Tag Archive: romance


Healing Romantic Obsession


Copyright Soul Arcanum LLC, 2011. All rights reserved.  
 All rights reserved. :)
 

Dear Soul Arcanum:

I’ve been seeing this man for about nine months. We had an open relationship. At first I was totally against it, but I felt like this was the only way I could be in his life. He has guided me on becoming more spiritual. (I think I have always been spiritual but now I’m not afraid to embrace it.) He is almost like a mentor to me. Now it seems he has fallen back in love with an old flame with whom he has children. It hurts that he just dropped me and committed to her. I want to disconnect from the spiritual connection we share. It’s like he is with me wherever I go. I love him but the pain and torment is something I can live without. I’m scared he will know and try to put a spell on me. He has done this in the past, and while it did not work on me, it was effective on others. I want to be free of this spiritual connection. It is very powerful and like nothing I have ever felt before.

Ameerah

Dear Ameerah:

Your question reveals what is happening on a metaphysical level. I find it particularly interesting that even though you say this man dropped you and committed to another, you write about your relationship in the present tense as though it is ongoing. In fact, you go back and forth between present and past tense when describing this relationship, which reflects how it’s both over and not over at the same time for you.

I’m wondering how you know about him putting spells on other people; I can only assume that he actually told you that he has done this. You imply that he tried to put a spell on you and that it didn’t work. Whether he overtly tried to influence you in this way or not, it’s pretty clear that you are “under his spell,” at least in the conventional sense of the term. This saying reflects our awareness on some level that it is possible for someone who is very magnetic and charismatic to influence people to feel as you are feeling.

Breaking free of a charismatic lover is in some ways similar to breaking free of the influence of a cult leader. In both scenarios, the “follower” gives their power away to someone they perceive to be somehow extraordinary. In order to reclaim your power, you have to begin to know YOURSELF to be just as special, lovable, and wonderful as the one you’ve been worshipping. When you make another person your God, you set yourself up for anguish and disappointment. It’s time to stop making him so special and begin to look for the divine within yourself and everyone else.

To be immune to the influence of charismatic types, you have only to own and exercise your power to consciously create what you want in your life. This is all about taking your power back. To have influence over us, a person must have stronger will/chi than we do. In order to break free, you must summon enough will power and desire to match that person’s energy or supercede it. This means you have to want to be free even more than he wants you hanging on. You also have to believe in your power to be free and to create what you want in your life even more than he believes in his power to influence you. This is definitely a battle of wills.

He may be the sort of person who wants as many admirers as possible, or who wants to have a back-up lover waiting in the wings just in case his current relationship doesn’t pan out. The good news is that he is focused elsewhere right now, and it will be impossible for him to summon enough desire to keep you if you begin to take your power back. This just makes sense, for your desire to have your life back will be much stronger than his desire to keep something he’s not focused on or attached to hanging around in the background.

Following are four ways you might go about ending this obsession. Allow your intuition to illuminate the best remedy for you by choosing whatever you feel drawn to. Please keep in mind that any of these options can instantly work for you if you bring your whole being to it.

Ways to End Romantic Obsession:

Guided meditation to cut psychic cords: Set aside special time for this exercise, then get quiet, close your eyes, and visualize the connection between you as a cord like string, linking you together. If it feels right, mentally explain to him why you are cutting the cord. If it doesn’t feel right, then explain to the Universe what you are doing and why, and ask for your guides and angels to help you. Focus on the positive: on what you want and the good that you expect to come from this. Be very clear that you are now taking conscious control of creating what you want in your life. You may perceive something in response from him or the Universe. This may include impressions, insights, ideas or solutions, so pay attention and allow whatever comes to you to lead you to new awareness and healing. When the time feels right, cut the cord by visualizing yourself with scissors or a knife cutting away whatever connects you. As you do so, say out loud: I cut this cord so that we may BOTH be free to find greater love and happiness. The more you can embody the feeling of love and happiness you desire for yourself and everyone involved, the more powerful the ritual will be. Afterward, get rid of anything he gave you, and remove all traces of him from your world.

