Serendipity is a verb (The Creativity Explorer. Episode 162)

“Hi, we have never met. We are connected on LinkedIn, but I do not know how. I am in Stockholm, would you like to meet?”

So read a LinkedIn message from Niki Ernst to me a few days ago.

I, of course, said “Yes!” and invited him, and his partner Laura, to my island.

Niki is a speaker on change who lives in Austria and San Francisco, but he works across the globe. He is also deeply involved in the TEDx community. We had a lovely conversation about a broad range of topics.

After an hour I ask him: “Why are you in Stockholm?” He replied that he was here to deliver a speech for a client from Germany. When I heard the name of the company I started to laugh – turns out that was a speaking gig I had lost to another speaker when we were just two speakers left on the shortlist. That other speaker was Niki!

I was sitting across the table from the guy who beat me to a speech in my home town… ;-D

That was a funny incident, but what I cherish from our meeting was the curious and broad conversations we had. Turns out we had a lot of things in common (not just the same clients).

Had I not replied to that message, we would not have met on my island. It might look like a chance encounter that we meet, but we both took action.

Serendipity is a verb.

What do you need to do in your life to make some “happy and unexpected event” happen?