The truth about Soul Mates.

One of the biggest dilemmas in our love quest is probably that of finding our ideal love partner and wondering about the possibility that our ideal ‘soul mate’ may or may not exist. Many of us, at any stage of life, wonder if it is best to wait for the elusive soul mate before truly committing or if, perhaps, it may be best to settle with someone who is not that ideal but is here in our life right now.

The subject is a complex one but, perhaps, simplifying somewhat, I would say that settling for someone whose main attribute is that of alleviating our loneliness is probably not the best choice. We would eventually resent him or her for not being as ideal as we would like them to be and make both our lives relatively miserable. However, read on, because it’s not a simple black and white issue!

So, what then?

Just wait for the perfect one? The one who sweeps off our feet, understands us, is perfectly compatible with our personality and, why not, who does not mind all our idiosyncrasies, no matter how bad they are? This could equally be a disastrous choice. Why? Because sooner or later we would find out that the person we thought as perfect is not quite so or, somehow that they do not love us as much as we would have thought.   

You can   choose one of the two options and they   can   work for you. However, before that, you absolutely need to figure out the following:   

♥     what do you want from love? Do you want a trustworthy, kind, loving companion for life? Or do you want someone who is exciting, someone who goes out with you every day or night, a social person? Or do you want someone who loves being at home with you? Ask yourself what you really want from your future love partner.  

♥     when you have come up with some answers, ask yourself this: is there anything that I expect from my future partner which I could, in fact, give to myself? For example: if you want someone who is fun and exciting for you, is this a fair expectation? It will be a much more successful approach if you   created fun and excitement in your own life so that you would not have this 'need' waiting to be fulfilled by someone else. No one can fulfil any void you may have. Having such 'needs' or ‘voids’ makes us vulnerable to the wrong choices of love partners and often renders us dependent on them. For example, if the relationship ends, our fun and excitement is over (if we depended on someone else to provide it for us) and we feel lost, lonely and flat. If we get what we need from another person, the moment they leave or stop ‘giving’ this element to us we feel lost and, because of the pain of being ‘lost’, we may ‘stick’ with the wrong partner just to avoid such pain. This is pivotal and it does not only apply to obvious needs but also to less obvious ones, such as beauty, youth, sex drive etc. Do not depend on the other for you to feel any of the above. If you need a younger, beautiful partner to feel young and beautiful, you are on the wrong love path; become youthful and beautiful yourself, work on your own sex drive yourself (rather than merely depending on external stimuli such as a much younger partner), so that your partner choices will be based on true love and not ‘fixes’. More on all of this on take care of yourself.   

Basically, if all our needs (what’s missing in our life, from passion to excitement to youthfulness) are taken care of by ourselves, our choice of partner will be based on other parameters, much healthier ones. As mentioned above, I have seen many people with insecurities determined to find a love partner who is stunning or much younger, a 'trophy' wife or a ‘trophy’ husband, so to speak; this makes them feel better about themselves, at least initially. However, such insecurities (or voids, as I mentioned earlier) do not disappear but rather mutate into unreasonable jealousy, into controlling behaviour, arrogance, workaholic tendencies, narcissism  and many other pathologies which sabotage everybody's chance of happiness.  

Moreover, the choice of partner is best exercised if we know ourselves completely, if we are aware of our strengths and our difficulties, if we accept who we are and become happy with who we are in a real, almost spiritual sense. You are not perfect, and you don’t need to be perfect. But become aware of where and how you are ‘unreasonable’, or ‘difficult’, or ‘challenging’ so that you can expose those traits to a loving and understanding partner.  

Our choice of ‘soul mate’ should be based on whether that person is best suited to walk along the life path we have each chosen; it should be based on whether that person has the willingness and the capacity to support us in our life quests no matter what (especially emotionally and psychologically speaking) and, of course, if we can do the same for him or her. 

If you are willing to find out as much as possible about him/her, inner dreams and inner fears included, and willing and happy to live with that real person beyond the public facade we all have, then your love is real and your choice is based on stronger criteria. And, last but not least, if you are willing to expose your inner self (including your fears, pains, hopes, dreams etc) to that person without being criticized or put down; if that person is indeed happy and able to understand you, the real you, and support you.  This is the real, ideal soul mate. A real life mate. 

If you want to read more about how to go about finding true love, you may wish to read my page titled ‘Do you really Know Your Love Partner”? as well as the one on Emotional Transference (which will teach you techniques on how to get your loved one to open up). It is also really useful to know what a truly loving relationship should be like, here called Evolving Relationship. The more you know, the more successful your love search will be, resulting in finding true love and a true love and life partner.

A great book about love reviewed here

A list of great self-help material is here

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