Direct healing from Spirit: If you are adept at prayer and meditation and have a strong relationship with your spirit guides, you can enter into a deep meditation and simply ask Spirit to heal you of this obsession. Ask to be set free, for all thoughts and feelings about him to be taken away, and to feel the way you want to feel: free, at peace, and hopeful about the future. Ask to be guided to something new to pour your love and passion into. Pay attention to what happens, especially in your body. If you are strongly connected, you’re sure to feel something shift or change within you, and afterward, to notice that you feel profoundly changed on an inner level by this exercise.

Spells and rituals: There are many “spells” and rituals you can perform to break free of obsession. Given the space limits of this column, I don’t have room to offer one here for you. The subconscious mind loves ritual, for it’s a way to communicate with your deeper self about what you want and to rally the forces of the Universe to help you achieve your aim. If this idea resonates with you, I encourage you to search the internet for an appropriate spell/ritual, and devote all of your being to it.

Hypnotherapy: Hypnotherapy is a very fast and powerful way to heal and release the past and program yourself to move forward to create what you want in your life. If the above methods don’t appeal to you or leave you somehow wanting, don’t give up hope: I’m sure a skilled hypnotherapist will be able to help you.

A final note: the surest way to release an obsession over something that has ended is to find something new, wonderful and fulfilling to get “obsessed” with. Whether it’s a new relationship, an exciting project, a pet or some endeavor you’re passionate about, if you choose something that blesses you in equal measure to the psychic and emotional energy you pour into it, you will wake up one day and realize that you can’t even remember the last time you thought about old whats-his-name.

To help you with all of this, I recommend you check out some of the great deep trance processes in the spiritual toolbox at Soul Arcanum. :)
– Soul Arcanum

 

Further Healing Old Emotional Wounds

Copyright Soul Arcanum LLC. All rights reserved. All rights reserved. :)
 

Dear Soul Arcanum:

I need some advice on a situation that doesn’t seem to want to finish. I had a short but cataclysmic relationship with a young man a few months back. We were both in places in our lives at the time that drew us to one another very quickly and intensely. Things progressed rapidly then suddenly blew up. It was devastating to me, but I’ve done a lot of work around this and have come to a pretty good place. I finally allowed myself to be angry with him, and then I forgave him and it felt wonderful. Since he teaches at my daughter’s school, I see him in the mornings, but the kicker was getting an email from him telling me that he is looking at an apartment in my building. I couldn’t help but laugh at the irony of the Universe, yet the old wounds began to open up. Part of me isn’t the slightest bit surprised that he is marching back into my life, for I’ve always believed we had more stuff to work through. I try to feel loving toward him as I know he is going through some challenges himself, yet I need to resist getting sucked into the cycle of putting his needs above my own. How do I gracefully accept the possibility that he can be my neighbor as if nothing ever happened between us? I want to tell him to get lost and go live somewhere else, yet I wonder why he is coming back (or being sent back) into my life. What do you think?
Loretta

Dear Loretta:

Before we delve into your personal spiritual lessons in this situation, I think it’s important to contemplate the possibility that he is missing you and was either feeling you out by telling you he was thinking about moving closer to you, or is indeed planning on moving into your building because he hopes that with time and effort, he may be able to rekindle your romance. (If he was as anxious to put your relationship in the past as you seem to be, instead of emailing you, he would most likely either look elsewhere for an apartment or at the very least, avoid telling you about his plans.)

This possibility aside, let’s explore the deeper spiritual issues at play here. Your reaction to this situation indicates that you do indeed have more healing and growth to accomplish. This is something of a spiritual test of your healing status. Given your panicked reaction, I think you’d be wise to view this situation as a wonderful opportunity for you to heal more completely from this very intense emotional experience. (If this process was complete, hearing from him and seeing him wouldn’t faze you any longer.)

Your situation illustrates one of the strange but beautiful things about the Universe: anything left unfinished naturally comes back up for us time after time until we master it. It may not seem like the time is right for you to deal with this yet, but these things also tend to happen when we’re ready to take our learning and growing to the next level.

Further, our feelings are very clear road markers regarding where we are vibrationally in relationship to other people, relationships, issues and experiences. When someone from the past comes back into our lives and we’re overjoyed, then clearly, there is nothing troublesome that was buried under the carpet that needs to be brought out into the open and cleaned up. When someone shows back up and we feel wary, anxious, angry, upset, etc., it’s a sign that there is great potential for further personal growth via this situation.

