The Trouble with Over-Spiritualizing Relationships

The Trouble with Over-Spiritualizing Relationships

Many schools of spiritual thought include dogma about romantic relationships. Very often that dogma is used to oppress and repress, and often causes great harm.

As a tarot professional, I spend a great deal of time speaking with people about their relationships. I find that, in many cases, I have to help clients slog through these harmful beliefs.

Depending on the school of thought and culture people come from, they may use different terms to describe a similar concept.

The central theme is generally that there is a particular person, somewhere in the world, who is destined to be your true love. In some schools of thought that person must be of the opposite gender, or of your same race, or it can’t be true love.

YouTube is full of tarot readers preaching about soul mates and twin flames. There are ‘love coaches’ who charge thousands of dollars to help you find your twin flame. These coaches teach these theories of soulmates and twin flames as fact.

No matter where we come from or what we believe, we can all understand why we have spiritual feelings about relationships. When we meet someone that we connect with we feel a sense of destiny. We feel our connection as a spiritual certainty. Sometimes it truly is. Sometimes, though, what we are feeling is more about chemistry and desire than spirituality.

The problems with propagating mystical beliefs about destined relationships are legion. In the course of my career, I have seen all of the following behaviors, and more.

People stay in abusive relationships because they believe their abuser is their soulmate.

People eschew workable healthy relationships because they are waiting for a perfect connection.

People feel shame for bonding with someone, who, according to their religious dogma, shouldn’t be their partner.

People who are sadly widowed don’t seek a new connection because they believe there is only one possibility for love in this life.

People resist healing from a breakup because they believe that the relationship was destined, and they did something wrong to change the course of destiny.

People refuse to develop communication skills in relationships because they believe that if something is meant to be, it will work effortlessly.

Lonely people refuse to be proactive in trying to meet people because they believe that destiny will do the work for them.

Happily single people feel pressure to be in relationship.

When it comes to theories about our spiritual nature as individuals, and in relationships, we have to remember that theories and beliefs are just that. Beliefs aren’t facts, no matter how closely those beliefs are held.

Love, in all its forms, is indeed a spiritual thing. Our ability to love one another is, to me, the surest proof of a Higher Power. Yet, in all things, God helps those who help themselves.

Good relationships are hard to find, and harder still to keep. When we over-spiritualize the concept of relationships, or the relationship we have or the relationship we lost, we make finding and keeping love harder still.

Why Didn’t My Cord-Cutting Ritual Work?

Why Didn’t My Cord-Cutting Ritual Work?

Of all of my many blog posts, one of the most popular has been my piece on how to perform a cord-cutting, from August of 2013. I receive emails about this topic at least a few times a month.

That tells me there are a whole lot of people out there trying to heal from broken relationships, break bad habits and survive dysfunctional families.

If you haven’t read the article, here’s the brief synopsis. A cord-cutting ritual is an easy bit of energy work you can do to release a dysfunctional relationship, be that a love relationship, a friendship or a toxic family situation. You can even do a cord-cutting to release your own unhealthy behavior or belief.

One thing I sometimes hear from people is that they have performed the cord-cutting ritual but still feel attached to the person or behavior they are trying to release. Another thing I hear are reports of unscrupulous psychic scammers taking advantage of people’s pain by performing cord-cutting rituals for exorbitant prices. These scammers often say (erroneously) that one cannot and should not perform these rituals for themselves.

If you have done a cord-cutting to release a friend, family member, lover or behavior, and haven’t yet received the results you wanted, here are some things to consider.

First, sometimes it takes more than one ritual to release the energy that binds you. This is especially true if the relationship is familial or lengthy. Don’t hesitate to do the ritual every day for seven days, or once a week for as many weeks as feels right.

Second, you need to do your part by refraining from re-engaging with this person or repeating your behaviors. Whatever energy you feed is the energy that will grow. If you keep speaking with a person you are trying to release, for example, your cord-cutting is like to be ineffectual.

Emotional habits take a while to break. If you are used to thinking about someone, or responding to their manipulation, over a long period of time, you will still have some desire to continue this pattern. The cord-cutting will ultimately help you wipe away this energy. While that energetic process begins the moment you perform the ceremony, you may not feel its effects right away. Be patient with the energy work and be patient with yourself.

