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You've probably heard of the ‘butterfly effect’ from the 2004 American sci-fi movie featuring young Ashton Kutcher. But the term stems from the branch of math called chaos theory and is actually associated with mathematician and meteorologist Edward Lorenz.
According to Lorenz, a tornado could be influenced by minor perturbations and a tiny change in the initial conditions would create a significantly different outcome. His ideas quickly spread among philosophers and mathematicians, but today, the whole concept of the butterfly effect is often used to describe a situation when a small change causes great consequences.
Like the decisions we make in life. So this time, we’re diving deep into real-life stories of the “butterfly effect” shared by people in this Reddit thread. Some of them are truly unbelievable, but hey, truth is stranger than fiction.
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
TL;DR: I over-drafted and caused four marriages and five babies.
Longer version, I was just out of high school and new in town with no job. I was living off what savings I had left and my account went below zero without me knowing. I was overdraft charged like 10 times and owed $300+. I went down to the bank spoke with a teller and she ended up being a lifesaver. She worked with me and got all the charges removed. On top of getting the charges removed, we got to talking about my situation and she said that her son worked at a local restaurant and she would help me get a job. She was a woman of her word and by the end of the week I was working full time. Fast forward, I meet a cool dude who worked there, we became friends, I introduced him to my sister, they fell in love, got married and had two kids. His best friend came into town for the wedding and I introduced him to my roommate at the time, they fell in love, got married and had two babies. I also got my best friend a job at the restaurant where he met a girl working there, they feel in love, got married and had a kid. Right before I left I got my roommate a job at the restaurant, where he met a customer, fell in love, got married and had a kid.
As a bonus, my best friend, who I helped get the job repaid the favor and got me a job at a different restaurant, where I met a girl, fell in love and got married.
#2
I was walking to school and got distracted by a hedgehog that ran in a bush next to me then a big ass tree branch fell infront of me, would've crushed me if I didn't get distracted by a spikey little mouse scurrying in the bushes. I gave him a dead cricket the next day, he took it and ran off. God speed spikey mouse.
To find out more about this incredible phenomenon, Bored Panda reached out to Helen Marlo, a licensed clinical psychologist and Jungian psychoanalyst who provides psychotherapy, psychoanalysis, and consultation. Helen is also a Professor of Clinical Psychology and the Department Chair at Notre Dame de Namur University.
“At its core, the 'butterfly effect' describes a phenomenon of interconnection between people and our larger world,” she explained and added that “This phenomenon has been expressed poetically by Walt Whitman in 'Song of Myself' when he describes the natural, inherent interconnectedness across space and time between individuals and the world.”
“Whitman writes:
I celebrate myself,
And what I assume, you shall assume
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
Walt Whitman (1959, p. 25)”
#3
My teacher encouraged me to enter a poetry competition when I was 17 years old. I only entered because there was a cash prize, but I ended up winning and getting my poem published. Well, a couple of months later, I got a Facebook message from a girl who wanted to know more about my poem because she had to analyze it for her upcoming exam. It turned out that we were about the same age, so we decided to meet up and discuss it. We've been together for four years and are getting married next month. I often wonder what my life would look like if my teacher hadn't approached me back then.
#4
When my dad was 20, he needed to find someone's phone number, so he called the operator from a pay phone and she gave him the number. He hung up, and she accidentally refunded the money back to the pay phone. She called the pay phone back and asked him if he could put the money back in, which he did and hung up again. She accidentally refunded the money a third time and had to call back again to ask him to put the money back in...he did and hung up.
She was so flustered, she refunded the money AGAIN and called back AGAIN and, since it was such a funny situation, my father got to chatting with her and got HER number. They set up a date, got coffee, and — four years later — were married.
This coming August, it'll be 50 years for them.
If my dad didn't need that original phone number, I wouldn't be here. My dad still calls it 'The most expensive phone call he ever made.
#5
When I was in eighth grade, I had a really long bus ride home, so I would pass the time by reading. One day, I faced the very serious situation of having nothing to read and only a minute to grab something in the library. For whatever reason, I grabbed a book on astronomy. That book was amazing and grabbed me like nothing else had before. I remember being so excited to realize every astronomer on Earth was 13 years old once too, and that was a career you could actually do, even if you were from Pittsburgh!
Anyway, today I am a professional astronomer who studies gigantic space explosions for a living. There was a lot of work to get from that moment to this one, but I’m always grateful that I picked up that library book!
Helen continued that similarly, this phenomenon has also been described, psychologically, by psychoanalyst Carl Jung. “His concept of 'synchronicity,' which he defines as an 'acausal connecting principle,' involves the simultaneous occurrence of two meaningfully but not causally connected events,” she explained. So ‘butterfly effect’ is not only referred to in mathematics or philosophy, it also has a significance in psychoanalysis.
#6
My parents dream was to have a 'famous child.' When my older sister's figure skating career ended in her early twenties, the spotlight shifted to me. I was a fine oboist, and took private voice lessons with the intent to audition for the local music faculty. In any case, there was a lot of pressure and, while I was successful at school and with classical music, it was never enough.
At 17 — before senior year began — my sister gifted me a kitten. My parents had given her two in her senior year and the implication was that it was my turn. When my sister dropped me off at their house, my parents locked me out, saying that if 'I wanted my own pet, I needed my own place.' So I found one that night. I worked three jobs to support myself through my senior year and graduated with entrance scholarships to both of the local universities.
Still, I couldn't afford a music degree while living on my own, even with the entrance scholarships. It was a good thing. Entering the work force showed me how much I love active jobs. Three years later, I enrolled in college and became an industrial mechanic/millwright, to my parents great shame.
After a few years of this I landed a sweet contract where I work on Saturdays and Sundays, but receive a full week's pay. Although I am a living beacon of disappointment, I comfort myself with my 100k a year job, two day workweek, and two cats. So, basically, kicked out over a kitten saved me from wasting years chasing an improbable career just to please my parents
#7
My mother and her five siblings were deported to Auschwitz in May of 1944. Soon after their arrival, my mother was placed into a line of people assigned to 'take showers' after their long trip. My mother was 13 years old and very frightened, so she held her mother's hand. Well, a Nazi soldier happened to spot this, and he ordered my mother into a different line, thinking it would be funny to separate her from her mother and make her cry. My grandmother was gassed to death about 15 minutes later, but my mother had been put in the line for the work camp. She worked in that camp until the Russians liberated Auschwitz in 1945, then moved to Romania, where she met the man who would become my father
SentimentAndBadJokes 3 years ago
Honestly, that's such a horrible thing. Auschwitz was a terrible place that had to business in existing, and that solider who thought it was funny to seperate two loved ones he was about to murder was a sick, sick person. What a terrible place and event. I find it hard to even call the mother 'lucky'.
#8
I was going out to grab pizza and a case of beer for me and my roommate but he texted me that he had a stomach thing so I walked to a restaurant and ordered dinner at the bar and met a girl there and now we are married and have two kids because my roommate had diarrhea
The psychoanalyst also said that in the butterfly effect, these meaningful interconnections happen with such frequency and often trigger reflection. “I have found it valuable to work with them, as other sources of reflection, guidance and meaning, in my psychotherapy practice,” she said.
Helen even coined the term, “Synchronicity-Informed Psychotherapy,” “to describe treatment that is informed by these kinds of phenomena.”
#9
My mom made me sign up for French in high school since I already spoke Spanish. I didn't really care about the language, but I became friends with a girl in that class. Later that year, she became sick with cancer, and she passed away the following year. Well, I had become close with her family, and they told me that French was her favorite subject and that it was her dream to study abroad. Her parents asked if we — her friends from French class — would do that on her behalf.... I was the only one who worked towards it, and I finally spent a semester there during my third year of college. I had always enjoyed French, but it wasn't a passion until something shifted that semester. So I came home, finished my undergrad degree, got my masters in French, then moved back to France. It's been 11 years since my friend died, and three years since I've lived here, and the whole time it's been clear to me that she's been with me on this journey.
#10
My girlfriend and I were on a road trip on the West Coast, and we had planned to spend a night in Las Vegas, go to Zion the next day for some hiking, and then spend another night in Vegas. Well, when we woke up for our Zion trip, we discovered that our hotel's coffee machine had broken down, so we had to go to a nearby McDonald's to get some coffee to go. When we got there, however, they told us they had run out of milk, so we let our GPS direct us to another one around the corner. Well, we arrived to find that one was permanently closed... The third McDonald's we tried to find only existed on the map. So, we nervously arrived at the fourth and final McDonald's and agreed that if we can't get coffee there, we'll stop wasting time and just go to Zion. They did have coffee and milk, but after we got to our car, we realized our order was wrong. We replaced it and laughed the whole thing off, and headed to Zion late. Well, we got back to Las Vegas just before 10 p.m. and started getting ready to go to the Harvest County Music Festival on the strip. We knew we were late, but thought we'd go anyway. But we were stopped at our hotel exit by a policeman telling us to remain in our room. There had been a shooting there, and if not for wasting all that time in the morning trying to get coffee, we would have made it to the festival in time. 58 people were shot dead that night at the festival. If not for McDonald's, it could've been 60
beastmachine. 3 years ago
This probably is the only good thing that happened due to broken mcd machines
#11
I had to renew the sticker on my license plate a couple of years ago and really didn't feel like sitting in the waiting room by myself forever, so I told my mom I'd take her out to dinner after if she came with me. The guy working at the counter turned out to be my mom's long-lost biological brother. If she hadn't come with me, I would have never known
Moreover, “Psychotherapy is a process where two people mutually constellate the unconscious. It is a unique dialect between two psyches where patient and therapist develop a meaningful exchange guided by their conscious and unconscious mind.” Such an exchange may include experiences from synchronicities or the “butterfly effect,” Helen concluded.
