Coincidence Vs Connection

Have you ever had a dream that coincided with something another person said or did unbeknownst to you? How do you believe it happened and for what reason, if any?

Last night, I dreamed that I pointed out a bob cat on the road to a friend. She asked me if it was unusual for the cats to have long tails...this one's tail was much longer than it should have been. I told her I'd have to check my field guide. I mentioned the dream off-handedly to her to this morning. To our mutual surprise, she said that she'd watched a program on the big cats of North America that evening and had learned about the differences between bob cats, lynxes, pumas, etc. -- included tail lengths. I hadn't watched the program and was unaware that it had been on TV.

In thinking this over, 5 possible explanations came to mind why this might have happened:
1) Pure coincidence
2) Modelling plus coincidence: We both love animals and are interested in dreaming, so only the timing of the dream is unusual
3) Symbolic dreaming plus coincidence: The dream images represent something my mind is trying to communicate to me; the timing was coincidental
4) A mind connection of some sort that isn't currently measurable by science, but might be in the future
5) A spiritual or "beyond dreaming" event

So, what you think?

I'd say 1 or 2 or 3. I don't believe in the supernatural, but coincidences have to occur occasionally, no matter how strange they seem, and I think the subconscious mind works in ways that we don't understand. I'm still waiting for that one true supernatural event to prove me wrong, so if it ever happens, let me know....

I want to say 4, because I like to believe that there's more to this world than what can be measured scientifically. Also, because I've had similar things happen to me, and pure coincidence just doesn't seem like the "right" explanation to me. I guess we'll never know for sure, but that's my feeling about it anyway.

Another possibility:
You subliminally picked up on the TV show somehow. Perhaps heard bits and pieces of it as background noise, perhaps heard bits of conversation about it, perhaps even only caught a fragment of it from a commercial as background noise. Afterwards, your mind incorporated it into a dream.

Thanks for the feedback, everyone! This was an interesting experience in that it really made me examine my own reactions and thought processes that followed. I'm still mulling things over, but it was one of the stranger things that have happened to me.

I agree that coincidence and happenstance are just a part of life. Things will happen for no apparent reason. It's generally a good policy to approach things from a rational/logical perspective and explain what one can within the framework of generally accepted scientific fact and theory. However, there is much we don't know in regards to the ways our brains and consciousness works and I'm willing to keep an open mind. But I do think there's a limit to what our individual experiences can teach us since we are each a single point of consciousness located in a particular place, body, culture, and time.

Tsen, that's a good point. It's possible that I was aware of program subconsciously, at some level.

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Originally Posted by EagleEye

But I do think there's a limit to what our individual experiences can teach us since we are each a single point of consciousness located in a particular place, body, culture, and time.
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Quite true. I wonder what would happen to me if I ever did have something happen that I had no explanation for other than something "supernatural". I don't know if I would except it or explain it away somehow. Probably the latter, altho I know there is an infinite amount that I don't know.

I thought about what Tsen said as a possibility too; that could potentially happen without you realizing it.