Finally, cord-cutting cannot take the place of grief. Cord-cutting can give you the strength to move on and can help release an unhealthy compulsion. Yet, anything that has an energy strong enough to require cord-cutting will also require a grieving period. Do not confuse grief with the desire to reconnect. Grief expresses the disappointment that the person you cared about can’t be who and what you needed them to be. Grief is natural and necessary at the end of a relationship. We must move through grief rather than try to avoid it.

There is energy work that you can do to help you handle your grief. There are meditations, stones, herbs and oils that can help give you strength, remember your joy and find your grounding as you go through your process.

Unhealthy relationships usually have a lot of guilt associated with them. Never does that guilt feel as strong as when we decide to break away. We need to recognize guilt as part of the manipulation that made the relationship unhealthy. Guilt can also be borne of our unrealistic expectations of how we should be, or how our relationships should be.

While cord-cutting can’t relieve our grief, cord-cutting can be very effective at helping us release guilt and expectations. This allows us to move forward in our healing process.

If you have performed a cord-cutting and still feel attached to the person or behavior you are working to release, keep trying. Do it again and do it with the expectation that healing and release can take some time to accomplish. Do it with the belief in your own happy future. Do it with the belief in your ability to be free of what has trapped you.

Seven Ways to Heal from a Breakup That Don't Involve Ice Cream

Seven Ways to Heal from a Breakup

That Don't Involve Ice Cream

It’s no surprise that something I see a lot at my tarot table is the pain that comes from the end of a relationship; especially when it wasn’t our choice, or when we didn’t see it coming. This is a pain that is familiar to most of us. In life, it is practically unavoidable. Breakups happen to everyone – young people, old people, straight people, gay people – everybody.  

After more than twenty years of professional tarot reading, I can see some common themes that emerge from the cards when helping people handle their grief and upset after a breakup. Here are seven things the cards often suggest that always seem to help. Whether or not you use tarot or have a reading to help process a breakup, these strategies reflect universal wisdom that anyone experiencing a breakup can find helpful. 

1. Recognize that connection, chemistry and coincidences do not determine nor predict healthy relationships. 

That you share a birthday or have great sex or feel some sense of spiritual connection does not necessarily mean that you are destined to be together. Very often people have a hard time getting closure and moving on because they spiritualize the relationship, and tell themselves a story that they belong together, or are fated to be together. 

Truly, if there is such a thing as a “fated” relationship, no force on earth will keep you apart. You can get closure now and know the Universe will bring you back together if it is indeed meant to be. In the meantime, stop telling yourself stories that suggest your breakup is somehow wrong, or impossible, or against some greater spiritual plan. 

2. Be willing to consider that you are not truly in love with this person, and maybe never have been. 

Very often we fall in love with our idea of someone, rather than the reality of who they are. We see the potential, rather than the reality. Focusing on the reality of who the person actually is, or how the relationship actually was, can make it much easier to let it go. 

3. Don’t worry if your ex has a bad opinion of you or blames you for what is clearly their fault. 

Sometimes we are ready to let the relationship go but hate the way our ex perceives us and our actions. We worry that they will trash-talk us to our friends and family, or that they are walking away believing bad things about us, unable to see their part in the problem. 

The trick here is recognizing that we can’t be responsible for what other people think and believe, and that if someone can’t see our side of the situation that makes them an a-hole, and we can’t be upset by what a-holes think. 

Also recognize that if they do trash-talk us that will make them look like bigger a-holes than we do, no matter what they may say, or to whom. 

4. Allow yourself to see now what you wouldn’t allow yourself to see before. 

In a relationship we try to focus on the good things and ignore the bad, right? After the breakup it’s important to review the things we didn’t want to look at during the relationship. When we do, we will very often come to the conclusion that we’ve dodged a bullet. 

5. Erase the negative mental tapes. 

Chances are, over the course of the relationship, and perhaps especially during the breakup, your ex has said some critical or negative things about you or has cast some blame your way. It’s important to own your part and learn what you can from the experience, but don’t let your ex’s perceptions, deflections, projections or angry words define who you are or how you see yourself going forward. 

6. Know that love is possible, that hearts heals, and that it’s okay to be open to something new. 

It’s easy to tell ourselves stories that we don’t want anyone else, that love isn’t worth the risk, and that we are better off alone. And, it’s okay to embrace being single and enjoy the beauty and freedom of the single lifestyle. But remember that love was never the reason for your relationship’s failure. Love still exists, is still possible for you, and is still a reasonable goal. 

7. Do a Cord-Cutting Ritual 

Whether you see this as an actual energetic healing or simply a psychological exercise, the act of physically cutting a string that represents the connection between you and your ex can be extremely helpful. You might need to perform this more than once. To learn more about how to do this, you can read my earlier blogpost on this topic.  