#12
Pregnant cousin usually takes the bus at around 5:10pm after work. She was about to hop inside the bus but she needed to pee really badly and the commute is about an hour long so she decided to go to the restroom instead and just catch the next bus. That 5:10 bus ended up falling from a cliff.
Lauren Caswell 3 years ago
Oh hell, may those poor ppl rest in peace and their families find solace :(
#13
So a few years back, I lived in Nice (South of France) for a while. As a musician, I would make a bit of extra cash busking, and one day, I figured I'd go and busk at the Promenade des Anglais by the sea. It's usually packed, but a generally pleasant place to be. I set up, played a couple of songs and was doing pretty well and making a decent amount of money. Then, suddenly, not one, but two of my guitar strings snapped (I even remember I was playing 'The Scientist' at the time).
I was massively gutted and decided to cut my losses early. I stormed off home (by the station) in a bit of a sulk at having to re-string my guitar and cutting short what was essentially one of my most productive days of busking since moving there. Literally one hour later, my phone starts to blow up with family and friends freaking out and asking if I was at the promenade.
It was Bastille Day, 2016. The truck drove into the same crowd I was playing to, killing 86 people, including my at-the-time gf's uncle. I had two other friends who were among the 458 injured. I moved home the next month because it was too much, and haven't been back since.
It's hard to explain, sometimes I think I was super lucky, sometimes I just kind of cry and wonder why I was lucky and others weren't. It's surreal, and despite what people think...it's a truly horrible feeling
#14
had to call my heart surgeon to give him my new insurance number, which was delayed by a bit because I was waiting on the insurance lady to call, but she had the flu. When I finally called, the receptionist said, 'Oh hey, we just had a cancellation for this Friday! Do you want it?' Of course I wanted to get it over with and not wait another full month, so I decided to take the open heart surgery cancellation appointment. Well, my surgeon said thank goodness I did because — once he got a look inside — he realized I would not have survived to the original appointment date.
So, if the insurance lady didn't have the flu, I would have gotten those numbers sooner, called at a different time, and probably never have gotten the offer to have the surgery when I did.
Someone else's flu saved my life
#15
I had been looking for direction, and went out for Chinese food one day. In my fortune cookie was a fortune that said, 'To teach is to learn twice.' I thought hard about it, and it led me to apply for a job at a local school as an ESL instructor. Well, two years later, there was an earthquake in Taiwan which caused many English teachers to leave. The school I was working for asked if anyone was interested in replacing those teachers at its sister school — I signed up, got a promotion there, then a wife, dog, son, and daughter. All because I like Chinese food
#16
Four years ago a kid I barely knew from school invited me to a Six Flags. I was a bit of a loner at the time and I heard rumors about this kid being 'weird,' so I intended not to go but, on the day he wanted me to go, I was extra bored and decided on a whim, 'Why not?' So I met up with this kid and two of his friends.
It's been four years and that 'kid' is my best friend, and I have three other very close friends I met through him. Not only that, but I also met my first ever girlfriend because of the connections some of my new friends had. It transformed my high school years from being lonely to having an amazing group of friends I could do almost anything with.
I intend to ask him to be my best man one day, and I don’t intend on ever falling out of touch with any of them. I’m home from college now, and we are still having a lot of fun together. Going to Six Flags was still the best decision I ever made
Devil's Advocate 3 years ago
He was probably labelled "weird" by the same people who labelled you "weird" and made you "a loner" so hopefully you also learnt an important life lesson about believing the prattling of fools
#17
My grandfather, then a toddler, woke in a night during WWII, and moved to his parents bed.
His room was a short while later decimated by a German bomb.
#18
High school, I didnt get into the AP history class wanted. Changed up my schedule, including a different gym class, without everyone I knew. I was heartbroken. I really wanted to teach, and without an AP class senior year, I was screwed.
Made a new friend in gym class, who was wearing a volunteer firefighter shirt. He had just joined. Seemed interesting, and he invited me to check it out.
They paid for me to get my EMT. Fell in love with healthcare.
Fast forward quite a while, and I'm an ER Nurse and 'precept' students and new nurses, teaching them how to survive in the ER. I also do public outreach and injury prevention. And I love it. Glad I missed out on my class.
Pernille Dyre 3 years ago (edited)
That i can relate to. My parents were teachers... I would never ever become a teacher, i swore. Long story short. I became a midwife and my strong side is/was teaching: students of all kind, pregnant women, sick pregnant women, fathers-to-be, women in labor ... And I didn't find out my self! The doctors told me.... do you know your patients release them self when you leave???? I became a teacher and I love it ❤❤❤
#19
My mother wore heels to work and slipped on the carpeted steps, resulting in a broken high heel and a broken leg. While she was home recovering, she somehow developed allergies that led to her needing an inhaler*.
The inhaler* interfered with her birth control and now I have a brother 13 years younger than me.
#20
When my now-husband was 18, he found out that his mom's side of the family was Spanish, not Mexican. He found this interesting, so he changed his country to 'Spain' on MySpace, instead of the US, which is where he really was.
Meanwhile, in Australia, I was helping my friend find Spanish people to add as friends, since she was learning the language. I came across my now-husband's profile and decided to send him a friend request as well. We got along really well and met in person after three years. We have now been together 11 years, married for seven. If he didn’t change his country to Spain (which he only did for a day or so) we’d never have known each other existed.
#21
At the end of 6th grade, my class took a field trip on a whale watch. That night, I saw a commercial for a documentary TV series on whales. Ever since that day, I wanted to grow up and protect whales from being hunted. Today I work in the military specializing in Marine Preservation.
Mary Rose Kent 3 years ago
I would like to suggest you go on YouTube and find a relatively short (15~ minutes) clip called Saving Valentina
#22
My desire for pizza set off a chain reaction that destroyed my family:
One day, I got home from school and really wanted pizza. My family was poor, so spontaneous food trips weren't always in the cards. I really worked my pouty face on my mom, and begged to go to the local pizza place for dinner. She actually went with it, so we went. While chilling there, I saw my uncle walk by, and I said, 'Uncle [insert name], is that you?!' Now, you might be thinking, 'He just wanted pizza, what's the big deal?'
WELL, he lived several states away, so to arbitrarily be in town and not tell anyone was strange.
Turned out he was having an affair with his sister-in-law (my aunt on the other side of the family). One thing led to another and now everyone hates each other, and we haven't had contact in like 20 years.
I just wanted some pizza
Cecilia Herrera 3 years ago
It's not the Pizza craving that is at fault. It was your sleazy uncle and aunt that were to blame.
#23
A few years ago, I was on the phone with my boss as I was getting home. We were discussing what we needed to get done the next day when he asked, 'What the eff is that noise?!' I said it'd make more sense to just show him, so I took a video of me opening the door and feeding my (very loud) farm cats.
He wanted me to show the video to other people, but I realized I didn't like anyone crowding me awkwardly looking at my phone to show the video, so I uploaded it to YouTube. The next morning, I went to show someone on the computer, and noticed it was up to 11 views, which I found odd.
Then, it went viral.
Thousands of views per hour. I was getting constant calls and emails about buying the video rights and just asking for permission to use it. It took off again in the pandemic time and has been a nice little source of income when things have been rough.
All because I didn't like holding my phone to show people a 30 second video."
Katie Lutesinger 3 years ago
I think this might be it! Boy, they really are noisy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EYZnSXEla0
#24
I procrastinated one day in high school by watching a foreign musical on youtube. I ended up trying to learn the lyrics and eventually the language. That led me to discovering the field of linguistics, which I'm now majoring in. I don't know what I'd be doing now had I actually started doing my homework that day instead.
#25
Had a surprising and rough breakup and decided to treat myself to a vacation somewhere I'd always wanted to go. Well, I loved it there more than I expected, and six months later, I emigrated there.
#26
The wife and I were having dinner in Hawaii one night on vacation. As we were getting up to leave, I noticed she hadn’t finished her beer. I told her she should finish the beer since we paid some ridiculous price for it. Fast forward 30 seconds and we leave the restaurant and are walking the 3 blocks back to the hotel. About 50 feet in front of us as we’re walking (were walking down the sidewalk on the left side of the road), a car comes flying out of a side street from the right and crosses through the street, hops the sidewalk in front of us, and smashes into a wall. If she didn’t finish her beer, we would have been smoked by the car and most likely squished between the car and the wall. We always finish our beer now.
#27
I was going to carpool with my aunt to go to a family gathering. At the last minute, I decided to go by myself instead so that I could leave early if I wanted.
On the way there, my aunt drove off the road into a ditch. She was okay, but the passenger side of her car — where I likely would've been sitting — was totally smashed in
Skulduggery Pheasant 3 years ago
My Dad knew someone who never, ever missed school. One day, the boy was ill, and couldn’t come in. On that same day, the school bus hit something ( Idk what), and his seat’s window shattered, covering his seat with glass. If he had been there, he would’ve been cut pretty badly. No one else was hurt.