This doesn’t mean that we have to welcome everyone we’ve ever been involved with back into our lives with open arms. In fact, I often read for people whose lesson is to love themselves enough to learn to say no. Being confronted by people to whom they’ve given their power away in the past tests their resolve to create something better in their lives, and until they find the strength and self-love to choose what is really good for them, those people will keep coming back. So though we naturally want to run away from people who have broken our hearts in the past, they are often our greatest teachers.

Of course, people keep coming back into our experience in order for karma to be worked out as well. It’s my understanding that this doesn’t happen due to some grand elaborate plan. Instead, the force behind it is more like gravity: our intense emotional connections to people are like elastic bands, so whether we love them or hate them, when people evoke strong emotions in us, they will keep coming back into our experiences time after time, lifetime after lifetime.

Sometimes, even after we’ve personally made peace with the past, people come back into our experience because they still have karma or issues to work out. I don’t feel that this is the case for you, however, because if you were fully at peace with this whole experience, you wouldn’t be afraid of getting sucked back into things with him.

You mention being afraid of putting his needs before your own, and it sounds like this may be the big lesson in all of this for you. What better way to learn (and practice) honoring your own needs than by being in a situation that challenges you to remember? We don’t learn anything by avoiding challenges, which is no doubt why we subconsciously create and recreate the perfect situations in which to master whatever we need to learn.

As for trying to be neighbors as though nothing ever happened, I don’t see the point. Why pretend that nothing ever happened when it did? The more real you can be with your own true feelings and the truth of the situation, the faster and more directly you will be able to get to the heart of things where you can unravel anything that is tangled and move on to create the love, peace and happiness you long for.

I assure you that your situation holds nothing to fear and lots of blessings for you. Even if you do get sucked back into some sort of relationship with this guy, it will no doubt lead you either to the fulfillment of some desire or greater peace and clarity, after which you will be more empowered to create what you want in your life. If you strive to approach this situation with love and wisdom, it will also improve the karma between the two of you, which means the next time you reconnect, instead of feeling anxious, you may feel delighted and go on to enjoy all the love and harmony you’ve cultivated between you.

My advice on how to make the most of this situation can be summed up in one line: attitude is everything. This is true with spiritual lessons and with all of life’s challenges, for that matter. When we sink into fear and resist whatever comes our way, we make everything so much harder for ourselves. When instead, we stretch to be our very best selves, and we relax and choose to trust that one way or another, everything will work out fine, life begins to just flow. In fact, it does better than flow: it grows brighter and more beautiful every step of the way.

How you approach this will absolutely determine the quality of your experiences. If you can embody love and trust and let yourself shine, this situation may not affect you one bit as you sail forward to your dreams. If you really pour your best self into it, you may even be able to cultivate a deeply beautiful, rewarding experience for all involved.

– Soul Arcanum

She Always Wants What She Can’t Have


Copyright Soul Arcanum LLC. All rights reserved. :)
 

Dear Soul Arcanum:

I have a very bad case of wanting what I can’t have, especially when it comes to relationships. I might have a crush on a guy until he becomes a real prospect, but then I begin to have doubts and get scared off. There are two men in my heart who were boyfriends in the past. I wasn’t serious about them when they pursued me and I easily let both of them go. When I thought about committing to them, I had all sorts of excuses for why they weren’t right for me. Years later, they are married fathers leading happy lives and I am single and going through tough times alone. I am now able to see how great they were and how my excuses for not getting serious about them were poor ones. I can’t tell you how hard I kick myself for letting them go. It’s truly eating me up, loving them deeply now and wanting them back and thinking how much more meaningful and fulfilling my life would be now had I been wiser before. I don’t want to be obsessive and stuck, which is how I feel, but I don’t want to stop loving them because even with all the painful regret, the love somehow feels better than indifference and the petty criticisms I had for them when I was dating them. I want to move on, stop the cycle of running from love, and be happy. Please help!

O.