Healing from a breakup is hard. The standard wisdom offers us little more than ice cream, shopping and spa days. A bit of self-care and self-indulgence can go a long way to help in healing. However, true healing comes when we change what we’ve been telling ourselves and reframe our perspective. 

Spiritual Single Still Seeking a Soulmate? Here's 10 Thoughts That Aren't Helping!

There’s a particular stereotype about professional diviners that suggest we have at our tables a never-ending parade of lovelorn women seeking hope for their disastrous romantic situations.

The truth is, people at my table are just as likely to seek connection with loved ones in spirit, business advice, and understanding of family dynamics as they are information about their love lives. However, it is fair to say that some reference to romance appears in virtually every reading.

That’s because our intimate relationships are so definitive of, and connected to, our experience in life.

It’s not only heterosexual women who seek insight from diviners. Over the course of my career I have read for people of all genders in all sorts of relationship configurations.

While no two situations, relationships, people or problems are the same, there are some threads of commonality that have become very clear to me over a quarter-century of full-time professional divining.

One demographic amongst those who bring me questions about love seems to have a great deal of commonality. That group is spiritual singles who are hoping to find love. They may be male, female, gay, trans or straight – what they seem to have in common are some particular perceptions about love, dating and spirituality.

Some of those perceptions are helpful, others may be so damaging as to become a barrier from finding the love they so desperately desire.

If you are a single spiritual person hoping to meet someone special, or afraid you won't, see if you are harboring any of these dangerous perceptions. 

1. It’s too late. 

Other variations of this are, I’m too fat or I’m too old.

One thing that is true about love is that love has no limitations. But, if your thinking about the possibilities of love is limited you’ll have a harder time finding what you want.

2. There are no good single people around me. 

Yes, sometimes the dating pool is shallow. When every visit to Bumble or Match shows you the same gallery of the same usual suspects, and every trip to the local watering hole delivers the same, it’s easy to believe that there are just no good candidates to be found. Thinking that way, though, isn’t helpful. If the old haunts turn up the same old faces, it’s time to find new haunts! 

3. Relationships aren’t worth it anyway.

If you don’t know the profound value of a relationship, it’s because you haven’t yet had a good one. Have faith in the power of love. Really.

4. I can’t be happy until I find love.

If you can’t be happy without a relationship you will never be happy with a relationship. Cultivate your happiness now, as a single person, and you will have happiness to share with someone special.

5. I know this new relationship is THE ONE because we share a birthday.

Variations on this can include any sort of synchronicity, spiritual sign, omen or intuitive feeling.

The fact is, we often feel a sense of spiritual connection and rightness at the beginning of a relationship. Sometimes that is a sign of good things ahead. Sometimes it’s not. This is important because single people often waste a lot of time trying to make bad relationships work, or mourning the loss of relationships, because they have over-spiritualized those relationships. The more time we spend on folks who aren't right, the less time we have to find the one who is.

6. I’ve never felt this way about someone before, so I know it must be right.

A new feeling, or a new experience, does not necessarily translate into permanence. There could be many other reasons for your feelings, including infatuation, chemistry, horniness, or even  growth in your own capacity to make a connection.

7. He’s a Scorpio and I’m an Aries so we can’t be together.

Please, please don’t let sun signs keep you from exploring a relationship! A good astrologer can look at your charts and see what the compatibility, and potential problems, might be. And, any good astrologer will tell you that one can’t possibly assess compatibility based on sun signs alone.

8. I love my ex so much, I don’t think I can ever love anyone like that again.

Love is infinite in its capacity. You may not be able to imagine yourself with someone right now, just like you can’t imagine eating food after you’ve had a big meal. In a while, though, you’ll be hungry again.

9. I need to tell the Universe exactly what I want in a partner.

This can actually be a good exercise, but it’s not a necessary one. There are many common advices about what one must do to find a great partner. Some say you have to make that list, others say you have to actively date, others say the right one comes when you stop looking. All of these things will be true for someone, so do what feels right for you!

10. I am sure I will know my soulmate when I see her.

Love at first sight is a real thing, but we can’t know if it’s really love or just attraction until some time passes.  Assuming you’ll know it when you see it could cause you to miss a good opportunity, or to waste time with a bad one.

