SoulMate

Its such a cliché , that we never stop and ponder its actual meaning. Its so frivolously used by college students (who change partners faster than clothes), in movies and expressions of love on Archie's greetings that it has just become an extension of the words boyfriend/girlfriend. The power and significance behind calling a person your soulmate has perhaps lost its meaning in this day and age. Its almost being used as a decorative word to describe the person that you are "currently" dating.

The stories passed on from generations is that when a person dies, sometimes his ‘soul’ is split in two , and each goes into a different person – a male and a female. Then starts the journey of each finding the other person, leading to a romance spanning centuries and births. This is where more cliché dialogues like “You complete me “ or "I feel incomplete without you "comes into the picture.

I was reading a book ‘Brida’ by Paulo Coelho, which puts forward a very interesting and disturbing concept. The magician in the book believes that the soul splits 7 ways. So a person has 6 other people in this wide world who could be his/her soulmate. I know it definitely makes the search easier, but for die hard lovers of eternal romance, this is a disturbing fact. The whole idea of soulmate revolves around your other half, split right down the middle, so it’s an open ended questions…Can we have more than one soul mates? Is it possible that a person loves you more than he loves himself ?

There is a very simple story I had heard some time ago. A story defining what love is. A youth in his prime asks his master what love is ? The master asks him to go to the garden and pick the most beautiful flower he can find. But once he has passed a flower , he is not allowed to turn back to it. The youth , though wondering how this is going to answer his question , obeys his master. He goes from flower to flower looking for the best one. But everytime he finds an amazing one , he thinks to himself, "What if I find a better on in the next row" and leaves the flower and moves on. This happens a couple of times, before he reaches the end of the flower bed. This is when he realizes, the flower at the beginning was the most beautiful he had ever seen. Dejected, he goes to the master. The master says "This my boy, is love. When we are lucky enough to find the love of our life , we give it away or let it slip away from our hands thinking it was never meant to happen, and someone made for us is just around the corner. A few, very few possess the courage ,spirit and fierce love to truly acknowledge the fact that they have met their soulmate and their search has ended. That they would fight any circumstance,temptation and storm to be with their soul. That my son , is love....Eternal and forever."

The youth , still having his doubts asks " Then what my lord is marriage ?". The master smiles and asks the youth to again go to the garden and pick the best flower he can find and as usual, he is not supposed to turn back to a flower once he has passed it. The youth confident this time , picks the first beautiful flower that he finds and brings it back to the master. The master says, "This is marriage my son. Where we choose the person we want to spend the rest of our life with and then spend the rest our life making it work.

But we also find another kind, who find their soulmate and are destined to spend their life in togetherness and love, where each day is a celebration and each year a milestone of eternal harmony and peace. Do you think such stories are only found in movies and Mills n Boon romances ? Each relationship has its ups an downs, the effort ,determination and sacrifices in blood to make it happen is what makes all the difference , which can only stem from the intensity of love for each other . I have been fortunate in my life to have known people like that , seen what it feels like to share your life with your soulmate and understood the true meaning of a partner. For that , I humbly bow before god because it cannot be described in words, as is true for the most innocent and fiercest of human emotions. The true nature of it stands the test of time, consequences, temptation, greed and lust.

As the saying goes, "You should not marry the person who you can live with, but who you cant live without".