Dear O:

Thank you for doing such a wonderful job of explaining your situation. What you describe is a common pattern; in fact, I know a number of people personally who do the same sort of thing. I’m sure you’re familiar with the term self-sabotage and the idea that many people unconsciously sabotage their efforts to create what they want in their lives. As a hypnotherapist, I see this a bit differently. While it’s true that people may do things that don’t appear to make sense, there is always a good reason why people do the things they do.

For example, Joann came to me at more than 200 pounds, deeply frustrated and desperate to find a way to lose weight. She had been on countless diets in her 47 years and had lost tens of pounds over and over again. Every time she got down to a size 8, she would start putting weight back on and regain all she had lost and more. In this way, she crept from around 145 pounds to over 200 despite years of dieting.

When I took her into a deep trance and asked her to go back to a significant event in her weight struggle, she at first relayed some upsetting but relatively minor experiences such as being embarrassed of her body as an adolescent and an incident in which she couldn’t fit into the jeans she was trying to borrow from a friend. These were just the outer layers of the onion, however. Eventually when asked to go back to the next significant event, she began to cry and hyperventilate. As I walked her through what she was experiencing, it came out that she had been raped at the age of 22; it was after this that she began to put on weight in an effort to feel less attractive and thus safer. She had been a size 8 at the time of the rape, and every time she became a size 8 again, she would grow very uncomfortable and immediately try to remedy what her subconscious perceived to be a problem by gaining weight again.

When I brought her out of trance, it was clear that a light bulb had come on: She now understood that she hadn’t been sabotaging herself – she had been trying to protect herself. The problem wasn’t a lack of self-love; it was the unfounded belief that if she didn’t carry extra weight, she would be hurt again. Once we healed and released the past trauma and put some empowering new beliefs in place, she found it relatively easy to lose the weight and keep it off.

Perhaps you’ve already figured out what this has to do with you. In case you haven’t, I’ll offer you a case that is a closer match to what you’re going through. Sarah came to me with a problem similar to yours: she was in her late thirties and had never been married because she too always wanted what she couldn’t have. She only wanted men who were unavailable for some reason. A couple of times, she did develop crushes on men who eventually returned her interest, but once she could have them, she didn’t want them anymore.

Regression therapy uncovered a number of possible causes for this pattern, such as her father abandoning the family when she was small, which led her mother into a depression from which she never recovered. From this she developed the belief that it’s never safe to give your heart completely to another human being.

More powerful, however, was the past life she relived in which her parents wanted her to marry a man of means but she chose to marry a penniless youth for love. Though he was handsome and romantic when he was courting her, her husband turned out to be a mean drunk who beat her and the children they had together. They lived in miserable destitution because he was too drunk to earn a living and would spend the money she was able to bring in on alcohol. She would sometimes see the man she had chosen NOT to marry with his wife, looking happy and prosperous, and think to herself that she had made a terrible choice. She died young in childbirth, and as she was dying, she was very worried about what would become of her young children with just their alcoholic father to depend upon. As she was dying, she was filled with regret and thoughts of how just one bad decision can ruin your life.

As a result of this traumatic past life experience, she was incredibly indecisive in this life: every time she was faced with a decision, she would get anxious and second-guess herself. She was also forever thinking that the grass must be greener on the other side. Though she consciously believed that she wanted to fall in love and get married, on a subconscious level, she did not believe this was a wise or safe thing to do. This led her to constantly chase after men she could never actually catch, and to run away from those who chased her. Within two years of resolving this past trauma and the limiting beliefs underlying her lack of fulfillment in love, she was happily married to the man of her dreams.

To resolve your pattern, first you must stop beating yourself up about it. Assume that your subconscious mind is trying to help you and that your job is to get your conscious and subconscious minds working in harmony. Imagine that your goal is to move a dresser: if your conscious mind is pushing forward on one side and your subconscious mind is pushing forward on the other side, you’re going to end up very frustrated. Now imagine that you can bring your subconscious mind over to your side to push WITH you: suddenly, things start to move forward with surprising ease.

I know of no faster way to totally transform your life than to begin to consciously work with your subconscious mind and higher self. Since every person’s story is unique, I encourage you to seek hypnotherapy so you can uncover and resolve whatever may be keeping you from a truly fulfilling experience in love.