Additionally, the term “soulmate” can be counter-productive because sets up a lot of expectations. The fact is, there are very likely a few people on the planet who could be a good match for you. Often, we over-spiritualize the concept of love and partnership to the point that we make it feel more impossible than it is.

Love is all around us, yet often feels dishearteningly elusive. Ironically, when we see dating in a practical, logical way we can increase our chances of finding the amazing spiritual connection we seek.

Dating as a Shopping Experience: How Online Dating Can Make It Hard to Build Relationships

I’ve been lucky to be married to the same partner since before internet dating was a thing, so I've never built a dating profile, or been stood up for a coffee date.

I do know some things about internet dating, though. My job as a professional tarot reader over the past quarter-century has given me an interesting perspective.

In a world where it has always been easy to feel isolated, the ability to meet new people is definitely a good thing, although I'm not sure most people actually enjoy online dating, After all, maintaining a dating profile can feel like a second, arduous job.  Nonetheless, the internet dating success stories out there are enough to to keep single people winking and swiping, and sprucing their profiles.

I believe internet dating is basically a good tool to help people meet each other. Ideally, it weeds out people who are obviously incompatible, and lets you see how well a person communicates in written language. On a spiritual level, it tells the Universe you’re serious about meeting someone.

As online dating has become the norm, rather than something to giggle about behind closed doors, I have to admit I have seen some disturbing shifts in our overall culture of dating and relationships. 

We are all used to the convenience of online shopping, and the ease of returning an item that arrives less than perfect, or different than desired. When we purchase something, we don’t want to make do with it if it is not exactly right, and perfect in every way.

With online dating, we choose from a catalog of people. What if swiping right and left on dating profiles plays into our desire to purchase the perfect item, rather than to meet an interesting person? Can we ever be happy with the person we’ve chosen, if we’ve been trained to view them as a product, or a commodity, rather than an actual human being? What if there is a better model available on the next screen?

If, when we meet for the first time, the person we’ve chosen is a little shorter, fatter or poorer than their profile reflected, our shopper genes may kick in to say “This is not the relationship I ordered”, and we easily move back to the catalog to start again.

Worse, when we start to think about eligible people as commodity, and dating as shopping, we may mistake the common irritations in any relationship for deal breakers.

That profile matching avoids anyone who does not share our interests or possess our favorite characteristics may cause us to miss that inspirational moment when we fall in love with exactly the person we thought we never would. Sometimes, chance makes room for magic when it comes to love. I’m not sure the precision of internet dating always leaves room for that chance.

Most couples who meet online spend a good deal of time in conversation, sometimes even falling in love, before they actually ever meet in person. This can offer a false sense of intimacy and compatibility that can make building a normal, healthy relationship a bit tricky.

The very nature of the dating profile assures that our first introduction to our potential partner will be somewhat tainted by dishonesty. It’s not that everyone lies on their profile. It’s that everyone paints a very limited picture of themselves.

That limited picture, and the phone marathons that lead up to that initial meeting, may cause us to fall in love with a profile, rather than a person.

Overall, internet dating may be the single best way to be proactive about finding love.  Still, it’s important that in our desire to shortcut the traditional introduction process, we don’t change the human courtship ritual to the point that we no longer know how to have meaningful relationships.

Perhaps most importantly, we need to remember the difference between ordering a product and meeting a partner.

Does your Relationship have a Future, and Does it Matter?

There is no denying that we do relationships differently, much differently, than in generations past. Yet, we often trot out our grandmother’s worn-out relationship wisdom to help us understand the complexities of modern life. Sometimes Grandma’s advice is timeless. Some of the time old relationship protocols just don’t translate well to our new world.

One of the standard and unquestioned rules of dating is to make sure your relationship “has a future.” The person you are investing time in must be “marriage material.”

If you want to get married and have kids, this is an essential rule. If you don’t want kids, you might want to rethink this rule. For you, the present may be more important than the future.

Sometimes we meet people who aren’t exactly “marriage material,” but who are really enjoyable to be around. If marriage is what you are looking for, these people are a waste of time for you.

However, if you are not interested in reproduction, or if your kids are already grown, the value of a relationship might be measured more in what it offers you in the present, rather than what it might secure for the future.

Generations ago, people formed relationships to ensure their survival. Now, we are perfectly capable of surviving on our own. Often, the purpose of a relationship can be recreation and enjoyment, rather than sharing work and resources.

These days not every relationship needs to have a future in order to be considered an appropriate relationship. Sometimes it really is ok to just be in the now, as long as everyone is on the same page.

