What is a soulmate?

I have been thinking about what it might mean to have a soulmate recently. Thinking about the connections that form between humans on deep spiritual levels. Soulmates. We bandy the word around a lot. Too easily perhaps. Is a soulmate a lover? Possibly, but not necessarily. A life partner? Maybe, but also maybe not in the traditional sense of couples in relationships or marriages. A partner, certainly. A friend, most definitely. I found this definition which is the one I think I like the best.

In the Celtic tradition, there is a beautiful understanding of love and friendship. One of the fascinating ideas here is the idea of soul love; “Anam Cara” may sound like some new French perfume, but it actually refers to the Celtic spiritual belief of souls connecting and bonding.

In Celtic Spiritual tradition, it is believed that the soul radiates all about the physical body what some refer to as an aura. When you connect with another person and become completely open and trusting with that individual, your two souls begin to flow together.

Should such a deep bond be formed, it is said you have found your “ Anam Cara” or soul friend.

Your “ Anam Cara” always accepts you as you truly are, holding you in beauty and light. In order to appreciate this relationship, you must first recognize your own inner light and beauty. This is not always easy to do. The Celts believed that forming an “Anam Cara” friendship would help you to awaken your awareness of your own nature and experience the joys of others.

The “ Anam Cara” was originally someone to whom you confessed, revealing the hidden intimacies of your life. With the “Anam Cara,” you could share your innermost self, your mind and your heart. This friendship was an act of recognition and belonging. When you had an “Anam Cara”, your friendship cut across all convention, morality, and category. You were joined in an ancient and eternal way with the “friend of your soul”. The Celtic understanding did not set limitations of space or time on the soul. There is no cage for the soul. The soul is a divine light that flows into you and into your Other.

This art of belonging awakened and fostered a deep and special companionship. When you love, you open your life to an Other. All your barriers are down. Your protective distances collapse. This person is given absolute permission to come into the deepest temple of your spirit. Your presence and life can become their ground. It takes great courage to let someone so close. Where a friendship recognizes itself as a gift, it will remain open to its own ground of blessing. When you are blessed with an “ Anam Cara”, the Irish believe, you have arrived at that most sacred place: home. This bond between friends is indissoluble: “This, I say, is what is broken by no chances, what no interval of time or space can sever or destroy, and what even death itself cannot part.” [From Anam Cara: Wisdom from the Celtic World, by John O’Donohue, as found online in Lisa Sabine's Blog.]

My soulmate is someone I can believe in even when he doesn't believe in himself. Who I can trust to be honest with me and tell me to shut up when I need to shut up and to listen to me when I need to talk. My soulmate is a person who will forgive me when I need forgiving and who I will forgive when he needs it, too.

And if sometimes we need space from each other because the Real (tm) World has been closing in on us and we (who are very human after all) have felt crowded or insecure and taken it out on each other, well, then I just have to trust there is a connection that brought us together and which will let us--when we are stronger--come back together, some way, some how. . . serendipitously.

Kowloon in Second Life

If you haven't been to Kowloon in SL you really need to make the time to see it. An incredible build. Makes you feel like you are really there!

Draven discovered it on a splash page of the Emerald (Greenlife) viewer and showed me around. Lovely architecture and, oh!, the neon!

When I need you to talk to me...

It has been a rough week. You know those days when everything just feels off? And you start making the little circles in your head . . . he loves me, he loves me not, he loves me, he loves me not.

I know Draven has been really busy. RL gets in our way so much these days. Sometimes he says, "We are in a good place." Which to me means he is comfortable with us just as we are. Why then do I feel like he's farther away than he used to be? For a fairly tough cookie I can be bloody insecure.

I wanted to talk to him about it Monday, but he wasn't there, only Wren was in-world. She had twenty questions for me: what was new with Rhi? Had I seen Seth lately? Who was that guy [Jamesen] I used to talk art with? What is he doing these days? Have I heard from Kilroy lately? I began to wonder if she was quizzing me for Draven. She does tell him evereything--little sis to big brother. Did he ask her to ask me? Was he worrying that I was seeing someone else? Was he seeing someone and was she trying to break it to me gently? Were my hormones in a dither and making me paranoid for no good reason?

Tuesday got crazy so I didn't get to talk to Draven in the morning. You know a half a year ago I would have heard from him 10 times a day. A year and a half ago I heard from him once or twice a week. Where we are now--chat once a day, an email here and there, in-world for a bit every other night or so--really does seem to be a balance point. So why am I so greedy for more of his time. For more of him? Selfish woman. Well, I thought, we have a date for a long romantic evening Wednesday night. We will talk about all this, and laugh at my foolishness, and it will be all better.

Now here I am Wednesday, I've put on a pretty dress, and I am sipping tea in Jhai's shuttle waiting for him. But haven't heard from him. He was supposed to be here at 5pm or so, and it is going on 9pm. He was on the road in RL today. I can't help feeling something has happened. He wouldn't stand me up, would he? He'd IM if something happened and he couldn't make it wouldn't he?

Where are you, my heart, when I need you to talk to me?