Soulmates?

This is going to be “short and sweet.” This is a topic about which I’ve had several “serious” conversations with several people over the last few weeks (for various reasons – perhaps I will touch on a few of them in the future….) and I have come to my own conclusion that I necessarily cannot believe in soulmates. Now, this is not to say that there IS NO SUCH THING as “soulmates,” but having had my last ex- (that I know of, at least!) get married (*cough cough* having dated the person for less time than we dated way back when and with an obvious “S” on his forehead – but I digress!) I have had to ask myself under what conditions and to whom do these people end up getting married … and what the hell is so wrong with me? The answer to the latter question is essentially “NOTHING!” I just happen to have been very ill and “out of circulation,” as it were, for the last decade or so of my life. I am – with any luck – working my way out of that (with everything I have, mind you!). As to the former questions? I believe that people “settle” for people to whom they find themselves attracted and with whom they can spend time and feel comfortable doing so. I really do not think there is much more to it than that. I think there is a small window in which men who are not already married see a shrinking pool of women and say something like “DEAR GOD! I’M 30 … 31! AND I’M SINGLE?! I WILL NEVER GET MARRIED!” and so they find someone who they can spend time with and with whom they enjoy spending time and that’s that. *As a note – if anyone is actually reading any of this yet and you have opinions to the contrary, I would genuinely love to hear them because this topic is one of fascination for me!* I know that if most of my relationships had occurred at this period of time in my life, I probably would have ended up marrying about 75% of them (that is if each relationship occurred in its own lifetime at the same time in my life … if that was coherent at all!). That NECESSARILY negates the very idea of soulmates, at least for me. I do believe that some people have soulmates and they manage to find them and stay with them forever. However, for the vast majority of people, I do not find this to be true. When I was a young teenager I genuinely believed that divorce was a sin (funny because I was really the only one in my family to believe this – goes to show how well “conditioned” I was hahahahahahaha); now, I believe that it can often be the best thing for people who are just tied together because they happened to marry each other at a time in their lives when they were together for x years and liked each other for x years and had kids and started a life together, blah blah blah, and then life went on and they stopped caring for each other the way they had. Perhaps more frequently (I can tell with at least 90% accuracy by looking in the eyes of the guy in the relationship – I can only speak to heterosexual relationships because they are the only ones with which I have had any experience! – if he genuinely loves his partner or if he just likes her / loves her. Sadly, about 90% of the time, it is a “just likes her / loves her” kind of look. Take note of this when you’re out and about or with couples who are friends – you will start to notice, I promise!) I think people – especially men – think they are in love (especially because of the attractiveness of women which is something I openly admire – this does not make me any less “heterosexual,” sadly! – and because once MOST women get their eyes on a man they sink their teeth and claws in with everything they have so he is theirs – true, true, true!) because they are attracted to the women they are with, they do have similar interests and possibly beliefs, and they do get along. However, love is something VERY very very different. And I have said from a VERY young age that REAL love between two people is a very rare thing indeed. I do believe that we have skewed the definition of love to mean the bond between two people (or more, whatever floats your boat!), but I think we forget what love really is. Love can be for a thing, for an idea, for an area of research, for an area, for an instrument, &c. &c. One can still be married and have these loves – I am certainly not saying they are mutually exclusive but I am saying this would be exceedingly rare to find and if there were people who genuinely loved each other and found their love in life they would be the luckiest humans on the planet! – but in most cases, the marriage is not based in REAL love. I have seen the look of REAL love more than once in my life … and due to time and circumstance the look and looks have been fleeting. I suppose what I am trying to get at with all of this ranting is that it is very rare to find a true “soulmate.” That we need to focus on what love really is, knowing that it can be for SOMETHING like writing or a particular branch of medicine or for children. That we need to be more open about marriages breaking apart not because of a loss of love but out of a mutual respect for another human being.

I also cannot believe that any person would be excluded from love in whatever form it might take because of something like I have experienced – a decade+ of severe illness or worse. Life is cruel enough. But we do have to open our eyes a little bit and realize that what we thought was right when we were 20 or 25 or even 30 is not necessarily what we want later in life or even what we were “meant” to find. Just needed to put that out there. NEEDED being the operative word in that one!

I also do not believe in the idea that “marriage is hard.” If marriage means love, and love is LOVE, then marriage shouldn’t be hard. You should know what the other is and wants and needs and there is ALWAYS work involved when other people are involved in any capacity whatsoever but I do not believe marriage or “love” should be “difficult.” It should just be. It is that dog or cat whose life you saved by adopting him or her who you’ve loved for 10 years who still comes running to the door when he or she hears you coming home. That is love. A very simple / simplistic explanation of it, but love nonetheless. There is nothing hard about it. It just is. There are ALWAYS trying times in life, but love should be the bond that pulls you through, not that wear the bond down. Okay I’m starting to get blabbery again. Too much going on in every respect. Like THINKING about love and how I have been and will have been denied the traditional “definition” of it because I have been sick and lost everything else? I think life can be very cruel … but I don’t believe that. I believe better things are coming. There might be boulders flying at you while you’re climbing up a mountain to get to that better, but the better is there. Waiting. That is love. In part.


That is all for now, kids. I hope you are all having a happy and healthy day, wherever you are in the world! I LUUURRRVE you! Tee hee hee!