Archive for Thursday 21st November 2002 - Lucky numbers

Are some numbers luckier than others? Today we look at one reader’s experience.

Jonathan has passed me a letter from Mrs D. Abbott of Kent. She is interested in the significance of numbers. Her own ‘lucky’ number is 8. It is in her birth date, and it is the street number of all the houses she has lived in. When she and her husband decided to move – the family has grown up and their present house is now too large – they found an ideal, smaller one nearby. Its number, of course, was 8.

My first thought was, this is just superstition. If you get something on your mind - a name, say, or a number – you find that it keeps turning up. The writer, Robert Anton Wilson, became fixated on the number 23. He found it everywhere he looked. It is like when you hear an odd name or word on the radio. Often you hear or read it again a bit later. It is a coincidence, but does it mean anything?

It seems to me that these coincidences do have a meaning. In general, they indicate that things are going well – that you are alert and in tune with life. It is the same with Mrs Abbott and her number 8. She feels it has brought her luck. Aged 74, she remains active and healthy. I think that one of the secrets to Mrs Abbott’s happy existence is that she is aware of coincidences and keeps in touch with her good luck. Long may she enjoy it!

Eight is a fascinating number. It is the first cube (2x2x2), and the shape that goes with it, the octagon, is much used in sacred architecture. In numerology the number eight is associated with practical endeavours, power-seeking and high material goals.

John Michell