In a rapidly changing world, it’s important to remember that the relationship norms of earlier times may not work for every person. The freer we feel to create the exact relationship that works for our unique situation, the more likely we are to find the simple happiness of love.

The Truth about New Relationships

Many times people are taken by surprise when their new relationships fail.

“I just know this is the one for me. We have a connection.”

The belief that you just lost your one chance at true love makes it hard to heal and move on.

The fact is this. Every new relationship has a phenomenal chemistry. Ever new relationship has an energy and a sense of destiny. That’s how relationships happen. Without that “new relationship energy” there would be no relationships at all.

We make a mistake when we assume that amazing feeling of being newly in love inherently means the relationship is meant to me.

Fifty years later, if you are telling the story of how you fell in love at first sight, then you know that “new relationship energy” held the promise of a future.

Here’s another thing. That couple that has been together for fifty years had some red flags about each other back in the beginning. Knowing that comes in handy when we are angry that we went ahead with a doomed relationship even though there were some red flags.

Just as every new relationship has that high-octane chemistry, every new relationship has some red flags. If you wait for a relationship that has no questions and no concerns, you will wait a lifetime.

The bottom line is this. Enjoy your new relationship, and see what happens. Make note of the red flags, and don’t attach to a particular outcome.  And, if you relationship ends, don’t kick yourself. Sometimes we have to explore opportunities that don’t work out.

Finding the right relationship is a numbers game. There are bound to be some that don’t work out. If you can simply enjoy getting to know another person without the pressure of worrying about the future, you will more easily find the person who is right for you.

The One who got Away

We all know about the fish story. Whatever the size of the catch it will never match the glory of the one the fisherman missed. What is it within us that makes us mourn and long for the one that got away more than we are grateful for the one we caught? It doesn’t really matter when it’s about fishing, but it matters a lot when it comes to love.

Recently an article appeared on Yahoo Health that really irritated me. The title is “Study: One in Seven Adults is not with Their True Love.” The article is about a survey of 2,000 adults which discovered many people had “made peace” with their partners but felt that the “love of their lives” was someone who had “gotten away”.

The survey was conducted by an organization that produces an opera festival, so clearly the questions asked may have been written more for their dramatic impact than their ability to create a legitimate scientific study. The article irritated me because it tried to use science to propagate harmful myths about relationships.

To a certain extent I believe in fate and karma when it comes to love. If someone really is your “true love” you will be with them when the time is right. There is no force that could keep that from happening. So it stands to reason if they “got away” they got away for a reason. And if they got away, you have no idea whether or not a long term marriage would have worked with this person.

In the drudgery of cleaning toilets, washing dishes and paying bills it is easy to fantasize about someone you knew when you were young and carefree. Young love is special and poignant. It is harder to find romance amongst the day-to-day operation of a household.  But are people really naïve enough to believe that the one who got away would love them and support them and work with them better than the one who stands by their side year after year? And who is Yahoo Health to promote such unhealthy suppositions?

Another unhealthy supposition promoted by this article is the concept of the one true love. That may have had merit when people were married at thirteen and dead by the time they were thirty. With the longevity we now enjoy there is time in many people’s lives for more than one true love.

Rather than encouraging people to pine for an overly romanticized lost love it may be healthier to help people consider the stability and support many long term relationships provide. If you are not feeling the love for your partner right now, don’t despair. In a long term relationship people fall in and out of love with each other all the time. If you allow the relationship to go through its phases and cycles you may find that you rediscover love with the one who has been by your side all along.

If your long term partnership really doesn’t work, don’t let the fantasy of a long lost love sustain you. If it is time to start a new chapter have the courage to do that while looking to the future rather than to the past.

The age of social networking has brought with it many late-in-life reconciliations and reconnections. It is not unusual these days to hear about a couple who broke up in college and after marriages and kids have reconnected in their senior years, courtesy of Facebook. These are often stories with happy endings, but we cannot assume that these couples “should have” been together for all these years. When we are older being with people we knew when we were young can help us to feel young once more. Sometimes we imprint and bond with a first love. The comfort of that bond can be a blessing in old age whether or not we have spent the majority of our life with that person.

Most of us will have a story about the one who got away. Time will have a way of improving on that story. We may de-emphasize the important point that ended the relationship way back when. The alcoholism may seem like less of a burden in hindsight, for instance. It is important to remember our younger years and to treasure and learn from those memories. But chances are the one who got away did so for a good reason.

