Do you believe in soul mates?

[lovesong]

Very tiny, and the leaves look...blue. I guess it's just my imagination running away with me.

Oh I assure you my eggplant is quite large.

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

Yes, but my understanding of what a soul mate is isn't the simplistic pop culture understanding of it. To me, a soul mate is simply another soul you have forged a bond of some sort with from past lives, usually multiple ones. They can be any sort of bond - positive or negative, they can be platonic friends, family members, romantic partners, even pets. There's something that keeps making you incarnate during the same lifetimes as each other and end up in each other's life in some way. Sometimes it's because there's unsettled issues that need to be worked out so both spirits can move on. Sometimes there's just a deep bond of longing and love that the spirit cannot let go of (not only with romantic love, but non-romantic love with friends, family and pets, too).

I find a good way to know if someone's a soul mate of yours of some sort is if, when you meet them (assuming you didn't grow up with them), you feel like you've known the person before and there's a sudden deep bond with the person as if you're old friends. There is one person in my life who I share that sort of bond with. I feel that my mother was another one of mine.

So you can have multiple soul mates of various types. Some of my family members are probably also some of mine because there are strong feelings of hate and resentment between us, going back even before I was born. So that is an issue that will have to be worked out in a future life, since it doesn't seem that it will be worked out in this one.

 

[atanu]

Lol. I know. Weird.

Existence of oneself is not any less weird, though. And despite many claims we actually do not know what self-soul is. Claiming to know about soul-mates, either way, IMO, is weirder.

 

[ThePainefulTruth]

Oh I assure you my eggplant is quite large.

I dunno. Think maybe I'm barking up the wrong eggplant. AOUWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.

 

[YmirGF]

With respect to how you appear to be understanding the term "soul mate," no, I don't believe in it. As the story is told, it implies a particular set of values that I do not share and encourages expectations for interpersonal relationships that I find problematic. I threw out that story long ago, and replaced it with a vision of "soul mates" that doesn't enshrine monogamous marriages and unrealistic expectations.

I hear you. So far, in this short life, I've managed to come across two "soul mates". These are two wonderful people that had a profound effect on my life and I'm a better person for having known them. That said, no relationship is perfect, but I did get the sense that, in both cases, we had known each other many times before. There was just an odd connection from the first moment in both cases.

 

[Kuzcotopia]

No, no soul mates.

I think the term implies that the relationship you are in is essentially effortless, because your compatibility is perfect somehow. I believe that relationships are rewarding, but they are also work and compromise. Like many things, you get out what you put into it.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

I think there are good and bad matches, but no one is a perfect match, and neither is there just one excellent match. Think about it: everybody's supposed to find their perfect match out of 7 billion people? It's a sentimental concept, but recognizing that doesn't undermine the genuine power of finding someone we can love without reservation.

On the other hand, having difficulty finding such a spouse shouldn't make us settle. Better to live your life unmatched, which doesn't mean you live alone.

I vote yes, in every sense there are soul mates

I believe love is the ultimate purpose for us existing at all, and so I don't think our personal relationships are left entirely to blind chance.. beyond that I obviously don't know how it works, I wonder sometimes if the past relatives of each person, can play matchmaker!