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My grandfather is in bad health and he is at a stage mentally where he wants to speak his peace to old relatives. One of his requests for me was to find where his Grandmother is buried in Chicago. Using google I was able to locate her cemetery and a picture of the headstone but not the actual location of her grave
So, I set out on a trip to the cemetery in the middle of Chicago's North side to locate her grave with my girlfriend. The office is non existent except for calling some place up in Evanston. After about 10 minutes of staring into rows upon rows of graves armed only with a picture of the headstone my girlfriend became a little bit discouraged that we would ever be able to locate it. "Come on Marie, give us a sign!" she pleaded, calling out to my great great grandmother to help us locate her grave.
Not a minute after her plea we came to a fork in the road. Unsure of what direction to take my girlfriend asked me which way we should go. I opted to go left in order to follow the outskirt of the cemetery since that would be easier to map later if we needed to revisit a second time for another search. Just as we were about to embark on a trip down the left side of the fork I spotted a coyote walking across the road to the right of the fork. The coyote was a good 100 yards away but it was clearly unusual since this cemetery is in the middle of Chicago's north side where any sort of large wildlife is RARE. The coyote walked across the road and sat down. He stared at me as he sat and as quickly as he came he got up and slowly walked away as if we were of no interest to him.
I'm not religious at all but something told me this was the sign my girlfriend was pleading for. I opted to go right instead of left at the fork and follow the direction of the coyote. Sure enough, as we approached the part of the road the coyote walked across I noticed the grave. It was in the EXACT spot the coyote sat down to look back at me. It was such a cool experience that gave me goosebumps immediately.
Have any of you had any surreal experiences like this that you can share? Trying to keep this unrelated to religion since these experiences are more spiritual in nature.
I'm pushing 50 and have traveled widely on a couple of continents.
I have experienced my share of things I would call "super-real" in that they aren't readily explainable. Maybe "preternatural" would be a better way for me to think of them.
Not bothering to go into specific stories, but I mention this because I often think theists look at nonbelievers and think "Well you don't believe in anything!"
To me, just because I don't default to the belief in gods doesn't mean I believe the sum total of existence and reality is only what we can experience with our regular senses.
I have no problem accepting that there are probably all manner of things about existence, reality, ourselves, the universe, other dimensions, and so on, and so on, that we have no conception of, and which no religion or science will ever be aware of or be able to explain.
One day I want to check my electric meter, and it real all ones (1-1-1-1-1-1). Surely a sign from the gods, right?
The surreal experience was not simply seeing a coyote in a cemetery. It was seeing a coyote in a cemetery in Chicago where coyotes are virtually non existant AND seeing said coyote sit right in front of the grave we were searching for. Thanks for the unnecessary comment and no I don't think it was GOD telling me something since I said in my post I am non believer.
I'm pushing 50 and have traveled widely on a couple of continents.
I have experienced my share of things I would call "super-real" in that they aren't readily explainable. Maybe "preternatural" would be a better way for me to think of them.
Not bothering to go into specific stories, but I mention this because I often think theists look at nonbelievers and think "Well you don't believe in anything!"
To me, just because I don't default to the belief in gods doesn't mean I believe the sum total of existence and reality is only what we can experience with our regular senses.
I have no problem accepting that there are probably all manner of things about existence, reality, ourselves, the universe, other dimensions, and so on, and so on, that we have no conception of, and which no religion or science will ever be aware of or be able to explain.
Good points. As a non-believer myself I agree that there must be a reality separate of our own. Surely there is an answer but it's beyond our understanding of our existence in this universe.
Good points. As a non-believer myself I agree that there must be a reality separate of our own. Surely there is an answer but it's beyond our understanding of our existence in this universe.
I agree. I just do not automatically resort to: "Well, I am not sure. Nobody else seems to be either. Therefore, The Bible must be right!"
The surreal experience was not simply seeing a coyote in a cemetery. It was seeing a coyote in a cemetery in Chicago where coyotes are virtually non existant AND seeing said coyote sit right in front of the grave we were searching for. Thanks for the unnecessary comment and no I don't think it was GOD telling me something since I said in my post I am non believer.
Improbable things happen.
Every day you have thousands of experiences. Over your lifetime, you will experience millions of events. 99.9999% of said events will be mundane. But given the millions of experiences you will have over the course of your lifetime, it's virtually certain that you will experience the highly improbable a few times in your life.
I agree. I just do not automatically resort to: "Well, I am not sure. Nobody else seems to be either. Therefore, The Bible must be right!"
Totally agree. If the bible were simply about a god who created the universe and oversees his creation I would be more likely to believe. Since there was some guy named Jesus, a bunch about heaven and hell, and a virgin mary thrown in they lost me...
Every day you have thousands of experiences. Over your lifetime, you will experience millions of events. 99.9999% of said events will be mundane. But given the millions of experiences you will have over the course of your lifetime, it's virtually certain that you will experience the highly improbable a few times in your life.
Exactly, which is what this thread is about. So I am looking for people to share in those experiences since they are so surreal and odd.
Coyote is Trickster in many of the First Nations myths.
You had a neat experience. Saviour it.
My father in law was a big B S er and gave all his friends native names. After weeks of thinking of one for him one of them at the bar told him he was Walking Eagle because he was too full of sh*t to fly. On my 3 hour drive to his farm to attend his funeral there was a Golden Eagle walking on the snow in the ditch on the last big curve to the farm. It was a special moment for me and I was alone except for my dog. Special and unexplained moments do happen and as was mentioned above those are the moments one notices and remembers. There were lots of corners on that trip that I do not remember but that one obvious I always will, it was over twenty years ago.
I love coyotes, they are so neat of an animal. Little wonder they appear in many Native stories.
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