#28
Back in the 80s, my mom studied abroad in England. A couple days before her flight back home to the US, she got too homesick to wait any longer and spontaneously bought a ticket home early. The flight she was originally supposed to take was Pan Am flight 103, where all 243 passengers and 16 crew died. If not for her homesickness, her and my dad would not have met and my brother and I would not have been in existence.
Jo Johannsen 3 years ago
I worked with a sweet woman whose daughter was a flight attendant on that flight.
#29
The other day, I was driving home from work. Traffic was light and I was behind a car with a license plate that started 'KFD.' It made me hungry, so I decided to duck through the KFC drive-thru for chippies with extra salt as a little treat to myself!
They took forever to bring them out and by the time they finally did (all told, about 10 minutes later), traffic had slowed to a complete halt.
I needed to get over a bridge that's normally six lanes, which had now been reduced to one. Turns out, it was due to a massive collision involving several cars. When I finally got to the point where I was driving past the accident, I noticed the license on one of the cars...it's the KFD plate.
If I hadn't stopped to get hot chips, I'm fairly sure I'd have been in a major collision. KFC chippies with extra salt saved my life.
Cecilia Herrera 3 years ago
It's not every day that you hear about fast food saving someone's life.
#30
I'm alive because my aunt was born.
My grandfather was conscripted into the Romanian army as a medic, and his unit was one of the many acting as a defensive barrier, covering the Nazi supply lines to Stalingrad. She was born, and he was called back to Bucharest from the front. While he was on leave, the Russians launched Operation Uranus, which decimated the axis forces. He recieved word that his unit had been completely destroyed. He was never reassigned, and in 1948, my mother was born.
I'm also alive because a bunch of Romanian cows got sick. My other grandfather was a pharmacist, back when that meant actually making medicines, he was also a Jew. The town he lived in was largely agrarian, and their cow herds came down with some illness that was killing them. He whipped something up that cured them. The townspeople were very grateful to him. So grateful that when the chief of police heard that the Nazis were coming to town to take inventory of who lived there, he came to my grandfather's house with some train tickets for him and his wife. They escaped the Nazis, and never got caught. My father was born at the end of 1945.
I guess this is the opposite of the butterfly effect, really. Rather than one small action blowing up into a much more important chain of events, two hugely improbable events are eventually lead to my birth(and obviously my extended family as well)... and now, I run ads on the internet.
#31
My wife got an email from her old colleagues the day we returned home from our honeymoon, asking if she wanted to star in a short film they were doing for fun. She said 'sure,' and asked if I wanted to come along, as she knew I had an interest in movies.
At the time, I worked in life insurance and was miserable, and filmmaking was more than an interest — I had always wanted to make films, but never made the right connections with people and didn’t know where to start.
I made friends with the producer of that short film my wife was in and, 11 years later, filmmaking and video production is my career. I’ve shot feature films, short films, video for TV and web all over the world because of that one email to my wife. Changed our lives!
#32
I chose to rearrange my sequence of classes slightly before starting my education. By doing this, I had to commute to a different branch of the school in a different town than the one I was originally signed up for.
On my first day there, I helped a girl who had, somehow, managed to break both of her arms in a drunken shopping cart accident. This girl, whom I would absolutely never have met had I not changed my classes around, is my wife of 14 years
Mary Rose Kent 3 years ago
Breaking both arms is crazy bad—I worked with someone who broke both of hers because she was trying to improve her balance on a balance board and fell off.
#33
I was Very little and singing a song completely with made up words. My mom asked what it was, and I said Evelynese (my name is Evelyn). Then a year later I made up a fake country for that fake language (Evelyninis). Then I started making up some stories. Now it’s a little over a decade later, I’m in high school, and I have a whole fictional world with three political superpowers (that I won’t name for personal reasons, but just know Evelyninis has a better name now). This world has a very intricate map of ecosystems (and soon, political borders of various eras), five distinct cultural and ethnic groups so far, and some unique flora and fauna. Former Evelyninis specifically has twenty families of nobility, two hundred thirty seven common families, a religion, a specific type of domesticated big cat, the bones of a conlang, two epics in the works (the first being adapted from older stories I made up), and much more. I’m probably going to work on this until the day I die. All because toddler me wanted to throw some snark at my mom.
#34
Got arrested for growing weed, moved back home. Got first job I could at Ikea. After working there for over a year, randomly decided to check Craigslist for jobs and saw an opening at a cafe and they were hiring right then, so instinctively went for it.
The cafe was connected and owned by one of the most popular brewpubs/beer gardens in the area. They hired me to host there, quickly worked my way up the ranks to eventually bar manager. Met girl of my dreams, we are now married with 2 amazing kids. Opened two more restaurants with them and currently assistant director of operations, overseeing three restaurants @ 3, 5, and 8 million a year in sales!
Love my job, love my family, love my life. No idea what I'd be doing if I never got arrested, or never applied for the cafe job.
#35
Someone I know once had a flight planned to Spain. He ended up missing it because he was like one minute late. The plane ended up crashing... one minute literally saved his life
~hUmMuS vIbEs~ 3 years ago
Here's a morbid thought: you never save a person's life, you only delay their death.
#36
I sent a friend from secondary school (who I had a huge crush on) a message just saying, 'Happy Birthday!' a couple years after we all left school. I did the whole 'We'll have to catch up soon!' thing, not expecting much.
He replied, 'How about Monday?' So I saw him that Monday for a coffee.
Next month is our six year anniversary.
It's truly the best thing that ever happened to me, and my friends joke that I'm the queen of escaping the friendzone.
Vanta Black 3 years ago
Dude probably had feelings himself, but needed some extra courage. Which hopefully wasn't Dutch.
#37
Getting my ears pierced the day after I graduated high school got me where I am today.
I worked at McDonald’s at the time and was scheduled to work that night. Before my shift, my girlfriend at the time convinced me to get my ears pierced. Well, when I showed up to my shift with these clear ear studs in, my manager gave me an option. Either take them out, or go home. Being only 17 and not taking anything seriously, I went home.
On my way home, I called that girlfriend’s dad, and asked if I could work with him laying tile. He gave me a chance, and I quit McDonald’s that day. Worked with him for about a year until the 08’/09’ recession caused us to run out of work. I got laid off.
4 months later, I land a job in a new hospital doing admitting in the emergency room. Did that for 2 years before I got my phlebotomy certification. Been doing that for a few years and now I’m in my final semester of nursing school.
I attribute everything I’ve done to that day my ex girlfriend pressured me into getting my ears pierced. Who knows how long I would have stayed at McDonald’s.
#38
I decided to try weed in high school. I met a dude through my weed connections, and we became roommates. My roommate talked me into trying World of Warcraft. I met a girl through WoW. Years later, I dated her. A year after that, I moved states and married her. We have kids now.
So, basically, my children are a direct result of weed.
#39
If my former roommate wasn't an alcoholic going thru withdrawal and had to be hospitalized, we'd have had enough money for rent. Then, I wouldn't have moved home. If I hadn't decided, while looking for a new job in my hometown, that it would be nice to have insurance, I'd have got another restaurant job instead of a manufacturing job. If I hadn't started that manufacturing job, I'd have never met a co-worker who was quitting for a much better job. Then, I wouldn't have also applied for a job with that company that was still hiring. I still work here 8 years later and hope to retire from here. It has its sh*tty days (or weeks), but the benefits are amazing and I'm making more than most college graduates.
LivingTheDream 3 years ago
uh.... this is not the butterfly effect. this is just how normal life works.
#40
In grad school I said f it and submitted a conference proposal the night before the deadline. Long story short, I basically have my job, my city, and my wife as a direct result of that decision.
What do you think ?
tuzdayschild 3 years ago
When my friends daughters were very young (2 and 3 yo) they caught colds. They were in their room crying and whining because they didn't feel good and would not go to sleep. My friend put them both in her bed so they would sleep. A storm came in overnight and blew a massive tree down which came through the roof and smashed into the girl's bedroom absolutely destroying their beds. Any other night, they would have been in those beds.
Big Blue Cat 3 years ago
My grandfather was shot by Russian soldier during the war. He was wounded and things were grim, they were surrounded. No way they could have carried him to safety. Until one of the soldiers tripped to a wooden sledge , under the snow in the middle of a forest. They were able to sneak out of there, pulling gramps in the sledge. I wouldn’t have born, neither my brother or our dad and his siblings, if not that old sledge.
Devil's Advocate 3 years ago (edited)
These are mostly examples of serendipity, an under-used word as it is, without calling it "butterfly effect". Or maybe an ancestor watching over people in some stories
Sky Render 3 years ago
Responding to a random e-mail from someone I didn't know because they wrote it in a very amusing tone led me down a path that resulted in the completion of a fan translation of a video game, my writing 3 novels, my fiance and I hooking up, and my recovering my true self from 30 years of repression. And yes, the author of that e-mail was in fact my fiance. She really has helped me make all of my dreams come true!
Jace 3 years ago
I got through ¼ to ⅓ of this list and gave up because all it’s doing for me is making me think of how my own examples of butterfly effect only lead on a path from “life was pretty okay” to “my life is absolutely miserable”. I already do that on my own without people’s happy tales of chance leading to happy outcomes (and probably survivorship bias) being presented as entertainment for me to distract myself when I’m too depressed to do anything productive (because what’s the goddamned point). I’m glad for these people having happy stories and neat little “imagine if” hypotheticals, but I got to age 45 with nothing but repeat lessons that no matter what I tried to do to live well, THIS is where I ended up. Yeah I’m ranting. “Learned helplessness” sucks. It’s not bad character; it’s repeated bad outcomes. My intellectual self knows better, but today my emotional self is driving.
