Searching for Soul Mates
Find your Perfect Partner © Martyn Carruthers

Online Couple Coaching & Mentorship

Are you looking for a perfect partner? Do you seek someone who will make your life complete?
Are you searching for a Soul Mate? Or maybe you've found one? Or perhaps you lost one?

Sometimes I barbecue sacred cows ... and this one seems overdue for a good grilling!

I meet many people who say that they are searching for soul mates - and a few who say that they found them. Many people seem to believe that finding an ideal counterpart will automatically bring happiness and fulfillment. While a sense of integration, connection and partnership usually enhances and enriches life, some beliefs and habits can prevent or sabotage this, and immaturity can truly mess things up.

Western philosophy originated in ancient Greece. Over 2000 years ago, Plato wrote that we are conceived perfect, and then split in half by the god Zeus. Plato described loneliness, a desire for lost perfection and a search for a twin soul ... sometimes called a soul mate or twin flame.

Do you believe that certain people are fated to play important roles in your life? Whether this is the influence of Zeus or fate or a wheel of karma, many people seek a special person who will complete their happiness ... and feel completed by them. During a search for a soul mate, a series of potential perfect partners is often found - but each person is sooner or later rejected as inadequate.

While happy partnership is a life treasure, people seeking such a special soulmate may put their lives on hold, and judge all potential partners as not special enough. Such people often seem to be searching for missing parts of themselves, or for missing people from their past. This is not good news.

If the presence of a person triggers wonderful feelings, and the absence of that person may trigger feelings of boredom, loneliness or worse, there is a risk of falling in love with one's own good feelings - and trying to stabilize those good feelings by clinging to someone. For such people, however, finding happiness independent of that special partner can put their relationship into an immediate crisis.

Soul Mate Challenges

Many people have told me about how they sought for and finally found a soulmate ... and how they behaved together ... and how they separated. The patterns and consequences are fascinating. A common pattern is that a person is attracted to a soul mate, but marries someone else; with a consequence that one of the children of that marriage tries to become the missing soul mate!

A yearning to feel connected in a lasting partnership is life-enhancing, but many obsessions about soulmates seem based on teenage romances, media stars, parents or on the qualities (often assumed) of a missing or dead family member - often an aborted or dead sibling, especially a vanishing twin.

People seeking soulmates may burden their partners with often-unspoken demands to fulfill their idealized dreams. On an even darker side, people seeking a soul mate who also experience inner emptiness may balance their search with other compulsions - notably drug, food or alcohol abuse.

For such people, if a soulmate obsession abates, substance abuse may increase, replacing one set of compulsions with another. (Some people endlessly search for the perfect recipe, or wine, or drug ... or pet, or car or computer ... doesn't it start to sound rather familiar? Good enough is not enough.)

Idealized Partners

Many people who search for an idealized soul mate may be responding to guilt ("I hurt someone"), transference ("I want a partner who looks like / acts like ..."), identity loss ("I search for part of me"); beliefs ("I am incomplete") or on a womb-twin ("someone very important is missing").

For some people, a soul mate must look and act like some teenage love, or like a favored actor or actress, or must have enviable financial resources. Or all of the above.

Some people have a string of affairs while waiting for the perfect partner, while others just wait and hope, often repeating a mantra like "If it's meant to be it will happen" ... until they they either give up - or decide to participate in life rather than watch it pass by.

Idealized Parents

Some people seek a soul mate who is like a parent ... this seems to come in two flavors. The first is that the potential soul mate must have qualities similar to a beloved parent. The second is that the potential soul mate must have qualities that a person wanted a parent to have.

I find nothing wrong with an inner child searching for a parent-like partner, but there are consequences ... for example if the inner child grows up or if the partner stops wanting to play parent to a partner. (I hope that this article can help a few people who are making a mess of their desire for happy partnership.)

Idealized Siblings

Many seekers of soulmates appear to seek a missing or dead family member, usually someone whose absence left a guilty hole in the family. In my experience, it seems that a child born immediately before or after a sibling who died of accident, neglect or abortion is most at risk. (Abortion is commonplace in many countries, and seems to have many other unpleasant consequences).

Dr. William Baldwin, wrote in "Spirit Releasement Therapy" that a dead twin attaches its soul to the surviving twin. Dr. Alice Rose wrote in "Coping with Eating Disabilities" that some eating disorders are the result of a twin dying in the womb due to competition for nourishment. Dr. Michael Newton, author of "Destiny of Souls" reports that his clients have "primary soul-mates" rather than twin souls.

Ultrasound tests show that perhaps 30% of people start life as twins, but the twin disappears in the first month of pregnancy. The surviving twin may develop emotional problems, even if the child is not told that a twin vanished. For more on this, see Solutions for Vanishing Twins.

Beliefs, Bonds & Soul Mates

I have met soul mates who describe their partnership as profoundly spiritual, intimate, mature and inspirational. And I have coached soul mates who seemed enmeshed in unrealistic expectations, symbiosis and codependence. (Clinging often summarizes their behavior together.)

I enjoy meeting people who are in healthy partnerships. Their wonderful relationships are often characterized by acceptance, encouragement and gratitude. They communicate respect, solve problems quickly, talk about feelings, plan and work together to raise children, build a business or help their communities. Healthy partnership requires huge commitment and many skills.

Tips for Finding a Life Partner

1. If you act childishly ... expect childish results!
2. Avoid damaged people (unless you want to suffer).
3. Don't just hope that someone finds you. Do the legwork.
4. Know what qualities you offer ... and project those qualities into your life.
5. Know what qualities a partner MUST have, and which qualities are merely important.

Happy, healthy partnership requires emotional maturity and mature partnership skills. These skills will help you build a soul mate relationship ... whether you meet by chance or on a dating website. Immature relationships may provide strong romantic feelings but they are unlikely to survive the everyday needs of committed partnership. See also Finding a Healthy Partner and From Singles to Partners

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Plagiarism is theft. Copyright © Martyn Carruthers 1996-2012 All rights reserved. Soulwork Systemic Coaching was primarily developed by Martyn Carruthers
to help people dissolve emotional blocks and improve relationships to achieve their goals. These concepts and strategies are for general knowledge only. Consult a physician about medical conditions and before changing medical treatment. Don't steal intellectual property ... get permission to post, publish or teach Martyn's work.