Why you are a Magnet for Narcissistic Men and What you Can Do About it

Ladies, are you an a-hole magnet? Do all the men you date turn out to be more into themselves than they are into you? If it happens once, it’s just dumb luck. But if it happens multiple times, there might be a reason.

One likely reason is quite simple. You are not attracted to very many guys, but the ones you are attracted to all have something in common.

You like dynamic, charismatic guys.

You like their charm, their power and their wit. And when they turn their attention to you it makes you melt inside.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with this. But here’s the problem.

Many (not all) dynamic, charismatic guys are narcissistic. That’s why so many politicians are jerks. It’s a problem for women who like dynamic men exclusively.

The good news is this.

There are a few guys in the world who are dynamic and charismatic and compassionate. It is possible, though rare, for a person to have both the qualities you like and the qualities you need to have a good relationship.

You generally can’t change what attracts you. But you can manage the pitfalls.

When you meet someone you are attracted to be aware of the huge chance that this person will treat you badly. Be open to the relationship, but look for the red flags. When you see the red flags appear, don’t waste time! You’ve been there before and you know where this is going.

The problem is that the type of guy you need is rare. You need to spend more time looking for him than you spend trying to make a doomed relationship work or recovering from the damage.

If you can quickly weed out the trash, you will have time to find the gem that is right for you.

True Love Beats the Mythical Soul Mate Every Time

I think I’m both lucky and smart in love. I’m lucky because I married a great guy almost twenty years ago. I’m smart because I am able to use tarot and intuition to help all sorts of people in all kinds of love life situations. Just as nothing can be more joyful than love, nothing can be more frustrating and painful than romantic difficulties.

Over the many years I’ve spent helping people sort out their heartaches a few things have become clear to me. Here’s one of them.

People of all genders, all ages and all sexual orientations have one thing in common – we all want romantic love.  Well, not all people want romantic love– but most do.

Many people are lucky to find a relationship that suits their needs. They settle nicely into lifelong relationships. One thing most of those people will tell you if you ask is this. Maintaining a relationship is hard work. Even when you are with the right person, even when you are head-over-heels in love for decades, relationships require a lot patience, compromise, compassion and communication. The other thing they will tell you is that it is worth it all of that, and more.

Many other people are still searching for a right partner, or healing from something that didn’t work out.

One term I hear often from those who are searching and healing, but not from those who are happily partnered, is “soul mate.” Very rarely will I hear a person who’s been happily married for two decades refer to their spouse as a “soul mate.” Single people are looking for their soul mate. Recently jilted people are saying “But I thought we were soul mates!” There are spiritual leaders who make a lot of money telling lonely people how to find their “soul mate”.

I wish they would all use a different term.

“Soul mate” is a good term to use to describe someone who shares your values and ideology, or someone with whom you have a deep spiritual connection. A soul mate can be a creative partner or a work partner. A soul mate can be a person with whom you have a past life karmic connection. But to describe a workable love relationship as a “soul mate” relationship sets up unreasonable expectations. In many cases setting up those expectations causes single people to fail to find a workable partner and causes love partnerships to fail.

You could say this is simply an argument of semantics. If a person wants to use a particular term, what’s the harm?

In my mind, the harm is this. Finding and maintaining a relationship is hard enough without putting that kind of pressure on it.

Beyond that, the concept of “soul mate” in this context suggests that there is just one person who has been somehow spiritually ordained as a right partner for you. If you somehow fail to find that person, you had better get twenty cats and learn to knit.

There truth is this. There are many potential partners on the planet for each of us.

Often in the beginning of a relationship when the chemistry is really good and the couple is focusing on their similarities rather than their differences they will decide they are soul mates. When they break up a year later they may feel as if they have somehow messed up their one shot at love.

Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between great chemistry and a spiritual mandate.

Are there relationships that are indeed spiritually mandated? I believe that everything happens for a reason. If you have a lousy relationship perhaps there is something you need to learn from it. If you have a great relationship maybe there is a clear purpose for you to be together. Spirit is always present. If something doesn’t happen it is because Spirit didn’t ordain it.

Another problem with the soul mate concept is it may cause single people to be too picky. Yes, we need to be selective in love. On the other hand, if you are waiting for perfection you will be waiting for a very long time. Cue the kitties.

Long term relationships aren’t for the squeamish. But for those who are lucky enough to find one and make it work the rewards are spectacular. I think the process would be easier if we were looking for a true love with a decent human partner rather than a mythical “soul mate.”