Paige Hyney 3 years ago
Between my junior & senior year of college I was offered a job in NYC for the summer. I had decided to take a trip into the city prior to my first day to get aquatinted with the subway system. I ended up getting lost in a very bad part of the city and called my mom crying. She told me to quit my new job & move up to Cape Cod for the summer with my best friend from high school. 2 days after being there with her we went out to a local bar and she introduced me to a guy she met at her new job. Two weeks after meeting him, I told my best friend that I was going to spend the rest of my life with him. Fast forward, 8 years later. I remind him every day that I'm always right. We got married a month ago, own our home here on the Cape, and have a house full of fur babies we love so very much. Never thought getting lost on a subway would land me in my very own fairytale.
Seedy Vine 3 years ago (edited)
Because my boss stole money from my purse, I missed getting hit by a car that flew through a red light and crashed. Instead of walking across the street at that point, I was in a payphone talking to police about the theft.
Leo Domitrix 3 years ago
Whatever you call it, just glad people didn't end up in worse places...
cheers, cassidy 3 years ago
i had plans to go to france with my family one winter. we would go to london, and then take a train to france. unfortunately, two nights before we left, my sister got incredibly sick, so we missed the trip. we later found out that the train we were supposed to go on caught fire.
Sean Harrison 3 years ago
I don't think any of these people know what the butterfly effect is. Same thing happens when people (incorrectly) try to use Occam's Razor.
Samantha Becker 3 years ago
After high school, I was working in a grocery store, no way to pay for college, so I decided I'd check out the Air Force. I called the number in the phone book, but it was listed incorrectly and ended up being the Army recruiter, so I joined the Army (planning is not my strong suit). I chose my job because the school was in California and I'd always wanted to go. My roommate in school promised to take our new neighbor to the mall one day, but asked me to do it because she found something better to do. Five months later, I married the neighbor; we'll celebrate 25 years in January thanks to a wrong number.
Ann Morrissey 3 years ago
My father was in the army in basic training. His unit was scheduled to do a 20 mile walk on a rainy day. My dad noticed a few of the guys were not going. He found out they were going to take a test to qualify for medical school. My dad sneaked in and took the test and got a top score. He went to med school. Most of the guys in his unit were killed in one of the early battles in world war II. My dad went on the become a gastroenterologist and one of the pioneers of endoscopy. He taught dozens of other doctors how to do endoscopy. I went to medical school and may have changed the course of a few people's lives when I found early cancers that were cured. Now my son is finishing his training to become a doctor.
Pheolei 3 years ago
My cousin was dating this guy. She was over at his place and I had him on MSN messenger, I message him asking how my cousin was. To my surprise his friend answered we hit it off we were friends for over 9 years then he asked me to be his girlfriend and then sometime later his wife. Messaging on his friend account was super out of character for him but if he didn't we wouldn't be happily married with amazing dogs and a chonky cat.
Carolyn Holt 3 years ago
Let me start by saying I was basically single for 20 yrs while I raised my children. When they became adults, I moved to a town I knew noone in and ended up working my way up to mgr at a fast food restaurant. Now I have had chronic kidney problems for as long as I can remember. Due to a flair up, I was off work and heavily medicated. I normally worked 60+ hrs a week so my free time was usually spent sleeping. So being off work and high as a kite, I decided to scroll Facebook and started talking to a ironworker from Alabama. After a few months of talking, he came to visit me for New Years Eve. 2 months later I moved to Alabama and 3 months later we are married. That was 5 yrs ago. I am now a housewife to a ret. ironworker and our days are spent fishing and doing projects around our home. He's my best friend and the kindest man I have ever met. None of this would have ever happened if I hadnt been high on pain meds and bored. My son and SIL got into the field right b4 I met my hubby.
Hannah Walters 3 years ago
Interesting thank you for sharing . Very unique stories. If your reading this I hope you have a great day and know. “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16 NIV
Auntiecorn 3 years ago
Met a good friend literally on the street. She said "Hi" when I walked by and we talked a bit. I had no idea who she was but the week after, found out she worked with my sister. We soon became very close friends. When it was almost her husbands (now her ex though) birthday, I wanted to get him a gift. Didn't know what to get him though. And knew if I asked her or anyone in the family I would have gotten the answer: you don't need to buy a gift! I knew they both had the same male best friend, decided to look him up back then on Facebook. I had never seen him before, since he lived on the other side of the country. He gave a suggestion, we kept talking after that. And now we are married! Thanks to a random person talking to me on the street, and I myself messaging their best friend whom I only knew from pictures. Before I got to know him I wasn’t really interested. But he’s the best thing that ever happened to me!
Steph Harrison 3 years ago
My partner and I met completely by chance. A few years ago the gaming club I was a member of did a collaboration with a local video game shop to host a mixed tabletop and video gaming evening. My partner's cousin was going and convinced him to go along because they were running a Tekken tournament and my partner had won a national Tekken championship at that point. In between rounds of the tournament, he would pop to a nearby table to do his turn in a tabletop game, which I was also playing. We noticed each other but didn't really talk until a year later when we both went on a group camping trip. We instantly became best friends at a point when we were both in really bad places, and have on multiple occasions acknowledged that if it hadn't been for that gaming event, we wouldn't have met and would be in much worse situations today if we were still here at all. We're getting married next year.
Julie 3 years ago (edited)
This is an amazing series of events. It happened to my good girlfriend's husband before they were married. I will call her Jane and her husband Joe. Joe's family was having a family party when his brother playfully sprayed the sink water hose at one of his nieces, who jumped back in surprise and slipped on the water and fell...which scared the cat who jumped up at the exact same time Joe was entering the kitchen, which made him fall too. While laying on the floor he saw underneath the refrigerator and saw a long lost family heirloom, a gold ring that had been lost for 3 years!!!! He then decided it was fate, and he proposed to Jane that very day, with that very ring. The fallen niece was the flower girl and the cat was the ring bearer. LOL
Annie Anderson 3 years ago
About a year ago, I was severely depressed and anxious. I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to go back to college, but my parents made me get a job before I tried to go back. I had to apply for three a day. I applied for a lot of random restaurant jobs on indeed, as well as other random things. Anything that I could show my parents. (Didn’t want to work.) Found a job working with children, it was one of the only ones I was qualified for. I HATED kids. They were the only 2 people that called me into an interview. After my first choice cancelled the interview, I got the job working with kids. Best therapy I’ve ever had. I loved the kids, loved the job, and decided to go into school to be an occupational therapist for children. Today, my depression is in remission and I am three months clean and sober. I would’ve hated painting cabinets.
Vicky Z 3 years ago (edited)
Few years ago i was suffering from depression and had also a broken heart... i had to do a small routine surgery that kept me in bed for a few days and needed something to occupy myself.... i downloaded an app and started talking with someone... I never liked those apps and did it only cause i was bored and also deleted it a month later! However i kept contact with the person I was talking and ended up in a 7 year relationship....
Kyli Gayle 2 years ago
I have a few, but I think the craziest one would be when I was about 8 years old. I always bugged my mom to let me sit in the passenger seat (cause big kids sit up there). She always told me no and explained why. Well one day on our way back from her job she told me I could sit in front just this once til I got a bit older. I sat in the front all excited, but before we took off, I told her I wanted to get into the back. Idk why but something felt wrong, so I played my game boy in the back seat. 15 minutes later there's a buck thru the windshield who's antlers penetrated the passenger seat. It would've killed me for sure. I always listen to my gut ever since that day.
Jazmin Shepherd 3 years ago
About three years ago I had to move from Shelby Ohio and move to Indiana due to my dad getting a job.Because we move I had to move schools. A couple weeks after I moved I met a guy in band class, apparently we rode the same bus. When I got on the bus that day he said hi to me and introduced me to his friend (I'll just call him k) anyway. Turns out k was also in band and realized I was pretty quiet and thought I was deaf. Which lead to the most embarrassing conversation in my life : "hi" k:"oh I thought you were deaf" "well I just don't like talking to people" "I'm people. You're talking to me" "I don't like talking to normal people" "Wooow thannnnks". I had only released it could be taken offensive afterwords and felt bad. Anyway after that we didn't talk at all. A couple weeks into the next school year he said my name on the bus and asked if I wanted a box of candy that he didn't want I said sure then we started talking. three years later we've been dating for a year
P.A.B. 3 years ago
I was in junior college, getting my art career started, when a lady came into my painting class to announce that there was a job opening for an art instructor at her daughter’s day care facility. It went in one ear and out the other; I wanted to do art, not teach art. After class, my instructor told to me apply for the job and I said ok, never intending to make the call. She knew me well, tho, knew I’d procrastinate, so she insisted I make the call immediately from her office. I went for an interview and got the position. I worked my way up from part-time art teacher to program director and was at that job for 20 years. I’ve been in child care for 35 years now.
