After nearly two weeks, I finally returned to Bikram yoga today. Painful is an understatement for the appropriate word to describe that experience. By the start of the floor series I was ready to go back home and crawl myself back in my bed. A missed week of Bikram, is like starting your first hot yoga class over again. On my travels east, I did go with my friend to a Bikram Yoga class in Virgina, however the experience was nothing like the Honolulu Bikram experience. Ahhh, another reason to love Honolulu 🙂
As I attempted my 90 minute moving meditation in the very hot room, my mind started to wander. Well my mind always wanders, nothing new.
But today my wandering brought me to thoughts about soul mates. Do they really exist, or is the idea of a soul mate a piece of fiction that can be comparable to Walt Disney fairy tale?
If this blog by some random chance of fate gone wild ever turned into a book, turned movie, my movie would not be your typical love story, or romantic comedy like so many other single girl goes on a random adventure to find a new life kind of movie. My movie would be more like a cynical comedy. Somewhat like Juno. Dry humor, with an unpredictable ending that is still unwritten.
If my life were fit for true Hollywood fashion it would go something like this: I leave New York, fly across the world, end up in Hawaii, learn the island, then randomly meet a gorgeous, charming man in a way that involves some form of irony, he falls in love with my quirks, flaws, and amazing personality. We spend an endless amount of time together, we have the all too predictable conflict over a meaningless topic, eventually get back together because we realize this is what the universe wants. The ending: we drive pass the ocean into the sunset. In movie world, I would have met my soul mate by now, or at least someone who I thought was my soul mate for the time being.
However, in reality, my life works something like this: I leave New York, fly across the world, end up in Hawaii, learn the island, make a ton of crazy friends, engage in life threatening adventures just to see if I survive, go to work everyday but love my job, and sit around thinking about what my next life challenge will be. Hmm that may not be interesting enough for the big screen. In my movie world, I will not stumble upon Mr. Perfect one day, who I eventually realize is the one I have been looking for all my life ( how cheesy does that sound anyway?)
But I am starting to wonder, do soul mates actually exist. Some married people have said, I knew I had met “the one” the moment I laid eyes them, is that real? Or, do people just say things like that because it sounds like love? Personally, I don’t think I would know my soul mate if he actually did come and save my life because I was about to get by a bus (just saying). I am not sure if ever in my life have I just laid eyes on someone, and knew he was “the one”. I think I have actually fallen in love by accident, it just happens over time. Obviously I haven’t yet met my soul mate.
Since I have decided that I would not make a good career military wife, I doubt my soul mate is on the island of Oahu. Maybe he is on Maui? Or, maybe not. Since there are so many people in the world, maybe we all get a pick of three or four soul mates. Fate would have us only meet one anyway there would be no conflict later in life. Perhaps my soul mate is in another state, he could actually be in New York and I just missed him. I could do some more traveling in case my soul mate is in another country. However, if fate brings us together than I really don’t have to look for him right? He will just pop out of the sky one day by some random coincidence. That sounds about right. I am not searching for “the one”. I will just stay still and let life happen.
To anyone who has found their soul mate, how did you know it was that person? And more importantly are they everything you expected they would be?
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Thanks for the comment!
I completely agree there is definitely no easy answer, one of the many complications of life and relationships. Sometimes people just mesh and have a strong connection, and I think that is totally cool. It works, but does it mean they are soul mates? Not sure because they could just be great for each other. If two people feel that they are perfect for each other, then they just may have found the perfect match. I also agree with you that everyone may not have that perfect match. Since compatibility is based on so many different factors, if one is able to find someone who meets all of the factors then I would say they would have found a person who is perfect for them or possibly a soul mate.
Are there soul mates… I guess that would depend on your definition of what a “soul mate” actually is. It seems this is a subjective question in the fact that you would probably get a lot of different answers from a lot of different people.
If we are talking about the religious concept of a soul, and everyone in the world has someone somewhere they are destined to be with, then I would say that no, soul mates do not exist. (Of course as I said, the answer depends on the person you are asking. As someone who doesn’t believe in a literal soul, I could not agree with this definition.)
But however, if you take the idea that some people have the potential to meet another person who they mesh with so perfectly, as in caring about the same things, having the same interests, having the same sense of humor, then I absolutely believe that some people can find a “soul mate.”
However I don’t think that everyone has a perfect match, I am not even sure if there really IS such a thing as a “perfect” match. Some people will be lucky enough to find people that they are extremely compatible with, and some people will meet someone that they are only somewhat compatible with. But in the end I don’t know if compatibility in this manner is really important, because I have seen many couples who are exact opposites, and have fantastic relationships.
This is definitely a question that has no easy answer!