Finally, it’s normal to continue to love people we’ve loved in the past, but that doesn’t mean we’re meant to be with them in the future. I think you’re hung up on these old boyfriends because they are symbols of the sort of man and relationship you want. Instead of lamenting the ones who got away, I encourage you to focus on the future and open your heart to meeting someone new.

Soul Arcanum

 


How to Attract True Love

 

Copyright Soul Arcanum LLC. All rights reserved. :)

Dear Soul Arcanum:

How can I use the law of attraction to manifest true love with the perfect man for me?
Kezzer

Dear Kezzer:

There are a couple of ideas we need to explore before moving on to the subject of manifesting true love.

While reunions with soul mates tend to happen on a destined schedule, in many cases, we may have some control over the speed with which we draw certain people into our lives. Usually such reunions occur when ‘the time is right’ and ‘the stars align.’ Other times, the only thing holding us up is a lack of readiness for such a relationship on our part or the part of the one we’re seeking.

It’s important to realize that the perfect relationship for us at any given time may not be one that is meant to last a lifetime or fulfill all our dreams for love, passion and harmony. We are all in the process of healing old wounds, working through old karma and growing into greater personal potential, and the greatest forum for doing so is our relationships. This means that every relationship is perfect for us at that time, for it is there to fulfill some desire or teach us something we need to learn in order to move on to a higher experience of love.

This doesn’t mean that we have to take whatever comes our way. In fact, there are lots of things we can do to prepare ourselves for true love. Should we have to wait on destiny in order to meet up with a certain individual, we can also create a delightful experience of love in the mean time.

One of the most common misconceptions I run into in my counseling work is the idea that if a relationship doesn’t work out, something must have gone wrong. In fact, all relationships arise for a good reason, and from a higher spiritual perspective, these become clear as underlying patterns of experience. It can therefore be very helpful to seek higher awareness via meditation, hypnotherapy and other spiritual practices, or via spiritual counseling with a gifted intuitive reader, for when we become conscious of the issues we’re working on, we can spark breakthroughs and fast progress.

The first thing I recommend is to work on any subconscious (or conscious) issues that may be holding you back from a fulfilling romantic experience. We all have these issues, for behind and beneath all we do there is profound longing to be loved and to love others on a deep, rich level. Further, we’ve all had painful or less than fulfilling experiences of love in the past, and if these are left unresolved, unhealed or incomplete somehow, they will hold us back from greater fulfillment until they are addressed.

All of this is perfect, for it’s what propels us toward personal growth and spiritual evolution. Our longing for a deeper sense of happiness and fulfillment keeps us trying, which is all we need to keep doing in order to naturally discover, heal and release old wounds, karma and issues. In my view, it is love and the longing for love that makes the world go ’round and gets us out of bed each morning.

As each person is a unique and beautiful individual, the issues holding people back from true love are unique and personal to them. This is another reason why it’s important to go beyond the advice and philosophies of self-help gurus and get our hands dirty by embracing spiritual practices and therapies.

There are some general common stumbling blocks, of course. I think we’re all familiar with how a lack of self-esteem can prevent people from pursuing a relationship that is truly healthy and fulfilling. Similarly, fears of rejection and abandonment hold many people back from fulfilling their dreams for love. Limiting beliefs about what is possible in love are also common obstacles. When these issues remain unconscious, they hold us emotionally hostage until they are faced, worked through and transformed to align with a higher level of experience.

Whenever we find ourselves in a pattern that is frustrating or unfulfilling, we are therefore wise to look to our inner world. To make new progress, we must examine old wounds, deep fears and limiting beliefs, and continue to stretch ourselves to heal, empower ourselves and reach for greater personal potential. If you feel blocked, I highly recommend hypnotherapy, through which you can go back and heal and release old wounds and also cultivate new beliefs and a more constructive approach to love.

As I mentioned above, there are things we can do to align with a delightful experience of love even as we’re doing whatever inner work is necessary in order to prepare for the soul mate experience our souls are yearning for.

