The Age Old Question

"Do you believe in soul mates?"

It's that cliche question that you see in movies, read in books, and ask in deep conversations over cocktails. The general consensus is that you get one soul mate and that person is the one. Your soul mate is the one person in the entire universe that fate has chosen for you to be with forever. Or, at least until one of you dies. I imagine if you are married or otherwise involved in a serious relationship, you probably believe in this one soul mate business. That is, you believe it until you break up or get divorced. Then, we will hear you claim, "Oh, that person must not have been my soul mate since it's over." This will lead you to go back out into the wonderful world of dating and be in search of yet again, the one.

It isn't our fault that we have this crazy idea of one soul mate. The movies and romance novels have filled our heads with this nonsense. Disney did most of the damage when we were too young to realize how they were manipulating our view of love. It is rare to find a movie that ends with the boy and girl not living happily ever after. However, I finally found one! The movie is called "Prime," starring Uma Thurman and Meryl Streep. The gist of the movie is not important at this point; however what Streep's character says to her son (who had been dating Thurman's character) is pretty much the point I'm getting at:

"Sometimes you love and you learn...and you move on. And that's okay."

We get so caught up in believing in one soul mate when we need to realize that every relationship is not meant to last forever. People enter our lives for different reasons and particularly when we need something that they can provide. Sometimes we can have brief relationships that leave us wondering, "What in the heck was that for? I wasted my time!" No, you learned something. You just don't know it yet. People come and go....to teach us something new about ourselves, to remind us of who we are, to heal a heart we thought would never mend, or most often just to help us find our smile again. The "smile finders" are my favorite, by the way! I can't even count the times I've encountered memorable people who did nothing more than make me smile again when it was the last thing in the world I wanted to do. It's bittersweet that these people can't stick around, but we wouldn't see their significance if they did. I believe fate sends us more than one soul mate. It's ridiculous to believe we are only allowed one person our entire lives that will make us feel complete and whole and be everything we ever dreamed.

You can't define a soul mate based on a romantic comedy or an epic love story. You have to decide what you think a soul mate is. Soul mate is defined on Dictionary.com as, "a person with whom one has a strong affinity." Aside from that sounding absolutely boring, I think I've had a strong affinity for more than one person in my lifetime. I realize that by saying we have more than one soul mate that tends to take the significance out of a "significant other." Well, I think the term significant other sounds pretty boring too. I want a lover, a friend, a protector, a gentleman, a listener, a storyteller, a partner in crime, a companion...I could go for days on all the things I want in "the one"...I figure this soul mate business is nothing to settle for, so I might as well get everything I want.

Every relationship we have teaches us something, whether one big thing or a lot of little things. It is the lessons we learn from these romantic partners that shape our future relationships. It is through experience that we learn to define what love and a soul mate are. We don't want our hearts to be broken, yet how else did we expect to find out what we don't want from a romantic partner? It's my belief that we do this song and dance of love and heartbreak to mold ourselves into the perfect partner for the soul mate that we are meant to be with forever. How else do you expect to be perfect for your mate unless you have shed all your imperfections in your past?

Originally written 12/15/07
~LDW~