When Serendipity Goes Awry

Photo Credit: Courtney Stephens

I wasn’t intending to do a “sequel” to last week’s post on The Magic of Serendipity, but something happened just a few days ago that made me realize that just as there are positive instances of serendipity, there’s a more sinister side too.

I promise there’s still positivity to be had and this piece will not be a downer, but the only way I know how to deal with this is to write about it. In doing so, I hope it will help you or someone you know at the same time.

When I worked for a decade in digital health start-ups, most colleague announcements that came out were about weddings or babies. It’s still true when I work with these companies in my current role managing digital health partnerships.

It’s just the nature of these fast-paced, high-intensity workplaces. I was fortunate in that even being “beyond having babies age”, I thrived in such dynamic environments as everyone saw, and I was welcomed.

In my current company, while people in all stages of life work there, it is definitely skewed to more older adults than digital health world, so the announcements tend to be retirement or losses of colleagues.

Out of the couple of thousand associates, I know relatively few because my work is not part of the main mission of the organization. While there is some collaboration, it’s mostly working with external people. So whether it’s retirement or a loss, it’s typically not something I personally connect with.

An email with the subject line “Sad News”, with the body obviously templated in an HR-approved way for Managers, is never a good thing, but you can’t help but look to see who is the unfortunate colleague.

This time it was different.

It was Marilyn Jones (name changed for privacy).

OMG, I know her. And she’s five years younger than I am.

Marilyn and I were volunteers working together on a vendor evaluation project. We’d do a video call together every few weeks with some email dialogue in-between over the course of a year.

She was personable so I learned a bit about her. Marilyn even opened up to me some in these conversations about her mission to improve her health including losing a lot of weight. I was always supportive and encouraging. I guess that’s the Coach in me that naturally comes out. Others tend to feel comfortable talking about such things even when that’s not the objective.

This made the loss announcement so much more puzzling. Her health had moved in a much more positive direction. If anything, she should have been adding years to her life through her actions.

In a company where even after three plus years, I don’t know many people, what are the odds that I would get to know this person enough to be shaken up by this news?

Serendipity can be cruel.

The “Sad News” email naturally was carefully crafted to avoid any details, but I just had to know more somehow. Her not being with us at this stage of her life made zero sense to me.

Her real name was fairly unusual, and I knew which state she lived in, so I did some internet sleuthing.

It didn’t take long to learn the chilling news that Marilyn was the unfortunate victim of “negative” serendipity. She was lost in a head-on crash with another vehicle when the other driver went over the single lane road divider line. Of course, the other driver only suffered minor injuries. The cause of the accident is still under investigation, but the authorities did say both were wearing seat belts.

A healthier Marilyn was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

My mind then started racing with other inquiries.

Was this a usual route for her?

Was the weather bad?

Was the other driver impaired or distracted in any way?

Could this have been avoided somehow?

Why her? Why now?

It wasn’t long being on this freight train of thought that a bad case of deja vu hit me.

Back in the late ‘90s when I was living in Orange County, CA, one time in the middle of the night, my husband heard a loud bang sound that woke him up. Back then, we would sometimes sleep with the window open in our top floor apartment bedroom to let the cool night air in since it was very safe and quiet in the newly developing area we lived in. I was away visiting my parents in Florida that night.

In the local news the next day, there was indeed mention of a car crash on the main road a few blocks away. A couple of occupants of the four in one car were lost after being t-boned by another car.

I knew this person too. My hairstylist Lisa (real name, it was a long time ago).

She was in her early 30’s and had also lost a bunch of weight to improve her health not long before I had moved to the area and became her customer.

Lisa was full of life. She was incredibly proud of her weight loss and being able to show off her new figure.

She was now a plaque on a decorative sculpture located at the intersection where the accident happened. Today, it’s heavily covered in ivy, but if you know where to look, it’s still there last I checked.

Another healthier person in a wrong place, wrong time situation.

I remember thinking what a waste. She went through all that effort to lose weight and get healthier and it didn’t ultimately matter.

Her mother, who owned the hair salon, hung up a large full body picture of a smiling Lisa rocking a skinny dress on the wall as an ongoing celebration of her.

I found it tough to look at it. That feeling stayed with me a long time.

Serendipity extending a middle finger.

Photo Credit: Arndt-Peter Bergfeld

There’s an early stage in one of the coaching psychology models where on the continuum of behavior change, someone doesn’t believe they have any health issues that need to change.

This is exactly the kind of person who would hear about the two situations I shared above when serendipity went awry and say “see, there’s no point to eating healthy and exercising or quitting smoking. You could get run over by a bus tomorrow.”

I know. I’ve had these conversations in forced coaching situations when I worked for large health insurers. They’re typically brought about by a well-meaning employer who added a requirement to their corporate wellness program that annual biometrics screenings must include a conversation with a Health Coach. Even worse was when someone had to have five forced coaching sessions on tobacco cessation so their health insurance premiums didn’t increase.

There’s nothing like hearing at the start of the call “Well, I’m here because they said I had to talk to you or you’re going to raise my health insurance.”

Such people were not ready or willing to make healthy changes, which is the first essential ingredient to any successful attempt at behavior change.

In fairness though, it is moments like Marilyn’s or Lisa’s that can allow that seed of doubt to creep in even for those of us who are determined a healthy path is the way.

I know despite all the healthy changes I’ve made and sustained, that still came to the surface for me, a Nationally Board-Certified Health and Wellness Coach. In fact, it’s happening right in the middle of securing the last continuing education credits I need to renew that professional designation next month for the third time since I was among the first in the U.S. to earn it.

The old me might’ve crunched away my anxious feelings on a big bag of Ruffles® Cheddar & Sour Cream Potato Chips, Party Size.

The me I am today says, like the bridge in the classic Isley Brothers song Shout, covered by any number of our local Chicago bands, now waaaaait a minute…

That’s not going to bring Marilyn back.

Like all of us, serendipity is not excluded from having a dark side.

Ultimately, knowing both positive and negative serendipity exist, we have to decide whether we want to dwell on the dark side like Darth Vader, or focus on the good side, like Luke Skywalker.

So how do I answer my own inner doubter about is a healthy path worth it when you can be gone in an instant? How do I help others resolve this ambivalence as well?

For me, from a practical standpoint, I feel it comes down to this.

No one truly knows what tomorrow brings.

I know I’ve personally been created with some less than stellar genetic material, but I’ve chosen to do everything I can to control my future health destiny.

All other things being equal, eventually my health will play a pretty big role in my ultimate longevity.

Besides, with my approach to healthy living, I never deprive myself of anything, and things like movement have become second nature like brushing my teeth, so it’s pretty easy to stay on that healthy path.

Of course, I’m not perfect. I could use going to bed a little earlier on what I call “school nights.” There’s almost always something you can work on to support your own cause.

Why not assume you’ll get to play a big part in determining your fate and try?

Wishing you maximum health and happiness always!

This piece is in memory of “Marilyn” and Lisa.

P.S. Have you ever doubted whether starting or maintaining a healthy lifestyle was worth it? How do you maintain belief in your healthy path when something causes you to question it?

Please comment. I’m very interested in how others keep themselves choosing things to support their health when doubt creeps in.

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