Dr. Williams offers an original theory of the nature of meaningful coincidences and their practical uses from a non-supernatural point of view. This topic is on the cutting edge of the heated battle between spirituality and science. The findings are the outgrowth of my forty five year investigation, both as a professional observer of some of his synchronicity prone psychoanalytic patients as well as his own intimate experiences with these intellectually challenging and emotionally powerful occurrences. Rather than viewing these perplexing events as coded "messages" from some transcendent realm of "spiritual" reality, he concludes that meaningful coincidences are the surface manifestations of an individuals" unique creative process, accommodating the "best" available resolution of a problem for a person initially feeling "stuck" in a seemingly intractable dilemma.
Gibbs A. Williams. Ph.D. is a psychoanalyst practicing in New York. His choice of profession is an outgrowth of three major interests - philosophy, depth psychology, and spirituality. He received a B.A. from Columbia University, majoring in philosophy; an M.S. in psychology from Yeshiva University; and a Ph.D. in vocational rehabilitation counseling from New York University. His dissertation topic studied the relationship among male heroin addicts, selected treatment programs, and ego weakness. He continued his involvement with addiction, working with a number of New York substance abuse programs. He was the assistant director of Odyssey House, a therapeutic community. His duties included planning, developing, and coordinating therapy; participating in overall policy decisions and patient evaluations; administering and interpreting psychological tests; leading and supervising individual, group, and marathon therapy sessions; giving lectures and conducting educational seminars; participating in, coordinating, and leading family and marital therapy groups; organizing and administering a group home (``the pressure cooker``) for thirty addicts. Other substance abuse programs included Samaritan Village (formerly known as The Samaritan Half-Way Society) as well as the female program run by the New York State Narcotics Control Commission. He was the primary care consultant for The Lowell Institute, an outpatient program for substance abusers (drugs and alcohol). He received a certificate in psychoanalytic psychotherapy from The Greenwich Institute in 1980 and went on to become an instructor and supervisor in the same institute. The courses he taught there included Ego Strength/Ego Weakness; Ego Psychology; and Transference/ Countertransference. He taught a course on crisis intervention to incoming interns for ten years. He is militantly opposed to the ``quick fix mentality`` in our nation. That mentality that tends to believe that normal feelings like anxiety and depression are to be suppressed or dismissed entirely, instead of translating their messages for personal well being. Gibbs is passionate in his conviction that significant change is possible, but it takes persistent hard work and a willingness to struggle with struggle.