Introduction: The Truth About Soul Mates

It’s amazing how many people use the term, "soul mate" to describe their partner or love interest, and yet don’t have an understanding of what "soul mate" means. On the surface, it sounds like soul mates are your true love that spans over lifetimes together. In a way, this is certainly one possibility. But then, what about those people who found their soul mate and yet the relationship didn’t last? Does that mean they weren’t soul mates after all? Or does it mean that the existence of soul mates isn’t real?

For anyone who has ever had the magical, out-of-the-blue experience of meeting someone whom you feel an instant, powerful attraction to along with a sense of having known them before (even though you have never met), you know that something unique and amazing is happening. It’s more than falling in love; there is something else present, connection. And not just any connection, it’s one that feels deep and primitive. For you, little doubt is present regarding the existence of soul mates. For others, this isn’t the case.

Whether or not you understand the true meaning of the term, "soul mate.", you should know that they do, in fact, exist. Not only do they exist, but they exist so that we can ultimately be blissful in life. But this bliss doesn’t come from our relationship with them, this bliss comes from you. It comes from your awakening of who you are in truth – that you are whole, perfect, complete and that you are love.

For many of you, the truth of you has yet to be realized. As you continue reading, you will find this truth, and it will heal you. Right now you may be suffering from pain, disappointment and disillusionment over what you thought you had with your soul mate and what could have been for your relationship. I know that feeling, and it is disheartening. But I tell you, this feeling is temporary, and there is a blessing in disguise that you will discover, and that blessing is you.

Your search for great, mutual love with a partner is not in vain, however. You can find this kind of great spiritual love if you are willing to grow and discover who you really are. I can provide the spiritual wisdom to help you understand - the willingness to grow and discover the truth about yourself is up to you.

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What most people believe about soul mates is that they are supposed to love you forever. Although, this sounds wonderful it isn’t always true. Nor is it the reason you have soul mates in your life. The true, spiritual definition of a soul mate is someone who has elected, in spiritual form before coming into this lifetime, to meet up with you for the purpose of awakening you to who you truly are. That is, the real you – the combined essence of your body, mind and spirit that make up the whole of you. When you agree to do this, it is called a ‘soul contract.’

A ‘soul contract’ is what you might imagine it to be – a pact made by two souls (and sometimes more depending on the situation) to meet in a particular lifetime to play out an often dramatic and emotionally charged scenario riddled with challenges and choices. The main challenge is to make a choice – one that has the potential to change your life – for good or for bad.

While many people would prefer to avoid these heavy weighted choices, in spirit form, the souls involved in the contract know they are necessary to grow and develop – spiritually, emotionally, mentally and physically. And sometimes, the souls involved have some karma to play out – balance in cause and effect that needs to occur between them. Most likely from a past lifetime together, called a karmic soul contract.

A karmic soul contract is one in which an imbalance has occurred in a particular lifetime together that must be balanced in this lifetime. An imbalance in a soul mate relationship is about love. This imbalance occurred by way of choice, which I will explain in further detail later.

Regardless of whether or not a karmic soul contract exists within the relationship, these souls have all pre-chosen spiritual goals to discover. They have chosen to explore their individual spirit as it relates to a far greater spirit that we call the Creator, Supreme Being, The All, The Divine or God/God of their choosing. This process is called the evolution of the spirit – or spiritual growth.

We define spiritual growth as the process by which one explores and discovers their individual spirit as it relates to a far greater spirit – the All, the One, the Divine and the God of their choosing. You long to have a much bigger love connection with your soul mate so much that the sheer desire alone can push open doors you didn’t even know existed. Because of this longing you are forced to look at yourself, to go within and ask questions like, "Who am I?", "Why is this happening?" and so forth. These questions undoubtedly open your mind and your heart to the existence of spiritual possibilities and eventually the answers you seek. Therefore, the cataclysmic arrival of your soul mate spawns this exploration into the spiritual realm that ultimately leads you to the truth of your oneness, your divinity, your wholeness and your perfection.

This is the role and true purpose of a soul mate. Of course romance, fantastic new emotions, and earth-shattering sex are part and parcel of the package. After all, those are essential experiences needed to begin even this growth. These and the desire for more are the proverbial carrots you occasionally need to bust out of your complacency. Still the purpose remains that soul mates are here to remind you, by way of this spiritual growth, of your divine wholeness and perfection. Since most of us are walking around believing we are anything but divine, whole and perfect, this reminder is an invitation to seek this truth out.

