Rambling Thoughts on Soul Mates

Let me preface this hub with the disclaimer that this is not intended to be a serious treatise on the existence and implications of soul mates. These really are just some rambling thoughts that arose from a conversation among friends but do indeed reflect my feelings on the subject.

Do soul mates exist? The topic of soul mates came up recently in a conversation amongst close friends. It provided fodder for one of the most interesting and heated discussions I've had of late. Everyone's idea of a soul mate varied somewhat but more was held in common than not. According to Wikipedia:

"A soul mate (or soulmate) is believed by some to be the person with whom one has a feeling of deep or natural affinity, similarity, love, intimacy, sexuality, spirituality, or compatibility. A related concept is that of the twin flame or twin soul, which is thought to be the ultimate soul mate. In New Age spirituality, the ultimate soul mate is the one and only other half of one's soul."

Regardless of whether or not everyone believed in them there was one aspect that was held constant, if they exist. That was the idea that soul mates are somehow destined to meet; that there is some kind of cosmic karma defying reason that will bring matching souls together.

To be up front and honest, when I was much younger I firmly believed in this concept. Out there somewhere was the woman that was perfect for me. Not that she would be perfect but she would be a perfect match for me. Somehow, somewhere, sometime, out of the nearly seven billion people in this world, we would be brought together. Of course, I had absolutely no evidence, empirical or otherwise, to support this belief. It just felt true and I believed it with all my heart.

If you think about it logically, it really is pretty ridiculous. Why would my soul mate most likely be found within my own nation, culture or neighborhood than off in some far-flung corner of the world? Some place I am most likely never to visit. After all, we're talking about soul mates. Souls are eternal; not limited by national borders, cultures or creeds. If this is true, what are the odds that of the seven billion people in the world I would realistically have the opportunity to actually meet them?

Of the world's population, how many people have you actually met in your lifetime? A few thousand, ten thousand, maybe. Even if you had met 100,000 people (very, very, very unlikely. Did I mention unlikely?), the odds your soul mate would have been one of them is 1 in 143,000. Add a zero to that, if you've only met 10,000 possible soul mates. Not very good odds! How is it then that most everyone's soul mate just happens to be living in the same general geographic location? Sure, there exceptions but I'm sure we can agree that statistically the vast, vast majority of people who claim to have found their soul mates did so locally.

When I was in my early twenties I was convinced I had met my soul mate. Honestly, I still am. Without waxing poetic and getting sappy, I felt all those things one is "supposed" to feel around your soul mate. I felt complete with her and lost without her. I loved her in all her imperfection and she, I. We didn't ignore our respective shortcomings we just seemed to have infinite patience with them. All was well in our universe ... until it ended. There's no need to discuss how it ended or why. But if you ask me who my soul mate was, I would name her even now. Even after nearly a quarter century married to another woman. Why it ended is not germane to this discussion but it does bring up the next topic.

Can a person lose their soul mate? If soul mates were meant to be together on some cosmic level, how could it end? Wouldn't we know that, in spite of our human foibles, we really, deeply, insatiably loved each other, needed each other and couldn't live without each other?

Some of my friends were quick to jump in with the trite adage that "If it was meant to be, then it would have been." Essentially saying that if we were really soul mates we wouldn't have broken up. This implies that soul mates have infinite patience, understanding and ability to forgive each other in spite of mankind's clear and substantial ability to seriously screw anything up.

Some soul mate advocates would argue that true soul mates are incapable of hurting their mate to the extent of a break up. If you were soul mates, you wouldn't break up and if you broke up, you weren't soul mates in the first place. This kind of circular logic goes nowhere. I also find this view a bit naive and inconsistent with experience, both mine and the claimed experiences of others. I would argue that the very intimacy of being soul mates gives us almost unlimited power to hurt and crush our soul mates with our infidelities and other indiscretions whatever they are.

Can a person have more than one soul mate? If one can lose their soul mate, then can there be another soul mate out there for them? Many of my friends were adamant on this point. Absolutely not! Only one soul mate per customer. If you lose yours, you're out of luck. Others thought, sure why not more than one and proceeded to cite cases including themselves..

This actually makes more sense in light of the statistical odds of finding that one soul mate out of the seven billion people alive. If there can be more than one, then there could be dozens, or hundreds, even thousands, who knows! This would explain how people so easily seem to find theirs and find them locally. But if there can be multiple soul mates, how come so many people can't seem to find even one?

A myriad of questions arise. There are, of course, an unlimited number of questions that arise out of this discussion. How do I know when I’ve met my soul mate? Can you have more than one soul mate at a time? Does everyone have a soul mate(s) or are there some poor unfortunate unmatched souls out there? What if I feel I have found my soul mate but they don't feel the same way? What if you meet your soul mate and the timing is all off? Can the timing between soul mates really be off? The more you think about it the more questions arise.

I consider myself a fairly logical and rational guy. In fact, I've been accused more than once of being too much so. I find it amazing that so many people put so much stock in the idea of soul mates considering a near complete dearth of real evidence. So, in light of all this my mind and experience tell me that soul mates do not exist. They are simply the creation of an undying desire, a hope, a need in people to, in all our ugliness, know intimately and be known intimately.

So why then, in spite of reason and experience, do I still want to believe there is a soul mate out there for me? Is there eternity in our hearts? What does it say of me that my heart tells me that she is out there, somewhere? Maybe I want them to exist. Maybe I need them to exist. Maybe I need them to exist because the alternative is too unpleasant to think about.