talk last? More than two hours already is. Right?
In a space of two hours, there’s obviously going to be a range that the battery is going to show in terms of the remaining charge. You said it said 22. It wasn’t 22. It was 36 till 15. The range is large. The ego is choosing to remember only 22.
Let’s say we started at 6 p.m. At 6 p.m. it was 36% charged. Let’s say we close at 8:40. At 8:40 it is 15% charged. But what’s the number I am choosing to remember? 22. So there is no paranormal event happening out there. Something in here (mind) has some stake in believing and asserting that some miraculous power is at work.
Plus, statistics is a beautiful thing. When you say during this talk the messages you received and the kind of numbers you engaged with, they had a pattern. That is entirely possible, right? And I admit that. But what about the numbers that you experienced that had no pattern? Why are you being choosy, selective? Please tell me.
As you sit here, right? Messages come, and so many things have numerical markers, and a lot of them are displaying patterns. And the ones that are displaying patterns, you’re choosing to pick up and quote. But what about all the ones that are not displaying any pattern? Don’t you see that we are intentionally discarding the data? Don’t you see that the selection of the data itself is deliberate and intentional? Do you see this?
Cars that have 13 as the last two digits on their registration plate meet a lot of accidents. 13 is an evil number. They actually do. Cars that have 13 as the last two digits on their number plate meet a lot of accidents. They actually do. I can code data, 4,886 accidents. What you’re not asking is: how many accidents for the cars with 12 and 14 as the last digits? And it turns out exactly the same, or even more.
So what am I doing? I’m intentionally picking up data to support my prejudice. This is not honest statistics. Do you see this? This is a logical fallacy. If you are pre-decided, you can code data to prove and support almost anything. Come up with your prejudice, just show me what you believe in, and I’ll show you how to arrange data in support of your belief. Show me any prejudice, and data can be arranged to support your belief, anything.
Don’t you see all these reels that are out there to prove that women can’t drive? Don’t you see? So it’ll start with saying, “Papa ki pari got a scooty,” and then we’ll show how she rams it into a wall or does something very funny or stupid, right? And those videos are not fakes. Probably they are real videos. So they have proven the point, have they? What is it that they are not showing? How the other gender is driving. How the other gender is driving.
So you come up with a belief, and data can be arranged to support it. Great data can be arranged to support any belief. But that would not pass the test of statistical rigor. A professor in statistics will reject that data. We have done that much stats, right?
First of all, you start sometimes with a hypothesis. You set up a confidence limit, and then you proceed with the calculations, and then finally you say whether or not the hypothesis stands validated or rejected. So there is a process, there is science, there is logic.
Where’s your phone? What number does it show right now?
Questioner: Sir, these are the things.
Acharya Prashant: I stand by you. These things have happened. What I’m saying is: you must also register the other things. You are cherry-picking.
Questioner: No, no, sir. Actually, I am confused. So I want to answer myself, actually. Why is this happening?
Acharya Prashant: Nothing is happening. This is pure randomness.
Questioner: Because I never knew such a thing actually existed.
Acharya Prashant: But nothing is existing.
Questioner: Since a day when I woke up at 3:33 exactly, and the same pattern goes on and on.
Acharya Prashant: Time is a human construct. In some other time zone, it would not be 3:33.
Questioner: Okay, that’s good. But then actually I want to convince, if this is delusional for me, then I want to get out from this.
Acharya Prashant: Obviously. Where were you when you woke up that night?
Questioner: This was Guru Purnima.
Acharya Prashant: That’s right. That was the day. The place?
Questioner: My home.
Acharya Prashant: Which city?
Questioner: Ajutney.
Acharya Prashant: Longitude?
Questioner: What longitude? I don’t know.
Acharya Prashant: Longitude has something to do with time. 3:33 is IST, and that’s not Bhubaneswar.
It was not even 3:33, just some fellow who randomly decided many, many, many decades back that Indian Standard Time will be decided by a particular longitude at 82.5° east. That’s why it is 3:33. Otherwise, it could be anything else.
Questioner: Then why is it me?
Acharya Prashant: It was 3:33 for everybody in India. It was not only you who woke up at 3:33. At least 20% of this country’s population was awake at that time. You are not alone. We are 150 crore people. 20% is a lot. You have company.
Questioner: Okay. Then what about the places? The names of the places randomly pop up. So if number is something, then what about the places and certain signs? Actually, I am confused because these are so randomly happening with me.