Soul mates always arrive at the perfect time – the time when you most need to remember who you are. You can tell that you’ve met a soulmate when there is instant recognition, a feeling like you’ve known each other before, even though, you haven’t. It feels like a connection that is undeniable and not just regarding a sexual connection, but also a telepathic connection. You might not be with that person, but all of a sudden he/she will pop into your mind and you might even think things like "I know he/she is thinking about me." It’s kind of an inexplicable connection that you have. It feels magical. And you wonder where this person has been all your life. It is beautiful and romantic, but often there is some restriction or interference preventing you from creating a lasting, committed bond with each other. So even though in spiritual truth the timing is perfect, it doesn’t appear that way in our physical reality.

You may meet your soul mate when one of both of you is married, committed to someone else or living in another state or country. Either one of you may have a job that limits the relationship from blossoming and developing. The stakes are high when soul mates appear - you risk a huge gain or loss depending on your choice. And you are summoned by powerful unseen forces to choose wisely. As mentioned before, these are not your everyday choices – these are life altering ones.

You inevitably find yourself at a crossroad that feels daunting. How do you choose? Do you take the high-paying job in Chicago or do you stay and cultivate this soul mate relationship? Do you leave your husband for a bigger love or do you stay out of the need for security? These are not choices that you can make by listing the pros and cons – that will drive you crazy. The best way to make these choices is by narrowing these two roads down to the very foundation of the choices: Love vs. Fear.

Choosing the path of fear is easy. You do it all the time. It feels safe. It requires no effort, no amount of strength and it is the most comfortable choice because above all it requires no change. Stay in your abusive marriage and deny your big love opportunity. Take that job in Chicago and life your life of luxury - alone. Or avoid taking a chance on love with that someone special because of the looming guilt and shame over that big mistake you made in your last choice of partner. But take note, because eventually change will take hold of your life. Isn’t it better to jump on your own than be pushed?

And then there is the other choice, choosing the path of love, not the easy path for the faint of heart. In fact, this is the path of the strong, courageous and adventurous heart. The path of love is the path of the unknown that can evoke a sense of fear, but the one with the lion-heart will follow it because, it has to be better than the current conditions of life. The path of love is the path for the one who wants to reach for the stars and never settle for less. Change is embraced, not feared.

Being at this crossroad of choosing between love and fear is considered in the spiritual realm as Karma. It isn’t the type of karma you may have heard of before; you know the one that consists of "what goes around, comes around" or "you reap what you sow" although there are certainly implications of this. This particular meaning refers to a life lesson and the learning and integration of such lesson, depending on which choice you make – love or fear. The lesson you learn isn’t meant to be punishment, but a blessing…albeit in disguise. Once learned, this is a lesson will change the course of your life forever – in a very positive way I might add. It’s very much like an initiation into a "higher" level of being. As if you are walking through some mystical gate appearing open to you and you know that once you walk through, you can never go back to the way you and your life used to be. A karmic test of love is being presented to you upon arrival at this crossroad to see just how far you are willing to grow spiritually to be in this – or any - soul mate relationship.

Choosing fear in this karmic test will present a whole different set of lessons to be integrated, mostly about trust in your safety and security. These lessons often appear over and over again until you are ready to surrender your fear and trust – without any proof – that it is safe to love and be loved.

Making a choice is also the crowning moment when you discover if this soul mate is truly the one. While you may choose the path of love, thereby passing your karmic test, your soul mate still has the free will to choose his/her way. And here, there is the unfortunate chance that he/she may choose the path of fear. You cannot make them choose the path of love to be with you, nor can the God of your choosing. The choice belongs to them and them alone. However, as long as YOU choose the path of love, you win. You see, you have more than one soul mate and because of your choice, you are destined to meet under much ‘softer’ and joyous circumstances. There is always a ‘back-up’ Divine plan available and for the one with the lion-heart that chose love, it is guaranteed to be an even greater (yes, even greater is possible) plan than you could ever have imagined.

This greater Divine plan for your love life is much easier and more fluid, and there is little interference in the blossoming of the relationship. However, this type of soul mate relationship, which I call Divine Partnership, doesn’t come for free. In other words, this relationship becomes available when you have done your spiritual "work". Upon doing your spiritual work, you essentially know who you are in truth – for the most part. Chances are, you have already learned a great deal from going through their grueling journey with relationships.

