“Your soulmate is not someone who completes you. No, a soulmate is someone who inspires you to perfect yourself.” ~Bianca Spallacino
For years, I seemed to be in an endless search for a soulmate, someone who understood me, loved me unconditionally, and shared my values and interests.
I felt I needed someone in my life who made me feel happy, fulfilled, and complete.
I went on a few dates, sometimes friend-zoned, sometimes turned down, and ended up dating the wrong person the rest of the time.
The thing that hurt me the most was repeatedly getting involved with people who were either emotionally incapable, uninterested in a committed relationship, or simply not compatible with me. And I didn’t understand why. At one point, I thought I was just having bad luck in love.
But looking back, it was my fault in a way. I have not been unlucky in love. I was bad at dating and relationships because my life was the worst.
what do you mean?
Dating and romantic life would have been easier if I had focused less on finding a partner and more on being the person I was attracted to.
After working on healing past wounds and releasing the limiting beliefs that held me back, while also working more on myself and cultivating the positive qualities I look for in a partner: kindness, compassion, honesty, and self-love, my love life changed for the better.
And now I’m living that dream with the love of my life, Sandra, who I met in my senior year of college.
focused who i was Excluding that what i wanted It has helped me attract compatible partners, and it has allowed me to become a better person over the years as I continue to grow.
need to take more responsibility
It’s often said that love is found when you’re not looking, but I’ve always believed that if you keep your mouth shut you won’t get nourishment.
This is why I have been very active in looking for a romantic partner for many years.
But after experiencing countless disappointments, I gave up completely and took a more passive approach, telling myself it was either the universe bringing me a soulmate or not.
For months, I stopped putting myself in situations where I was likely to meet like-minded people. I asked less people, went on less dates, and tried to maintain relationships that were clearly wrong (more on that later).
I have become more and more disillusioned with dating and relationships. Sometimes I thought it wasn’t ‘fate’ to find ‘that person’. Other times, I told myself I had to wait until the universe gave me the “perfect match.”
I left everything to God, destiny, and destiny, and instead of focusing on the things I couldn’t control, I should have taken responsibility for the things I could control, which led to a disappointing love life.
Life probably won’t give most of us the “perfect mate.” This means that unless we act proactively, we are likely to miss opportunities to connect with others who could be a good match for us.
That’s why we believe we should put ourselves in the dating world. You can do this by using online dating apps (which can be frustrating), attending social events, joining interest-focused clubs and groups, and being more open and approachable.
I know it sounds cliché, but it’s better than living passively and waiting for some supernatural force to bring you the “perfect partner.”
No you don’t have to start your life over to find love
I used to be obsessed with finding a soulmate who would not only make me perfect, but also enjoy a fairytale romance with me.
I was so obsessed with finding “that person” that I had to rearrange my life around search.
I even changed my personality to match what all my then lovers wanted in a partner.
I sacrificed so much just to keep the relationship secure and didn’t realize how much I was losing myself in the process.
Now I will no longer bend my life to give someone room or to be loved and accepted by someone.
Because when I do this and end up having relationships with people I thought were the “best partners” I could ever hope for, it often ends in pain and tears.
We didn’t even come close to compatibility. Either we had different goals or our personalities often clash.
With each heartbreaking breakup, it was clear (to everyone but me) that I had given up too much of myself and compromised too much to make things work.
It’s not “true love” if you have to sacrifice yourself in the process of finding and keeping it.
Do not force nonexistent connections
The inconvenient truth is that you can’t change reality just because you don’t want to accept it.
You may choose to put the relationship on a pedestal and ignore the obvious issues because you want to believe that someone is the right fit for you. Perhaps it’s because you’re tired of searching, or because the person seems like a good fit and just has to be “that person.”
But what if they aren’t “that person” because they don’t want to be “that person”?
When this happens, we may try hard to convince ourselves that this person is our soulmate, even if they are unresponsive to our feelings, treat us poorly, or generally act contrary to our expressions of love for them.
I’m a hopeless romantic at heart, so I’ve met a few people who I strongly feel would be a good fit for me. But what affected me the most was the last girl I dated before I met Sandra.
She was smart, beautiful, and made me feel like the only person in the world.
But over time things started to look different than I expected.
It wasn’t because I had unrealistic expectations. Unless it’s unrealistic to expect my partner to at least minimize last-minute cancellations of plans or be considerate of my feelings.
Despite all this, I couldn’t shake the feeling that she was my soulmate and that we should be together. I thought of her behavior as a temporary phase and told myself that if I was patient, things would get better.
Sound familiar?
One of the big lessons I’ve learned is that people who are so committed to thinking we are soulmates are actually the wrong people for us.
Because we all deserve someone who appreciates us for who we are.
To find that kind of love, we need to focus on being the kind of person we want to attract, take more responsibility in meeting new people (without sacrificing ourselves and clinging to them), and never settle for anything less than we deserve. Doing these things increases our chances of finding that special love we’ve been longing for.