Megan Tees 3 years ago
When I was 13, my parents bought a farm, leaving the house I grew up in. I had to attend a new high school that I wouldn’t have gone to if we hadn’t moved. At the high school, I met a guy that I started dating about three years later. We moved in together eventually to place we found because he helped us do inventory at the store I worked at. He met my boss’s boyfriend (also helping out) and that guy knew a guy with a place to rent. We moved in but things went sideways and he moved out a few months later. The guy living downstairs from me had a sister who introduced me to her friend who needed a place to live. I needed a roommate. He moved in. My roommate had a crush on a straight guy and when the straight guy kept being straight, my roommate endeavoured to set us up. Somebody had to be with this beautiful man! Eventually we got married and had two kids. All because my parents bought a farm.
the annoying theatre kid 3 years ago
me and my friend friend in kindergarten had a play date once. basically she had an au pair and i had a nanny. my mom had gotten sick on the day before so she had to catch up on her work then. basically my nanny had to drop me off then and she mets my friends au pir. eventually they started liking each other and nine years later they're married in sweden with a two year old. my friend and i like to joke thag our friendship created life!!
Jarrod Nichols 3 years ago
When the internet first started up, the wife of one of my friends told me to search for a Filipina (she was a filipina), as she said it would fit my personality better and I had had an extraordinarily hard run up till then. I met the most beautiful women I'd ever seen online. We chatted for years, but she wasn't interested in a relationship. I made the joke that when she turned 40 in 13 years, if she wasn't married, I would marry her. We laughed and thought it was funny. We drifted apart, as things happened, and one day, years after I last chatted with her, I happened to check an old email account and she DM me. She told me it was her birthday and she was 40. She joked and asked if I was still going to marry her. To make a long story short. We've been married 6 years now. Just because of a series of unlikely events.
Susan Bosse 3 years ago
I had throat cancer when I was 19. We probably wouldn't have known until it was too late if it weren't for two church ladies who lived in two different states and knew two different people in my life. Coworker told me about a lady he went to Christ with who talked like me (raspy) and had nodules. Told my mom and we thought nothing more about it. Three months later, my aunt tells me the same exact story...lady at church, etc. She lives in another state, three hours away. So I went to the dr. He said I had a polyp, nothing to worry about. On the way to the hospital at 5:30 a.m. for surgery, I told my mom that I'd dreamt I had cancer. Mom said "omg. You don't have cancer," and I said "I know. It was a dream." I now know all of that was God getting me to the doctor and preparing me for having cancer. 33 years remission this past June. Had it not been for those two ladies, I might have a voice box mechanism or I might be dead.
Happy Daihatsu 3 years ago (edited)
These stories reminded me that I only exist because of bacon.
Kym Boyle 3 years ago
One day at Six Flags, my family had just finished lunch. At first, we were planning on riding a roller coaster, but my mom said we should ride something tamer on our full stomachs. Flash forward to after we returned home. We turned on the news, and there was a story of someone falling out of the very roller coaster we decided not to ride.
Stephen Watkins 2 years ago
The best can come from the worst.. Back in 2014 my marriage collapsed along with my world. Fast forward almost a year and I'm doing freelance work for an online media company. A young lady and I get to talking and think maybe there could be something there, problem is we live in two different provinces (I'm in Johannesburg, she's in Cape Town) and I have already accepted a Job running a restaurant in Marseilles and am just about ready to fly out because that is the path my life is going. Anyways I am on the Air France website getting ready to book my flight and I see a random banner ad at the bottom of the screen (the kind you see a thousand times a day and ignore) I glance at it and it says "Everything You Need Is In Cape Town" I look at it, cancel my flight, leave behind everything I've ever known and April 21st was our 7 year Anniversary.
Dick Fletes 2 years ago
I'm pretty sure Butterfly Effect came from Ray Bradbury's 1952 "A sound of thunder" where the guy steps on a butterfly in the past and makes subtle but significant changes to the future.
Jackie Lulu 2 years ago
My friend "E" had a roommate "S" in Naval Nuke school in Idaho. After school, they lost touch. A few years later, E was driving somewhere on the east coast and saw S driving the other way. They stopped, talked, and E invited S to his Halloween party. I was also at the party. 1.5 years later, S and I were married. So, Pandas, is this serendipity, or butterflies? I don't understand the difference.
Adam L 2 years ago
I was shy and never did anything besides work and binge TV shows. My cousin convinced me to join her for karaoke nights at a local bar. I started coming out of my shell because I was meeting new people and having fun. Eventually I received a message from a friend of my older brother, she was on a dart team that needed one more player and my brother suggested me. I joined the team and made friends with them. Eventually the dart captain decided he needed a break for awhile, so I joined a team with that one of the other members started along with a couple others and a few new people. After awhile I had needed a dart night off because I was Co-Den leader with my older brother and his son was receiving a cub scout award. My new dart captain was practically begging me to show up late for darts anyway, so I said fine. I made it to the bar and ended being introduced to a girl that was the best friend of the daughter of 2 of my teammates, and now I'm happily married with a son.
Monica Isnota Robot 2 years ago
When I was 11, I got sick with what my doctor thought was mono. In 3 weeks, I'd lost the ability to eat, drink, use the bathroom myself and couldn't walk. I got my first period ever and everyone thought maybe I was being overly dramatic about my pain. My dad took me to the family Dr a second time without an appointment and the only one there was his med student, locking up to close the office. She took one look at me and said "it's not period cramps! It's her appendix! Go to the ER NOW!" sure enough, my appendix had ruptured and I was septic. I spent a month in the hospital and missed 3 months of school. All because a female med student stayed late at the office. I wouldn't have survived another night.
Victoria Pitt 2 years ago
You can literally backtrack any current situation in your life back to some random thing that if you had done otherwise would have changed the course of your life. Just saying.
Vincent Van Bro 2 years ago
My great-grandfather kept a swiss army knife in his chest pocket, and he was shot in the chest, but that little knife saved him. I’m always in awe whenever my dad tells me about him, he was super cool!
TmKhr 3 years ago
Mine isn't nearly as impressive as most of these here, but: back in September, after being unemployed for about a month, I checked online from a specific website if there was any one-time security guard jobs nearby. There was a hockey game and I applied there for the job (I have the necessary licenses etc.) and got accepted. There I met a fellow security guard who's been in the company for two years now, and after telling her I'd be interested in a job in the same company, she gave me the boss' number, and a couple of days later I called, got into the interview and got the job after the company paid for the proper training, and now I have a full-time job. Would be a different story if I hadn't check that one website back in September :D
leigh arbuckle 3 years ago
when I was 10 we moved from Ontario to Saskatchewan. it was 3 long days. While traveling through northern Ontario, we were behind a tractor trailer who was driving pretty fast for an empty trailer. The roads were winding and his trailer kept crossing the line. My dad decided that we needed to stop for a snack/bathroom break. We pulled into this little cafe and were there probably about 1/2 hour. when we started back our journey, we saw the driver of the transport truck had crossed the line and hit a vehicle killing both the driver and the child in the backseat. My father figured if we hadn't stopped, we would have been in the middle of it
Brandy Grote 3 years ago (edited)
I had minor surgery in early June. Complications led to one ER visit, and med side effects led to ANOTHER ER visit by the end of June. 2nd week of July, I saw my ortho surgeon, and agreed to get the spine fusion I needed because I couldn't get pt and pain shots during Covid, and was bed bound from pain. He said late July. Before I got back to my car, the ofc mgr called saying we could get it done the NEXT WEEK- but I needed tests and xrays! Which had been done in the ER! The tests were normal, and within time limits. I just needed Covid and MRSA tests at the hospital! Got my surgery, already 95% less pain!! Glad I went to the ER, and had the tests, there would gave been no way I could have gotten them in time otherwise!
Kasandra Porter 2 years ago
My son 17 at the time and a bunch of his friends and their friends 28 total, all had tickets to go see The Dark Knight on opening night. That night all but 2 of them had things happen so that they couldn't go, haf to work am extra shift, got grounded, food poisoning etc... The 2 that went were in the second theater that bullets came through the wall and in a row that was just above where a man got hit. It was an unbelievable morning after, trying to contact all those kids and parents to see if they were ok. --- Ialso had a real close friend who lived in NY who had decided to take a personal day and called out of work for the first time in 20+ years. An hour later she watched as the first plane hit the world trade center - where her office was! She had never called out before for no reason and still to this day doesn't know what made her do it THAT day.
Cathy Hurd 2 years ago
The Family Guy's Seth MacFarlane is alive today because of a hangover. He was supposed to have been on one of the 9/11 planes.
that rando_;) 2 years ago
My mother had this friend who was scheduled to be on one of the 9/11 flights. However, his alarm clock didn't go off that morning and he missed the flight.
Patti Vance 2 years ago
my ex was military in the 80s and the housing we were in were like duplexes with tiny little fence "yards" big enough for a clothesline. i had a washer but no dryer so this was fine. one afternoon i was hanging clothes and he started calling me in to see something on tv. i kept telling him to wait but he insisted. i had barely stepped into the house when a car came crashing through the fence. had i kept hanging clothes i would have been history.
