Soul Mates

Google the words SOUL MATE and watch how thousands of sites line up in readiness to teach you how to meet and find your Soul Mate.
If there is one void that humanity seems to share it is the seemingly eternal search for one’s SOUL MATE. I must admit to searching for the relevance of meaning of this term in my own life.

The word 'soul' stems from the Old English word ' sawol' meaning the spiritual and emotional part of a person. It first emerged in literary public around the year 725 in the tale of Beowulf. Obviously your MATE has been regarded as being of spiritual and emotional importance to you as opposed to simply being functional for the pro creation of offspring, maintenance of an economic base and to hold lands and chattels in a genealogical hierarchy forged in a familial foundation.
Soul Mate is a term we all popularly use to describe someone with whom one has a feeling of deep and natural affinity, friendship, love, intimacy, sexuality and compatibility. Some people believe these are souls we have met and lived with in many life times. They have been our lovers, spouses, mothers, fathers, siblings, teachers, students, family and friends. Somehow we have a contract with these souls to return to earth together for learning and evolution.

One theory of Soul Mates, presented by Aristophanes in Plato's Symposium, is that that humans originally were combined of four arms, four legs, and a single head made of two faces, but Zeus feared their power and split them all in half, condemning them to spending their lives searching for the other half to complete them.

It seems that we feel closer to certain souls, because we have attracted them into our lives as they are on the same frequency or because we want to work out issues with them.

The Law of Conservation says that Nothing is Missing – your Soul Mate is therefore either in the form of the one or the many. I can see that in my life my Soul Mate lives in the many – about 20 beautiful men in my life – all together – are my Soul Mate. Now before you cast aspersions on my admission – (No I’m not a Skank) my Soul Mate is according to the hierarchy of my values – therefore these men provide great feedback for my particular value system and clearly demonstrate who I am and what is important in my life right now.

I get to spend time discussing and philosophizing with some of them – Scientists, Healers, Conspiracy Theorists – Intelligent brains with words instead of juices flowing between us – just as exhilarating but less messy. J The Mediterranean and Middle Eastern men in my life bring out the Goddess in me as they flaunt their masculine energy with me feigning and feinting - opening doors and killing spiders – the ancient game of the warrior rescuing the maiden (swoon) - and the sacred dance (if I so choose J ) My fitness freak posse accompany me on adventure hikes, mountain climbs and marathon runs. As a fag hag, my gay friends (yes they form part of my Soul Mate) share retail therapy and home decorating sprees. My business buddies wheel and deal over endless cocktail lunches with me, exchanging project concepts and beta testing plans together. I have men to go to social dinners with, boys to take to chick flicks, fellows to suffer endless family events with and buddies to party, dance and rock with.

Nothing is missing – all forms are there – in many faces and places. What I love about my Soul Mate in the MANY is the freedom to have NO expectations other than of myself.

As a child, I had this bizarre belief that one day I would meet my Soul Mate walking down the street one day, he would seem familiar and a white light appears between us then boom ….we live happily ever after. My own parents did not provide me with a balanced view of Soul Mates or even a loving Relationship, so my benchmark was drawn from fairy tales, TV and movies.

And so fuelled by a Boy Meets Girl Fantasy, at the tender age of 20, I married my first husband and had children very quickly. I still regard him as family – wonderful person - however he was not what could be termed The One. However, he remains part of my collective Soul Mate and for that I am truly grateful. At the age of 30, I married my second husband. He is one of my business partners even now and I still regard him as family – He Taught me SO much - however he was not what could be termed The One. Yes, he forms part of my collective Soul Mate and I continue to learn appreciation of him.

My children are part of my collective Soul Mate for they are truly great loves of my life. They express what I suppress and give me the opportunity to love all the things I disown about myself and my parents and our families. I find it hardest to love them without expectation as theirs is the love that stings and rewards the most in my life – my greatest obligation and my dearest joys.

I look back over the relationships of my life and see that there has only been one person that I truly opened my heart to. I was SURE he was the one – all the signs pointed to him being my twin flame. It was a lesson steeped in synchronicity and destined to change me forever. But I was wrong - he wasn’t the one – I was – and through my love for him, I learned to love the one person I never really knew and never took the time to love – ME.

It has been two and a half years since we parted and I have met the most beautiful men since that time. I could say that no one has captured my heart like he did, or perhaps I have just been unwilling to open my heart again. All I know is that the great mysteries of life must be experienced; they must be lived. Duff writes: “The Nahuatl peoples believed that we are born with a physical heart, but have to create a deified heart by finding a firm and enduring centre within ourselves from which to lead our lives, so that our hearts will shine through our faces, and our features will become reliable reflections of ourselves. Otherwise, they explained, we wander aimlessly through life, giving our hearts to everything and nothing, and so destroy them.”

Now looking back, seeing that for me there has been the ONE (past) and the MANY (present), I appreciate the power of the Soul Mate in whatever form I create and see that my heart shines through my own face now.

It feels like there are so many levels of Soul Mate – well I guess I am collecting data about this right now J.
At the base of the Soul Mate pyramid is the Got To– The Physical Attraction – derived from the Cell and the Amoeba.
The next level is the Should/Ought To – This is our search for the Right Person (i.e. fitting into our Fantasy and Value System)– derived from our Pre Amphibian selves.
Then we find the Need to level– This is our Emotional Need – the search for Romance - derived from our Amphibian centre.
Next level is Want To – This is all about the I – the EGO – everything is the way I Want it - derived from our Reptilian selves. Many people never move past this phase.
Then we move into the Desire To level – This is beyond the EGO – Beyond the Physical, Emotional, Romantic, Material – we enter the realm of REAL LOVE only when the first phases are complete – this is derived from the Mammal part of us.
Once we truly love ourselves as we are with no changes and no expectations that another will complete us, we enter the Choose To level – This is a Conscious Commitment – a Value of Self Beyond the Ego without dependence on the other – this is where we become more Human and less Animal.
And finally we enter the Love To level – Unconditional Love – No Rejection – No Expectation – Nothing to Lose or Gain – Nothing is Missing – we are inspired by pure Spirit.

According to theories popularized by Theosophy and in a modified form by Edgar Cayce, God created androgynous souls, equally male and female. The souls split into separate genders later, perhaps because they incurred Karma while playing around on the earth". Over countless reincarnations, each half seeks the other. When all karmic debt is purged, the two will fuse back together and return to the ultimate.

There is obviously a karma aspect – what I don’t love about myself I will attract a Soul Mate who owns that very thing in him. I hope that for me, a Soul Mate – the ONE – is someone I can share my life with, in freedom, integrity, grace, without judgement or expectation, with two open hearts, walking beside each other on similar paths – where living in my highest values serves his and vice versa.

Lao Tsu called it the trackless path. Jehovah translated means “I am.” In Genesis, God says to Moses, “I am that I am.” Perhaps our Soul Mate is the ME in us and will only appear in another form of ONE when we appreciate our Soul Mate in ourselves? For now, I appreciate that my Soul Mate is all around me and there is nothing missing in my life while I still hold the Fantasy of the One Soul Mate who I will meet walking down the street one day, he seems familiar and a white light appears between us then boom……... :-)