Have you ever wondered how your strong sense of purpose in life originated?

I would venture to say that you probably do not spend much time thinking about your life’s purpose no less where it originated from, especially if you are not a reflective person in search of finding your calling.

But, if we are alike in the ways we see our world through self-reflection, you might be aware that your sense of purpose may come in a flash of insight when you least expect it, like what Carl Jung proposed as his theory of synchronicity and meaningful coincidences. This is what recently happened to me.

Three Circumstances that Set Me Up for Life

Since the focus of our conversation here is about lessons I learned from the sea during my childhood and beyond, I am going to share with you three recent coincidences I had where I  found my anchor that connected the dots for me to better realize my life’s purpose and personal transformation.

This occurred when I participated in a project, along with other authors, to promote my award-winning book, Wrestling Through Adversity: Empowering Children, Teens, and Young Adults to Win in Life.

My assignment  was to participate in the free virtual Beach-Bound Book Bash known to us as the BBBB that occurred on June 6, 2026, where book lovers were invited to join fun activities and win prizes to get set up for their summer reading.

We authors were instructed to wear “beachy” attire to get in the Zone, so I donned a straw hat and a beach coverup and displayed my boogie board during my 10-minute presentation I was allotted.

However, for the life of me, I couldn’t conjure up the words to say that related my author’s story of how I was inspired to write my book and how it connected me with the ocean, that is, until I recalled the lived experiences I enjoyed at the beach when I was a youngster and beyond.

My Deep Connection with the Ocean

Since I grew up living in a small beach community on the Rockaway Peninsula in Queens, NYC, I learned at an early age that “Life’s a beach,” which meant to me that I could cool off during the day when there was no air conditioning at home, go swimming, ride the waves, and build sandcastles in the sunshine, while soaking up some Vitamin D.

However, as I reflect back upon those times now, I realize that the term about life and the beach had a different meaning as I matured in that I learned lessons about living and dying at the beach even as a child, when people drowned because of the strong riptides and when the lifeguards’ resuscitation efforts failed.

Four Miscarriages and a New Direction

Another lesson I later learned about the cycles of the tides was when I had four miscarriages after trying to have a family. At this time, an MD told me that I, as a habitual aborter, would never have my baby to hold in my arms, so he offered me a prescription to take a toxic drug, DES, to prevent miscarriage, even though he knew it caused cancer in women and her offspring.

Fortunately, I did not take the drug but went on to understand the spiritual meaning of “fertility consciousness,” began to meditate, use self-hypnosis, and supplement my nutriments and diet. As a consequence of wrestling through adversity and becoming  emotionally resilient, I subsequently gave birth to four healthy babies, which also gave me a purpose in life on my journey as a mother, but it was not without challenges.

To understand what occurred back then, fast forward from my childhood days to when I  was a stay-at-home mom and would sometimes feel a sense of longing but did not understand what it meant. In other words, I was at a loss as to what to do beyond Monday Morning Blues when the family’s laundry was piled up from the floor to my hips, the children were at school, and my husband was at his engineering job.

My Reason for Being

At this time, during this personal transformation, I recall feeling somewhat guilty about acting like a complaining primary caregiver without gratitude for all I had, but sometimes I was overwhelmed and screamed out in desperation in my laundry room: “Is there more to my life than this? Please, Lord, tell me. Does my life have purpose beyond household chores?”

These desperate moments continued until I had a clarifying insight that I had spoken about during my BBBB presentation. At this time, I was a young mother, raising four children, and awoke in the middle of the night from a dream in which I was told that I had a mission in life beyond caring for my family. From the depths of my dream, I recall now how I sat straight up in my bed and told my husband: “Jeff, wake up. The ocean is calling me.”

Since my husband grew up in a landlocked borough of the Bronx, he could not relate to my oceanic message of how I learned that I had a strong purpose in life during REM sleep, especially since I admitted I did not yet understand what it was. So, in his grogginess, he replied: “Christine, can’t we talk about what the ocean is telling you in the morning because I’m tired, and I have to get up early for work?”

After this enlightenment, there were at least two other clarifying experiences that directed me towards my life’s purpose and were spoken about during my 10-minute BBBB presentation.

A Call-to-Action

One was about how I got in the Zone with self-hypnosis during dental work after being told I could not have any more anesthesia to dull the pain. There in the dental chair I had a vision that I was graduating from Columbia University with a doctoral degree in my hand.

My version of supplemental numbing as a hypno-coach surprised my dentist, but four years later I graduated with honors and accomplished my goal, using the Mindful Toughness ®skillsets I teach to assist clients how to use their own innate Mind Power.

Another moment I had described in my BBBB presentation related to a visit to the Outer Banks in North Carolina when I was walking along the shoreline—hand-in-hand with my husband in ankle-deep water—during a storm and was swept out to sea by a riptide.

I thought I was drowning and that I was going to die.

At this time, I felt the presence of an angel over my right shoulder and said: “I can’t die now because I have to fulfill a promise to my father I made to him on his death bed that I would be a writer and author in his stead because he never got the chance. Immediately afterwards, a professor who was reading The Count of Monte Crisco on a beach lounge chair nearby heard my screams, came into the water, extended his hand, and saved me.

As he dragged me out of the sea, I looked like a human sandcastle, but I knew that it was my dad—a youth athletic director, sailor, and lover of the sea—telling me in spirit that it was time to write my book about my life’s work as a coach, which I completed a year later and published.

It might seem to you that all these coincidences were unrelated and came about by happenstance during a project about a book bash that culminated in not only learning more about my life’s purpose earlier but helped me to compartmentalize the experiences and make sense of them within 10 short minutes of speaking during my presentation.

Finding Purpose Through Synchronicity and Meaningful Coincidences

I believe that if these coincidences had not occurred in the correct sequence as they did and at the right time, or if I had not pursued them, the opportunity to learn and grow might have passed unnoticed.

For example, if I did not have an insightful dream about my sense of purpose, I may not have become a peak performance coach or have started my entrepreneurship at The Summit Center for Ideal Performance some years later. If I did not have the experience of overcoming childhood trauma at the dental office by going into the Zone, I might not have attended Columbia University or graduated with a doctorate. Coincidentally, if I had not experienced in reality the near drowning during a storm, I may never have written my book to tell my story.

Pay Attention to the Tides of Wisdom

Carl Jung  believed that one should pay close attention to meaningful moments like these to bring important material of the unconscious mind to attention.

Looking back, I now realize that purpose rarely arrives all at once. It often appears like waves upon the shore—one experience, one insight, one meaningful coincidence at a time. The challenge is not finding purpose. The challenge is paying attention when it arrives.

For me, these fortuitous encounters occurred unexpectedly when I crossed paths with someone or stumbled upon an opportunity exactly when I most needed it, like in my laundry room while washing my family’s soiled clothing.

Perhaps you’ve had such happy accidents, a stroke of good luck, or a simple serendipity in your life, too, but you did not follow through with them and now wish you did because life is too short. For you, I hope you find your anchor by discovering whatever gives you a sense of calm purpose in this chaotic world.