Sara 2 years ago (edited)
In elementary school I had a crush on a boy. One time I wrote him a love song.He threw it at me and said he didnt like me. My soul was crushed and I left hin alone. Fast forward to highschool. Everytime I saw him I would avoid him because of shame and rejection.He saw me walking in the opposite direction so he ran towards me and said "hey you wrote me a song in elementary school, I still have it" and he proceeds to show me the letter. He kept it! Anyway we dated for 9 months and we broke up bc my mom was controlling. His next girlfriend "A" lived in a town 30 mins from us. When he broke up with A he moved on to the next. A and I ended up becoming good friends as a result of dating the guy.Fast forward to my 20s. Instagram was super big and I posted A as my woman crush wednesday. She returned the gesture 3 weeks later. That same day a guy was in my DM's spitting some game. A said she dated K in middle school and vouched he was a solid guy. Weve together 8 yrs married 5 with a kid
Bernát Bonda 2 years ago
When I was young(er), I found a very nice Computer game, but my parents limited my online time. So I copied the game, and migrated it To paper base, so I could play it offline. Years later, when I got bored throwing about 30 dices, I decided to create a computer program of my own. And oh now I am a senior Software engineer, just because my parents wanted To protect my eyes.
Patricia 2 years ago
The building on the corner of a crossroads "village" burned down and some boys from a farm up the road came down to sift the ashes for nails. Dad was one of those. Some people wanted to adopt a girl, but her brother wouldn't hear of it and practically kidnapped her and got her a job at a farm the other direction from the corner. She went down to look at the smouldering remains of the building. That was Mother. So, if that building hadn't burned, Mother wouldn't have met Dad, and all of us wouldn't be.
RedFox 3 years ago
I don’t remember how the story goes exactly, so don’t hate on me if it sounds odd.. Right around the 2000’s, my dads best friend invited him to a movie with this girl that he had met (happened to be my moms best friend or something like that) and they wanted to go on a double blind date, in right around two years, my parents met, dated, married, and had my older sister. Four years later, they had me. The only side affect to this is that me and my sister assume that anyone that we even sort of like might be our future husband/wife/married significant other.
Nubmaeme 3 years ago
I was going home from work one day and was about to get on the interstate when I had this overwhelming desire for a soda. I'm not normally a big soda drinker but I had to have one so I pulled into a little convenience store near the on ramp. The car behind me pulled up into my place in line for the ramp. When I came out of the store, there were flashing lights and sirens just up on the interstate. When I finally got up the ramp, I could see what had happened. The car that had taken my place in line was now smashed against a bridge railing by a semi. The people in the car didn't make it.
Ryan O'Carroll 3 years ago
A friend of mine pressured me into coming to a role play club meeting one night. I hadn't been for weeks because I was lazy and not in the mood but he convinced me to turn up and say hi if nothing else. So I turn up and a guy i've never met comes bounding over, jumping up and down like a toddler begging me to play in his game. I thought his behaviour was endearing so agreed. Anyway, we got chatting online figuring out character stuff and got close. I was in a crumbling relationship at the time though, but then that guy kinda imploded our relationship. First, he worked halloween after arranging to spend the night with me. Then he ditched me at a party so I had to walk home alone. I was upset about both these things and turned to my new friend. I bullied him into taking me out for drinks, one thing led to another. We've been married like 12 years now. Amusingly, the ex ended up marrying an aquaintance of my husband and I. No idea how they met. Small world.
A 3 years ago
One day, my mother, brother and myself were planning to go to the beach. However, my brother and I were stalling for time because we wanted to finish some comics we were drawing. When we finally left our house, our close family friend who lived in a different country was deciding to visit us while she was in our country to visit her sister. If my brother and I weren't persisting on finishing our comic drawings, we would have never seen her after around 2 years of no contact (It was 2014 at the time and that was the last time we've seen her in person).
Apollo Starbuck 2 years ago
Most of these stories weren't "butterfly effects". They're a series of coincidences
Kieran N 2 years ago
I decided to apply to a college on a whim at 7 pm the day the apps were due even though I had just spent days working on apps for other schools. Mostly I didn't want to be forced into family time after having spent all of Christmas break working on apps with my mother. Surprise, it was the only one I got fully into for the fall semester without having come off the waitlist to get there. I have all of my friends, a job I'm valued in, and my two cats because of a whim that I went with to avoid family time
tuzdayschild 3 years ago
When my friends daughters were very young (2 and 3 yo) they caught colds. They were in their room crying and whining because they didn't feel good and would not go to sleep. My friend put them both in her bed so they would sleep. A storm came in overnight and blew a massive tree down which came through the roof and smashed into the girl's bedroom absolutely destroying their beds. Any other night, they would have been in those beds.
Big Blue Cat 3 years ago
My grandfather was shot by Russian soldier during the war. He was wounded and things were grim, they were surrounded. No way they could have carried him to safety. Until one of the soldiers tripped to a wooden sledge , under the snow in the middle of a forest. They were able to sneak out of there, pulling gramps in the sledge. I wouldn’t have born, neither my brother or our dad and his siblings, if not that old sledge.
Devil's Advocate 3 years ago (edited)
These are mostly examples of serendipity, an under-used word as it is, without calling it "butterfly effect". Or maybe an ancestor watching over people in some stories
Sky Render 3 years ago
Responding to a random e-mail from someone I didn't know because they wrote it in a very amusing tone led me down a path that resulted in the completion of a fan translation of a video game, my writing 3 novels, my fiance and I hooking up, and my recovering my true self from 30 years of repression. And yes, the author of that e-mail was in fact my fiance. She really has helped me make all of my dreams come true!
Jace 3 years ago
I got through ¼ to ⅓ of this list and gave up because all it’s doing for me is making me think of how my own examples of butterfly effect only lead on a path from “life was pretty okay” to “my life is absolutely miserable”. I already do that on my own without people’s happy tales of chance leading to happy outcomes (and probably survivorship bias) being presented as entertainment for me to distract myself when I’m too depressed to do anything productive (because what’s the goddamned point). I’m glad for these people having happy stories and neat little “imagine if” hypotheticals, but I got to age 45 with nothing but repeat lessons that no matter what I tried to do to live well, THIS is where I ended up. Yeah I’m ranting. “Learned helplessness” sucks. It’s not bad character; it’s repeated bad outcomes. My intellectual self knows better, but today my emotional self is driving.
Paige Hyney 3 years ago
Between my junior & senior year of college I was offered a job in NYC for the summer. I had decided to take a trip into the city prior to my first day to get aquatinted with the subway system. I ended up getting lost in a very bad part of the city and called my mom crying. She told me to quit my new job & move up to Cape Cod for the summer with my best friend from high school. 2 days after being there with her we went out to a local bar and she introduced me to a guy she met at her new job. Two weeks after meeting him, I told my best friend that I was going to spend the rest of my life with him. Fast forward, 8 years later. I remind him every day that I'm always right. We got married a month ago, own our home here on the Cape, and have a house full of fur babies we love so very much. Never thought getting lost on a subway would land me in my very own fairytale.
Seedy Vine 3 years ago (edited)
Because my boss stole money from my purse, I missed getting hit by a car that flew through a red light and crashed. Instead of walking across the street at that point, I was in a payphone talking to police about the theft.
Leo Domitrix 3 years ago
Whatever you call it, just glad people didn't end up in worse places...
cheers, cassidy 3 years ago
i had plans to go to france with my family one winter. we would go to london, and then take a train to france. unfortunately, two nights before we left, my sister got incredibly sick, so we missed the trip. we later found out that the train we were supposed to go on caught fire.
Sean Harrison 3 years ago
I don't think any of these people know what the butterfly effect is. Same thing happens when people (incorrectly) try to use Occam's Razor.
Samantha Becker 3 years ago
After high school, I was working in a grocery store, no way to pay for college, so I decided I'd check out the Air Force. I called the number in the phone book, but it was listed incorrectly and ended up being the Army recruiter, so I joined the Army (planning is not my strong suit). I chose my job because the school was in California and I'd always wanted to go. My roommate in school promised to take our new neighbor to the mall one day, but asked me to do it because she found something better to do. Five months later, I married the neighbor; we'll celebrate 25 years in January thanks to a wrong number.
Ann Morrissey 3 years ago
My father was in the army in basic training. His unit was scheduled to do a 20 mile walk on a rainy day. My dad noticed a few of the guys were not going. He found out they were going to take a test to qualify for medical school. My dad sneaked in and took the test and got a top score. He went to med school. Most of the guys in his unit were killed in one of the early battles in world war II. My dad went on the become a gastroenterologist and one of the pioneers of endoscopy. He taught dozens of other doctors how to do endoscopy. I went to medical school and may have changed the course of a few people's lives when I found early cancers that were cured. Now my son is finishing his training to become a doctor.
Pheolei 3 years ago
My cousin was dating this guy. She was over at his place and I had him on MSN messenger, I message him asking how my cousin was. To my surprise his friend answered we hit it off we were friends for over 9 years then he asked me to be his girlfriend and then sometime later his wife. Messaging on his friend account was super out of character for him but if he didn't we wouldn't be happily married with amazing dogs and a chonky cat.
Carolyn Holt 3 years ago
Let me start by saying I was basically single for 20 yrs while I raised my children. When they became adults, I moved to a town I knew noone in and ended up working my way up to mgr at a fast food restaurant. Now I have had chronic kidney problems for as long as I can remember. Due to a flair up, I was off work and heavily medicated. I normally worked 60+ hrs a week so my free time was usually spent sleeping. So being off work and high as a kite, I decided to scroll Facebook and started talking to a ironworker from Alabama. After a few months of talking, he came to visit me for New Years Eve. 2 months later I moved to Alabama and 3 months later we are married. That was 5 yrs ago. I am now a housewife to a ret. ironworker and our days are spent fishing and doing projects around our home. He's my best friend and the kindest man I have ever met. None of this would have ever happened if I hadnt been high on pain meds and bored. My son and SIL got into the field right b4 I met my hubby.