How we feel about love is ultra-important, for we tend to manifest what we expect, and what we focus upon grows larger in our experience. Just as it is important to let go of worrying about symptoms and focus on well-being in order to cultivate good health, we are wise to look past whatever we lack in terms of love and focus on embodying love itself in order to manifest more of it in our lives.

The more we give our attention to love with a positive feeling, the more we become magnets for it in all sorts of wonderful ways. If you don’t have a partner to shower with love and affection yet, you can love the one you’re with, by which I mean that you infuse all the relationships already in your life with more love. Flow love to your friends, family, neighbors and acquaintances. Upon greeting someone, say to yourself, The love in me greets the love in thee. Visualize your heart chakra openly flowing love and good will to everyone you meet.

One of the most powerful tools for working with the law of attraction is to write the story of what you want to happen in the past tense. The key to infusing this exercise with lots of power lies in the emotional vibration it carries you into.

First just sit for a few moments and think about all you long for in love. Imagine yourself with a partner who has all the traits you find attractive. Take a few moments to get very clear about how you want to feel. Allow images to come to you as you do this. You may imagine yourself receiving flowers, going on dates and kissing someone passionately. You may see yourself attending family functions with your partner on your arm. You may imagine how wonderful it will be to have someone you adore to snuggle up with in bed. Allow this to just flow naturally.

Now sit down and write out the story of how you found this love. This is not going to be published, so don’t censor yourself. Do make sure your phrasing is positive, however, and most importantly, take time as you write this to pause and sink into all the wonderful feelings that imagining this brings up for you. If you really get into this exercise, your heart will soon be soaring. You will feel like your chest is tingling or expanding with light or energy – this is what you want!

Once your story is complete and you’ve basked in all those wonderful feelings for a while, let it go. You can put it away in a drawer or file it away on your computer. It doesn’t matter. You’re not going to go back to it because you’re going to trust that what you desire has been set in motion, and the love you long for is already on its way to you.

If you now just consciously strive to embody and flow love to everyone you meet, and you stay in a high vibration, soon delightful love will be knocking on your door.

 

– Soul Arcanum

Cultivating Romantic Chemistry

Copyright Soul Arcanum LLC. All rights reserved. :)
 

Dear Soul Arcanum:
I have been trying to attract new love into my life using the law of attraction. Two years ago, I had a few dates with a great guy who has all the qualities I’m looking for. We could talk and laugh for hours. We went on four dates, and then I backed out because I was unable to feel sexually attracted to him and figured it would be better to stop sooner rather than later. I kept his number in my cell phone, and a couple of months ago when I seriously started praying for new love and trying to attract it into my life, I started noticing his name in my cell phone book. Every time I tried to visualize this new love, he would pop into my mind. I thought perhaps I should give it another try. We’ve now reconnected, and it’s just as easy and natural as it was before. We’re even on the same page spiritually in terms of what we’ve been up to recently. We’ve seen each other again, and it was wonderful, but I was still not physically attracted. I’m wondering what’s happening with me. Am I resisting attraction at an unconscious level because part of me is still afraid of men? (I’ve always been more attracted to men who weren’t good for me.) Am I trying to force myself into a relationship with this guy because I know he would be a wonderful partner? If I get to know him better, might I become sexually attracted to him?
S.

Dear S.:

First it’s important to note that whenever we have trouble manifesting something we think we really desire, there are usually lessons we need to learn or wounds we need to heal that are tripping us up. When it comes to finding a soul mate, there are lots of issues that can cause people to search endlessly in vain. Many people do block chemistry due to various fears; I see this all the time in my own friends and the clients I counsel. For example, I know a number of women who only want what they can’t have: they find everyone who is attracted to them to be inadequate for some reason, and always get hung up on guys who are out of their league, married, or somehow unavailable, which effectively prevents them from getting seriously involved with anyone.

Many people have deep psychic wounds that need to be healed. If women were abused, raped, shamed for being sexual or rejected in this life or another lifetime, those wounds must be healed in order for them to have a healthy, fulfilling sex life. (Women who died in childbirth in past lives often have sexual problems in future lives as well.) Similarly, men who were abused, raped, shouldered with the heavy burdens of providing for an unexpected family, unable to sexually perform, infected with an STD, or romantically rejected must also heal those wounds to find sexual fulfillment.