Acharya Prashant: Why are you trying to remain confused?
Questioner: No, no. I want to get out of it, but the thing is that now I will go, then a certain car will come up, like 44. What is happening with me now? I am confused.
Acharya Prashant: Definitely, some car with a number ending in 44 will come up. But how many cars in total come up?
Questioner: Someday though, it will come up around 15.
Acharya Prashant: Then it’s just one car that’s stalking you. You can’t have so many 444 cars in Bhubaneswar.
Questioner: No, no. Now 444, then 222, then 111, then 369, those kinds of things. Like, what’s happening? I actually want to know.
Acharya Prashant: All I can say is that the stalker is fun-loving, and he has a love for natural numbers.
Questioner: Then, like a few months back, I actually went to Bangalore. Before that, I kept on saying Bangalore, Bangalore, Bangalore. I was like, why is this happening? Because this place I never wanted to go, but somehow or the other, accidentally I landed in that place. Like, what is this? I am not able to get why these are the things. And now I’m studying there.
Acharya Prashant: What’s the time on your watch? Look into your watch.
Questioner: 45.
Acharya Prashant: Is there a pattern?
Questioner: 45, No.
Acharya Prashant: No, so whenever you will, without bias, just randomly pick data, you’ll find nothing.
Questioner: No, no. Here only I got.
Acharya Prashant: No, here only, just now we conducted an experiment. Okay, come here.
How many people are sitting in this row?
Questioner: Five.
Acharya Prashant: Any pattern? Nothing.
Questioner: They are not related to me.
Acharya Prashant: How are they not related to you? They are present in the same hall as you.
See, unless you are looking for something special, particular, all you will find is random numbers. How many letters in this? Show me a pattern. No pattern.
There is no pattern anywhere unless I impose my mind on reality. The pattern is not there. The pattern is here (mind), and I am superimposing on something.
And that’s not particular to her. We do it all the time. When you are young, you superimpose sexiness on girls. They are not sexy, but your mind has already decided there has to be somebody in my life. So whoever you can find becomes sexy. That’s how we operate.
One fellow in my hostel used to say, we were a batch of 350, only 13 girls in the batch, he used to say, “I have fallen in love since one year, only waiting for the girl. I am already decided I’ll have an affair, just waiting for the girl.”
Will I care for the data? No. I’ll say the affair is 50% settled, 100% from my side. Will I care for the Truth, the reality? No. Because I am already determined.
Why am I already determined? Because there is some self-interest at stake. And that’s what you need to figure out. Not where the pattern is coming from, but what exactly are you defending within. What belief are you trying to protect, and what do you have at stake there? That’s what you need to find out. Otherwise, there is no pattern anywhere.
Let’s figure out. Any particular row where you find people wearing only green.
Questioner: Green is not my life purpose.
Acharya Prashant: Tell me a color.
Questioner: Here it is green.
Acharya Prashant: No, row. Any particular row? See, again you are confusing. Any particular row where anybody is wearing, even that is statistically possible. Even that is possible, but even that won’t happen because the probability is low.
Questioner: That is not the purpose of my life, maybe.
Acharya Prashant: How is 1144 the purpose of your life?
Questioner: Maybe it is showing where I should go. I don’t know.
Acharya Prashant: Why don’t you try to figure out why you are trying to defend this thesis?
Questioner: No. No. I’m not defending.
Acharya Prashant: You’re defending it. 1144, some random car you see that becomes the purpose of your life. Are you a car dealer?
Questioner: No, no. Sir, you are the first person actually I can ask someone.
Acharya Prashant: Yes, you’re asking me, and to the best of my ability, I’m giving an honest answer.
Questioner: So I am actually completely grasping what you are saying.
Acharya Prashant: Please understand the philosophy.
The universe does not care for any human being. The universe is a very, very neutral place and a very random place. We are all products of randomness.
Do you get this? The universe is not going to have any specific intention towards a specific individual. All that we are experiencing is episodes and events of random distribution. That’s all.
And you are trying to superimpose intentionality on something that is inherently random, and this is absurd. No order specific to a human being exists there. If order exists there, it is in relation to the total. The universe has nothing specific for any human being. Nothing at all. Even if the entire population of all species collapses, it does not matter at all to the universe. The universe continues as it is.
Why do you think the universe is playing games with you? Are you so important? No. So let’s have some humility and close it.
Questioner: Okay. Thank you.