Hannah Walters 3 years ago
Interesting thank you for sharing . Very unique stories. If your reading this I hope you have a great day and know. “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16 NIV
Auntiecorn 3 years ago
Met a good friend literally on the street. She said "Hi" when I walked by and we talked a bit. I had no idea who she was but the week after, found out she worked with my sister. We soon became very close friends. When it was almost her husbands (now her ex though) birthday, I wanted to get him a gift. Didn't know what to get him though. And knew if I asked her or anyone in the family I would have gotten the answer: you don't need to buy a gift! I knew they both had the same male best friend, decided to look him up back then on Facebook. I had never seen him before, since he lived on the other side of the country. He gave a suggestion, we kept talking after that. And now we are married! Thanks to a random person talking to me on the street, and I myself messaging their best friend whom I only knew from pictures. Before I got to know him I wasn’t really interested. But he’s the best thing that ever happened to me!
Steph Harrison 3 years ago
My partner and I met completely by chance. A few years ago the gaming club I was a member of did a collaboration with a local video game shop to host a mixed tabletop and video gaming evening. My partner's cousin was going and convinced him to go along because they were running a Tekken tournament and my partner had won a national Tekken championship at that point. In between rounds of the tournament, he would pop to a nearby table to do his turn in a tabletop game, which I was also playing. We noticed each other but didn't really talk until a year later when we both went on a group camping trip. We instantly became best friends at a point when we were both in really bad places, and have on multiple occasions acknowledged that if it hadn't been for that gaming event, we wouldn't have met and would be in much worse situations today if we were still here at all. We're getting married next year.
Julie 3 years ago (edited)
This is an amazing series of events. It happened to my good girlfriend's husband before they were married. I will call her Jane and her husband Joe. Joe's family was having a family party when his brother playfully sprayed the sink water hose at one of his nieces, who jumped back in surprise and slipped on the water and fell...which scared the cat who jumped up at the exact same time Joe was entering the kitchen, which made him fall too. While laying on the floor he saw underneath the refrigerator and saw a long lost family heirloom, a gold ring that had been lost for 3 years!!!! He then decided it was fate, and he proposed to Jane that very day, with that very ring. The fallen niece was the flower girl and the cat was the ring bearer. LOL
Annie Anderson 3 years ago
About a year ago, I was severely depressed and anxious. I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to go back to college, but my parents made me get a job before I tried to go back. I had to apply for three a day. I applied for a lot of random restaurant jobs on indeed, as well as other random things. Anything that I could show my parents. (Didn’t want to work.) Found a job working with children, it was one of the only ones I was qualified for. I HATED kids. They were the only 2 people that called me into an interview. After my first choice cancelled the interview, I got the job working with kids. Best therapy I’ve ever had. I loved the kids, loved the job, and decided to go into school to be an occupational therapist for children. Today, my depression is in remission and I am three months clean and sober. I would’ve hated painting cabinets.
Vicky Z 3 years ago (edited)
Few years ago i was suffering from depression and had also a broken heart... i had to do a small routine surgery that kept me in bed for a few days and needed something to occupy myself.... i downloaded an app and started talking with someone... I never liked those apps and did it only cause i was bored and also deleted it a month later! However i kept contact with the person I was talking and ended up in a 7 year relationship....
Kyli Gayle 2 years ago
I have a few, but I think the craziest one would be when I was about 8 years old. I always bugged my mom to let me sit in the passenger seat (cause big kids sit up there). She always told me no and explained why. Well one day on our way back from her job she told me I could sit in front just this once til I got a bit older. I sat in the front all excited, but before we took off, I told her I wanted to get into the back. Idk why but something felt wrong, so I played my game boy in the back seat. 15 minutes later there's a buck thru the windshield who's antlers penetrated the passenger seat. It would've killed me for sure. I always listen to my gut ever since that day.
Jazmin Shepherd 3 years ago
About three years ago I had to move from Shelby Ohio and move to Indiana due to my dad getting a job.Because we move I had to move schools. A couple weeks after I moved I met a guy in band class, apparently we rode the same bus. When I got on the bus that day he said hi to me and introduced me to his friend (I'll just call him k) anyway. Turns out k was also in band and realized I was pretty quiet and thought I was deaf. Which lead to the most embarrassing conversation in my life : "hi" k:"oh I thought you were deaf" "well I just don't like talking to people" "I'm people. You're talking to me" "I don't like talking to normal people" "Wooow thannnnks". I had only released it could be taken offensive afterwords and felt bad. Anyway after that we didn't talk at all. A couple weeks into the next school year he said my name on the bus and asked if I wanted a box of candy that he didn't want I said sure then we started talking. three years later we've been dating for a year
P.A.B. 3 years ago
I was in junior college, getting my art career started, when a lady came into my painting class to announce that there was a job opening for an art instructor at her daughter’s day care facility. It went in one ear and out the other; I wanted to do art, not teach art. After class, my instructor told to me apply for the job and I said ok, never intending to make the call. She knew me well, tho, knew I’d procrastinate, so she insisted I make the call immediately from her office. I went for an interview and got the position. I worked my way up from part-time art teacher to program director and was at that job for 20 years. I’ve been in child care for 35 years now.
Megan Tees 3 years ago
When I was 13, my parents bought a farm, leaving the house I grew up in. I had to attend a new high school that I wouldn’t have gone to if we hadn’t moved. At the high school, I met a guy that I started dating about three years later. We moved in together eventually to place we found because he helped us do inventory at the store I worked at. He met my boss’s boyfriend (also helping out) and that guy knew a guy with a place to rent. We moved in but things went sideways and he moved out a few months later. The guy living downstairs from me had a sister who introduced me to her friend who needed a place to live. I needed a roommate. He moved in. My roommate had a crush on a straight guy and when the straight guy kept being straight, my roommate endeavoured to set us up. Somebody had to be with this beautiful man! Eventually we got married and had two kids. All because my parents bought a farm.
the annoying theatre kid 3 years ago
me and my friend friend in kindergarten had a play date once. basically she had an au pair and i had a nanny. my mom had gotten sick on the day before so she had to catch up on her work then. basically my nanny had to drop me off then and she mets my friends au pir. eventually they started liking each other and nine years later they're married in sweden with a two year old. my friend and i like to joke thag our friendship created life!!
Jarrod Nichols 3 years ago
When the internet first started up, the wife of one of my friends told me to search for a Filipina (she was a filipina), as she said it would fit my personality better and I had had an extraordinarily hard run up till then. I met the most beautiful women I'd ever seen online. We chatted for years, but she wasn't interested in a relationship. I made the joke that when she turned 40 in 13 years, if she wasn't married, I would marry her. We laughed and thought it was funny. We drifted apart, as things happened, and one day, years after I last chatted with her, I happened to check an old email account and she DM me. She told me it was her birthday and she was 40. She joked and asked if I was still going to marry her. To make a long story short. We've been married 6 years now. Just because of a series of unlikely events.
Susan Bosse 3 years ago
I had throat cancer when I was 19. We probably wouldn't have known until it was too late if it weren't for two church ladies who lived in two different states and knew two different people in my life. Coworker told me about a lady he went to Christ with who talked like me (raspy) and had nodules. Told my mom and we thought nothing more about it. Three months later, my aunt tells me the same exact story...lady at church, etc. She lives in another state, three hours away. So I went to the dr. He said I had a polyp, nothing to worry about. On the way to the hospital at 5:30 a.m. for surgery, I told my mom that I'd dreamt I had cancer. Mom said "omg. You don't have cancer," and I said "I know. It was a dream." I now know all of that was God getting me to the doctor and preparing me for having cancer. 33 years remission this past June. Had it not been for those two ladies, I might have a voice box mechanism or I might be dead.
Happy Daihatsu 3 years ago (edited)
These stories reminded me that I only exist because of bacon.
Kym Boyle 3 years ago
One day at Six Flags, my family had just finished lunch. At first, we were planning on riding a roller coaster, but my mom said we should ride something tamer on our full stomachs. Flash forward to after we returned home. We turned on the news, and there was a story of someone falling out of the very roller coaster we decided not to ride.
Stephen Watkins 2 years ago
The best can come from the worst.. Back in 2014 my marriage collapsed along with my world. Fast forward almost a year and I'm doing freelance work for an online media company. A young lady and I get to talking and think maybe there could be something there, problem is we live in two different provinces (I'm in Johannesburg, she's in Cape Town) and I have already accepted a Job running a restaurant in Marseilles and am just about ready to fly out because that is the path my life is going. Anyways I am on the Air France website getting ready to book my flight and I see a random banner ad at the bottom of the screen (the kind you see a thousand times a day and ignore) I glance at it and it says "Everything You Need Is In Cape Town" I look at it, cancel my flight, leave behind everything I've ever known and April 21st was our 7 year Anniversary.
Dick Fletes 2 years ago
I'm pretty sure Butterfly Effect came from Ray Bradbury's 1952 "A sound of thunder" where the guy steps on a butterfly in the past and makes subtle but significant changes to the future.
Jackie Lulu 2 years ago
My friend "E" had a roommate "S" in Naval Nuke school in Idaho. After school, they lost touch. A few years later, E was driving somewhere on the east coast and saw S driving the other way. They stopped, talked, and E invited S to his Halloween party. I was also at the party. 1.5 years later, S and I were married. So, Pandas, is this serendipity, or butterflies? I don't understand the difference.