That said, I want you to know that it IS possible for a soul mate to become a divine partner. For this to happen both people have to do the spiritual work. When I refer to spiritual work, I’m referring to becoming independent, learning to love yourself, discovering who you are and integrating everything that soul mate woke up in you. Doing your spiritual work also means that you attribute the glorious flourishing that is occurring to you as a result of something divine within you, as opposed to giving your soul mate full responsibility for this powerful occurrence. You must understand that he/she is a simply a catalyst – everything else that develops and materializes after their entrance into your life is all up to you. It’s your sole responsibility to grab this golden opportunity to delve into the discovery of who you are in body, mind and spirit by first seeking out those aspects that appear as fractional, broken or otherwise deficient and transform them into wholeness. When this happens, it is a sacred healing journey that a soul mate must walk to manifest the jubilant Divine Partnership they desire. For a soul mate relationship to reach this Divine Partnership, each step taken forward on this journey requires a strong heart full of faith, courage and of course, love.

In my experiences – both personal and professional – I’ve found that it is more often than not that only one-half of the soul mate relationship has the courage and conviction necessary to embark on this journey. I am in no way implying that both will not unite in this challenge. It is entirely possible that both can and will. However, I wish to turn you away from your concern about the outcome and redirect you to the task at hand. This task of embarking on this sacred journey is of critical importance to you whether your soul mate embarks in unison or not. You see, as long as you do embark, you win. The real prize here is in discovering YOU first and foremost. Of course, your Divine Partnership is an equally valuable attainment, yet you can’t have one without the other. And at the very least, becoming your authentic, whole self – who you really are – is by far a deeply fulfilling position to be in.

Allow me to explain what becoming your whole your true self means.

• Becoming whole means that you love yourself exactly as you are. You maintain compassion and unconditional love for yourself.

• Becoming whole means that as much as you might love the other person you don’t need them to make you feel "complete." You don’t emotionally depend upon them.

• Becoming whole means you have strength in your convictions and have integrity. You act in alignment with what is true for you.

• Becoming whole means establishing, strengthening and prioritizing your relationship with the God of your choosing.

Yes, the God of your choosing has an intimate and powerful role in all this. You see, you have another home – a true spiritual home - which is in the heart of God. And there is always a way back to God’s heart. Most of the time the way back is through your desires and your longings. If you longing is to be with a soul mate, someone who resonates with you on a deeper level, someone you feel a deep connection to and equally yearn for us on these same levels. But when things aren’t going the way you hope it may be God’s way of saying, come back home and you’ll see who you truly are. You’ll see that you can have all this and more, but you need first to know your true self. You need to grow spiritually.

Once you stop resisting spiritual growth and instead allow change within and around you, the angst and despair you once felt over your ‘failed’ soul mate relationship starts to dissipate. Life takes on an effortless quality to it. There is a synchronistic flow that is taking you that feels strangely enjoyable. For the first time in your life, you feel more trusting, more relaxed and even happier despite any heartache that accompanies you. You start to care for yourself in more loving ways, and your priorities change in a much more positive and suitable fashion. You want to become closer to the God of your choosing, and you want to become whole. It’s as if everything is working for you to flow you to where you can achieve your innermost desires – namely to connect with your Divine Partner.

This effortless, synchronistic flow means you are in alignment with your Divine plan that is your destiny. Everything in your life that led up to this moment was supposed to happen. You are where you are meant to be to live the life of love, joy, and freedom that you were meant to live. Everything happens for a reason. There’s a divine plan that’s happening all the time, and it’s always for your highest good. There’s no punishment it’s only for good.

As an infinite spiritual being, you choose your life path before you come into this world. Sometimes you make these agreements with other people, and sometimes you make them with yourself, God or the God of our choosing. You test different things out and come out of them feeling better about yourself, loving yourself and growing closer to God and to the divine and getting more in touch with your infinite self. Choosing your life path before you are born is kind of like you’re in a play, and you’re playing a role – you just don’t remember that you chose it.

You choose these spiritual agreements and roles before you are born with the knowledge that you are going to go through challenges and difficulties so that you can experience victory and thus love and joy in yourself and your life.

In the next few chapters of this book, details about how you can apply this knowledge to attain a true, Divine Partnership is given to you in a step by step process.