Soul Mates On Steroids: Growth the Hard Way
By Nina Atwood
A soul mate is a person with whom you feel a deep connection that may even defy logic. In love relationships, the term soul mate includes a sexual connection. Many happy, fulfilled long-term couples consider themselves soul mates. But I want to discuss the kind of soul mate connection that doesn’t work in the long run. For lack of a better phrase, let’s call them soul mates on steroids (SMOS).
SMOS connections are more painful than positive in the long run. The highs are very high, but the lows are very low in these highly charged, intense relationships. Why? Because familiarity and commitment lower intensity while yearning and conflict raises it. For some soul mates, their relationship is defined more by what they are seeking from one another than it is by what they actually have, thus setting them up for feelings of unrequited love.
If you have ever experienced it, then you know the personal challenge that this kind of soul mate can introduce into your life. Because the connection is so intense, meaning that you feel so passionately in love yet don’t feel that there is a smooth path to commitment, you can be emotionally hooked into an up and down dynamic. You pull very close, then pull apart due to outside forces (i.e., your lover lives in another town, is married, is an active addict, is in another relationship, etc.). The fundamental lack of availability that characterizes these kinds of soul mate relationships makes them prone to emotional highs and lows.
Another characteristic of SMOS’s is the sense that this person triggers you in a way that brings out your worst behavior. It’s as if your lover knows without being told where all of your deepest emotional buttons are and how to push them. The challenge for you is to maintain your emotional equilibrium with all of this button-pushing. If you embrace that task in a positive way, you may actually grow from the relationship.
On the other hand, the emotional ups and downs take their toll over time, and many people find that the relationship is not sustainable. The end of an intense relationship like this can leave a great deal of pain in its wake that takes a long time to heal. Though intensely painful, a SMOS can push you into growth, although definitely the hard way.
Can a soul mate relationship be positive? Absolutely, as long as you have the right ingredients for commitment. A positive soul mate relationship prods you gently to grow rather than being a force that tears your world apart. You can grow the hard way, but why not choose someone who promotes gentle, healing growth in your life?
Entry Filed under: Relationships