Adam L 2 years ago
I was shy and never did anything besides work and binge TV shows. My cousin convinced me to join her for karaoke nights at a local bar. I started coming out of my shell because I was meeting new people and having fun. Eventually I received a message from a friend of my older brother, she was on a dart team that needed one more player and my brother suggested me. I joined the team and made friends with them. Eventually the dart captain decided he needed a break for awhile, so I joined a team with that one of the other members started along with a couple others and a few new people. After awhile I had needed a dart night off because I was Co-Den leader with my older brother and his son was receiving a cub scout award. My new dart captain was practically begging me to show up late for darts anyway, so I said fine. I made it to the bar and ended being introduced to a girl that was the best friend of the daughter of 2 of my teammates, and now I'm happily married with a son.
Monica Isnota Robot 2 years ago
When I was 11, I got sick with what my doctor thought was mono. In 3 weeks, I'd lost the ability to eat, drink, use the bathroom myself and couldn't walk. I got my first period ever and everyone thought maybe I was being overly dramatic about my pain. My dad took me to the family Dr a second time without an appointment and the only one there was his med student, locking up to close the office. She took one look at me and said "it's not period cramps! It's her appendix! Go to the ER NOW!" sure enough, my appendix had ruptured and I was septic. I spent a month in the hospital and missed 3 months of school. All because a female med student stayed late at the office. I wouldn't have survived another night.
Victoria Pitt 2 years ago
You can literally backtrack any current situation in your life back to some random thing that if you had done otherwise would have changed the course of your life. Just saying.
Vincent Van Bro 2 years ago
My great-grandfather kept a swiss army knife in his chest pocket, and he was shot in the chest, but that little knife saved him. I’m always in awe whenever my dad tells me about him, he was super cool!
TmKhr 3 years ago
Mine isn't nearly as impressive as most of these here, but: back in September, after being unemployed for about a month, I checked online from a specific website if there was any one-time security guard jobs nearby. There was a hockey game and I applied there for the job (I have the necessary licenses etc.) and got accepted. There I met a fellow security guard who's been in the company for two years now, and after telling her I'd be interested in a job in the same company, she gave me the boss' number, and a couple of days later I called, got into the interview and got the job after the company paid for the proper training, and now I have a full-time job. Would be a different story if I hadn't check that one website back in September :D
leigh arbuckle 3 years ago
when I was 10 we moved from Ontario to Saskatchewan. it was 3 long days. While traveling through northern Ontario, we were behind a tractor trailer who was driving pretty fast for an empty trailer. The roads were winding and his trailer kept crossing the line. My dad decided that we needed to stop for a snack/bathroom break. We pulled into this little cafe and were there probably about 1/2 hour. when we started back our journey, we saw the driver of the transport truck had crossed the line and hit a vehicle killing both the driver and the child in the backseat. My father figured if we hadn't stopped, we would have been in the middle of it
Brandy Grote 3 years ago (edited)
I had minor surgery in early June. Complications led to one ER visit, and med side effects led to ANOTHER ER visit by the end of June. 2nd week of July, I saw my ortho surgeon, and agreed to get the spine fusion I needed because I couldn't get pt and pain shots during Covid, and was bed bound from pain. He said late July. Before I got back to my car, the ofc mgr called saying we could get it done the NEXT WEEK- but I needed tests and xrays! Which had been done in the ER! The tests were normal, and within time limits. I just needed Covid and MRSA tests at the hospital! Got my surgery, already 95% less pain!! Glad I went to the ER, and had the tests, there would gave been no way I could have gotten them in time otherwise!
Kasandra Porter 2 years ago
My son 17 at the time and a bunch of his friends and their friends 28 total, all had tickets to go see The Dark Knight on opening night. That night all but 2 of them had things happen so that they couldn't go, haf to work am extra shift, got grounded, food poisoning etc... The 2 that went were in the second theater that bullets came through the wall and in a row that was just above where a man got hit. It was an unbelievable morning after, trying to contact all those kids and parents to see if they were ok. --- Ialso had a real close friend who lived in NY who had decided to take a personal day and called out of work for the first time in 20+ years. An hour later she watched as the first plane hit the world trade center - where her office was! She had never called out before for no reason and still to this day doesn't know what made her do it THAT day.
Cathy Hurd 2 years ago
The Family Guy's Seth MacFarlane is alive today because of a hangover. He was supposed to have been on one of the 9/11 planes.
that rando_;) 2 years ago
My mother had this friend who was scheduled to be on one of the 9/11 flights. However, his alarm clock didn't go off that morning and he missed the flight.
Patti Vance 2 years ago
my ex was military in the 80s and the housing we were in were like duplexes with tiny little fence "yards" big enough for a clothesline. i had a washer but no dryer so this was fine. one afternoon i was hanging clothes and he started calling me in to see something on tv. i kept telling him to wait but he insisted. i had barely stepped into the house when a car came crashing through the fence. had i kept hanging clothes i would have been history.
Sara 2 years ago (edited)
In elementary school I had a crush on a boy. One time I wrote him a love song.He threw it at me and said he didnt like me. My soul was crushed and I left hin alone. Fast forward to highschool. Everytime I saw him I would avoid him because of shame and rejection.He saw me walking in the opposite direction so he ran towards me and said "hey you wrote me a song in elementary school, I still have it" and he proceeds to show me the letter. He kept it! Anyway we dated for 9 months and we broke up bc my mom was controlling. His next girlfriend "A" lived in a town 30 mins from us. When he broke up with A he moved on to the next. A and I ended up becoming good friends as a result of dating the guy.Fast forward to my 20s. Instagram was super big and I posted A as my woman crush wednesday. She returned the gesture 3 weeks later. That same day a guy was in my DM's spitting some game. A said she dated K in middle school and vouched he was a solid guy. Weve together 8 yrs married 5 with a kid
Bernát Bonda 2 years ago
When I was young(er), I found a very nice Computer game, but my parents limited my online time. So I copied the game, and migrated it To paper base, so I could play it offline. Years later, when I got bored throwing about 30 dices, I decided to create a computer program of my own. And oh now I am a senior Software engineer, just because my parents wanted To protect my eyes.
Patricia 2 years ago
The building on the corner of a crossroads "village" burned down and some boys from a farm up the road came down to sift the ashes for nails. Dad was one of those. Some people wanted to adopt a girl, but her brother wouldn't hear of it and practically kidnapped her and got her a job at a farm the other direction from the corner. She went down to look at the smouldering remains of the building. That was Mother. So, if that building hadn't burned, Mother wouldn't have met Dad, and all of us wouldn't be.
RedFox 3 years ago
I don’t remember how the story goes exactly, so don’t hate on me if it sounds odd.. Right around the 2000’s, my dads best friend invited him to a movie with this girl that he had met (happened to be my moms best friend or something like that) and they wanted to go on a double blind date, in right around two years, my parents met, dated, married, and had my older sister. Four years later, they had me. The only side affect to this is that me and my sister assume that anyone that we even sort of like might be our future husband/wife/married significant other.
Nubmaeme 3 years ago
I was going home from work one day and was about to get on the interstate when I had this overwhelming desire for a soda. I'm not normally a big soda drinker but I had to have one so I pulled into a little convenience store near the on ramp. The car behind me pulled up into my place in line for the ramp. When I came out of the store, there were flashing lights and sirens just up on the interstate. When I finally got up the ramp, I could see what had happened. The car that had taken my place in line was now smashed against a bridge railing by a semi. The people in the car didn't make it.
Ryan O'Carroll 3 years ago
A friend of mine pressured me into coming to a role play club meeting one night. I hadn't been for weeks because I was lazy and not in the mood but he convinced me to turn up and say hi if nothing else. So I turn up and a guy i've never met comes bounding over, jumping up and down like a toddler begging me to play in his game. I thought his behaviour was endearing so agreed. Anyway, we got chatting online figuring out character stuff and got close. I was in a crumbling relationship at the time though, but then that guy kinda imploded our relationship. First, he worked halloween after arranging to spend the night with me. Then he ditched me at a party so I had to walk home alone. I was upset about both these things and turned to my new friend. I bullied him into taking me out for drinks, one thing led to another. We've been married like 12 years now. Amusingly, the ex ended up marrying an aquaintance of my husband and I. No idea how they met. Small world.
A 3 years ago
One day, my mother, brother and myself were planning to go to the beach. However, my brother and I were stalling for time because we wanted to finish some comics we were drawing. When we finally left our house, our close family friend who lived in a different country was deciding to visit us while she was in our country to visit her sister. If my brother and I weren't persisting on finishing our comic drawings, we would have never seen her after around 2 years of no contact (It was 2014 at the time and that was the last time we've seen her in person).
Apollo Starbuck 2 years ago
Most of these stories weren't "butterfly effects". They're a series of coincidences
Kieran N 2 years ago
I decided to apply to a college on a whim at 7 pm the day the apps were due even though I had just spent days working on apps for other schools. Mostly I didn't want to be forced into family time after having spent all of Christmas break working on apps with my mother. Surprise, it was the only one I got fully into for the fall semester without having come off the waitlist to get there. I have all of my friends, a job I'm valued in, and my two cats because of a whim that I went with to avoid family time
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