Deep issues aside, there are all sorts of energetic interactions constantly happening between people. These largely determine whether we feel drawn to them as well as the quality of relationship we form with them. For example, you can meet someone who seems really nice on the surface and yet feel uneasy around them because on an unconscious level, you sense that who they are pretending to be is not who they really are.

There are two issues at work here: how we are vibrating, and how we are vibrating in relationship to another individual. We have tremendous control over our own vibration, and some control over how we vibrationally relate to others.

We can cultivate passion and sensuality just like we manifest anything else in life. For example, I had a lover long ago who awakened me to a new level of sensuality. Until my experiences with him, I had been rather repressed but didn’t know it. We were amazing together, for he brought me sensually to life.

This taught me that it’s possible to bring out in lovers whatever turns us on. To awaken another, however, we must first embody the sensuality we’re hoping to find instead of looking for someone else to make it happen for us. So instead of looking for someone with whom you have good chemistry, you might try becoming more passionate and sensual yourself, focusing energetically on what you want to manifest, and setting that tone for whatever relationship you want to evoke good chemistry in. In this particular relationship, you can focus on cultivating all kinds of sensual pleasure, evoking the wonderful lover in him, and enjoying yourself no matter what.

This approach will only take us so far in particular relationships, however, just like being kind will only take us so far with certain people. If their idea of being a good friend is way off from our own, then we’re just not going to click. Similarly, if we don’t even really like someone, we won’t find them sexually attractive, or if they have sexual issues that need to be healed, they may not be ready to engage at the higher level of experience we’re longing for.

Of course, just as every combination of elements produces a different chemical reaction, there are all sorts of different chemistries between people. It’s particularly interesting to observe how new babies in a family will immediately demonstrate great rapport with some family members and show an aversion to others. No doubt this is in part due to past life experiences/karma.

Regardless how it comes to be, the chemistry between any two people is determined by the quality of the vibration of the relationship. Just as the individuals in the relationship have personal vibrations, the relationship itself has a certain feeling or tone.

Music offers us a great metaphor for understanding this better. Let’s say that everyone has an overall vibration that matches a certain note of the scale, and whenever we get together with one or more other people, we strike a chord. Clearly, there will be some combinations that sound really good and others that are discordant.

When we meet someone who shares our personal note, we feel like they are very much like us. We are kindred spirits, so we communicate and get along very well. It sounds like you and this wonderful man are very similar in nature, which is why you feel so at ease around him.

When we meet someone who has a different vibration but one that sounds really good with our own, we complement each other. The more complex but complementary a chord is, the more interesting it sounds. This is when you get a very passionate sort of bond, for you are different enough to be fascinated by each other, but at the same time, you complement each other or sound good together. Even when we are very similar to someone else, however, we can create a melody with them that is simple but moving and beautiful.

All of this is a gross oversimplification, of course, for we are all so much more than one note, and we are forever changing. This is where we have a lot of room to play at creating something beautiful. I believe that we can cultivate good chemistry with anyone we basically like, respect, and feel good around. If we are too similar, it may become sort of routine after a while, but every relationship feels like that after we’ve ironed out all the kinks – it just happens sooner rather than later when we’re highly compatible with someone. On the other hand, with someone who is too different from us, we may feel intense passion but so much conflict that it’s just not worth it.

Life is full of beautiful people and endless opportunities for passion and pleasure. To find deep fulfillment, we must become within what we seek in our outer experience, and make the most of love wherever and however we may find it.

– Soul Arcanum


Maintaining a Strong Psychic Connection with Your Mate

Copyright Soul Arcanum LLC. All rights reserved. :)
 

Dear Soul Arcanum:
I’ve been married for three years. In the first years we were together, I felt very close to my husband; I felt like I could sense what he was thinking and feeling, often finished his sentences, etc. I felt like we were on the same page, so to speak. Then about four months ago, he was promoted to a new position that requires him to travel every week. (He’s home on the weekends.) I’ve noticed a dramatic shift in our relationship since this change; I just don’t feel that same sense of connection. I’m afraid we’re drifting apart on a deep, energetic level. How can we recreate and maintain that strong psychic connection we had in the beginning? Thank you so much!
Holly

Dear Holly:

When people live together, they naturally grow closer. In fact, the more time we spend with someone, the closer we grow to them. This is more than a result of our overt interactions, for we actually entrain to each others’ vibrations. This is also why it’s so powerful to spend time with a guru. A guru’s energy would be more powerful than our own, so it would raise our vibration. Similarly, when we’re in a weakened or vulnerable state, and we’re around someone who is down or depressed, they may drag us down to their level too.

