What is spiritual connection?

We've all heard it: when you call someone and they tell you “I was just thinking of you!”, “your ears were burning”, “you were in my dream last night”, etc. There are seemingly odd coincidences of simultaneous, mutual remembrance. It's eerie, like we can call out to each other without speaking to one another but solely through thought or feeling.

Is there something there? Is it pure imagination? Is it just a desire to keep some sense of magic or mysticism alive in a world increasingly devoted to scientism?

I've described myself to my sister as an spiritual man living in an atheist's body. I am skeptical by nature, deeply critical of broad and vague claims that seek to explain or hand-wave reality at the expense of clarity or specificity. While psychologically useful at times, phrases like “it was meant to be” or “God had something else in mind” can grate at me. Was it meant to be because it was the consequence of an infinite sequence of variables, some of which were in my own control and in the control of others with responsibility? Do we know what God really has in mind? (spoiler alert, we have no idea).

At the same time, it's hard for me to deny a sense of magic behind certain connections or coincidences. Sometimes people call you at just the right time, sometimes the right opportunity comes your way when you need it. Sometimes it does just work out. I cringe a little at my own vagueness, succumbing to the very axioms I feel critical of, living the plight of a mild hypocrite. But it rings true regardless, at if just to a small extent.

If there is an ineffable, untraceable connection between us... what is it?

The best analogue I've found for these seemingly inexplicable connective coincidences is that of mycelia. Mushrooms are powerful organisms — and deceptive at the sight. We only see the mushroom, the fruiting body of an entire network of mycelia that comprise a much more sophisticated entity.

Are we like mushrooms? Are we similarly the fruiting bodies of a spiritual network that connects us?

I wonder if there is an invisible, spiritual network that connects us (no, not the internet). Maybe there are indeed ways for us to send messages to each other through this network. Or perhaps we can only do so unconsciously.

At the very least, we may be able to better attune ourselves to receiving messages from the network.