A Little Comment on Serendipity

My active bloggage these days is over on Nomadness, as that's the new boat project; this one is becoming a catch-all for random commentary that might be a bit more enduring than those ephemeral snippets on my live page that, after a few days online, are whisked off to the bit bucket the moment new ones arrive.

A friend was remarking recently about the increasing number of "small world" moments in her life as she pursues ever more interesting projects -- wondering aloud if this is merely random chance or if there are larger forces at work. I had so much fun responding that I thought I'd share the essence of it here:

I've seen this phenomenon in the hard-core geek culture (or "hackers," in the classic sense of folks who get pleasure from circumventing limitations, not in the bad-guy sense of destroying things). There is a relatively small percentage of the population that is out there on the creative asymptote, pushing envelopes and inventing things, and once you start to mingle with any part of it, you quickly make connections across what may seem to be an insanely diverse range of specialties. If you are yourself a specialist, you may never notice the "small world" phenomenon in this context, but if you are working on complex systems like geeky boats... where one high profile project includes embedded microprocessors, advanced ultra-light composites, satellite communication, solar power, navigation, sealed low-friction mechanical linkages, tricky problems involving wheels, and countless other interesting things... then your movement within creative circles and the fallout of friends-of-friends will inevitably trigger a variety of startling full-circle moments. It's not really about probability in the context of billions of people on the planet; it's about the rarefied world of people who are actively being creative instead of toiling away (however competently) at a defined task... or just crank-turning and consuming.

There's another delightful effect, and this is my answer to people who observe, in a sort of breathless New-Age way, that we were meant to meet. I see no reason to believe that there's a "universe" watching out for us and setting up connections, although when you look back at your life in retrospect it often seems a bit too perfect that you met so-and-so at such-and-such a time, without which some major life-defining event would have never occurred. But we should give ourselves more credit. As we wander through the years making choices and dealing with the results, we presumably amass some useful level of wisdom which will help us refine those choices in the future: wasting less time, optimizing return on investment, recognizing love, and maximizing the probability of growth. Every day there are countless little choices... Do I smile back at this stranger? Do I take a moment to write a more thoughtful email than I would normally compose in response to this question? Do I spend a bit more time researching this puzzle to which I haven't yet found a satisfying answer?

Over time, we learn the little behavioral cues -- the signs that someone has skills and insights of value, the "spark" of consciousness in the eyes of a potential friend, the twinkle of humor that reveals a deep shared context without which context-switches would make no sense, the subtle glow between the lines of email that reveals much more than the bare lexical content. If we pay attention to these things, even subconsciously, they pay off thus: we end up spending time with brilliant and wonderful people whom we were meant to meet!

-Steve