When we first fall in love with someone, we are constantly building deep psychic cords with them. When we’re in their presence, we send tons of energy to them and receive the same back. We stare into their eyes, listen very intently to all they say, and send them tons of love and admiration from our hearts. We spend as much time as possible with them, and when we’re not with them, we’re usually sending out cords to them by thinking of them and feeling full of love for them, and all of this forges deep psychic bonds. When we then move in together and begin to sleep in the same bed, we spend about 1/3 of our lives basking in each others’ auras, which naturally leads to a great deal of entrainment. (Of course, having sex with someone is one of the most potent ways to form a psychic bond with them.)

Soul mates are people we forged strong loving psychic cords to in other lives. It’s like there is a rubber band connected between our hearts, and the stronger the love, the stronger and thicker that elastic band. Wherever we go, whether in this life or the afterlife, if we are separating from someone we’re strongly corded to, tension is created on that band. In this way, we are naturally drawn back together again. The same thing happens with people who hate each other, by the way: any intense emotion will create a strong cord that draws those parties back together again.

Since all of the above things deepen psychic bonds, it only makes sense that when we do the reverse – when we spend less time with someone, don’t sleep with them every night, and are caught up in lots of individual new personal activities or endeavors – we tend to feel distanced from them because we’re not feeding that psychic cord like we used to.

How to Maintain a Strong Psychic Bond with Someone at a Distance:

First I encourage you to talk to your husband about how you’re feeling. Depending on how open he is to metaphysical subjects, you may have to phrase some of what I suggest here in more mainstream terms. (For example, instead of talking about your auras and psychic connection, you might talk about your feelings and your desire to feel closer to him.) Your goal with this talk is to make a joint conscious agreement that you will both pour a lot of psychic/ emotional/ mental energy into maintaining a strong sense of connection.

My husband and I often talk about how connected (or disconnected) we feel. We’ve been together for nearly a decade now, and because we established in the beginning that we wanted to maintain the passionate connection we had early on, it has become normal for us to feel strongly linked. When we don’t, we miss it right away. As high divorce rates reveal, sustaining passionate relationships long-term takes a LOT of focus and energy; it doesn’t just happen. Many people wake up too late to this truth – like when their partner is walking out the door in frustration. If you want this relationship to prosper, you’ll both have to devote yourselves to keeping it vibrantly alive.

Though you may not be able to be together physically during the week, you can still be together mentally, emotionally and spiritually. After all, it’s only the physical body that is restricted by the laws of space and time – this is why psychics are able to peek into the future or tap into others’ energies even when they’re a world apart.

To remain metaphysically connected, you should communicate often. You might text each other throughout the day or send daily emails to each other. If you don’t know what to say, agree on a couple of things you’ll both cover, such as what stands out to you as you look back on your day, or what you’re most missing or appreciating about your partner at that time. The more you open up emotionally when communicating, the more you’ll feed your psychic bond to each other.

It would also be wise to schedule a phone call once or twice a day, perhaps first thing in the morning and then again at night before you go to bed. The key with this is not to just chat like this is some daily chore but to truly connect via the phone.

When you hang up, you might agree that as you drift off to sleep, you’ll meditate upon each other and imagine connecting in love: hugging, kissing, whatever you want to do. This will send energy to each other and also facilitate you both connecting in your dreams/on the astral plane, which will really help you stay connected. You might ask for this to happen as you fall asleep at night by setting your intention or praying for help from your guides and angels in meeting up with your partner during the night.

Surround yourselves with each others’ essence. For example, while he’s away, you could sleep in a shirt he has worn. The more it smells like him, the better. My husband wears Brut deodorant, which I love, and his shirts always smell like this. When he used to spend nights working at the fire station, I would often sleep in his shirt and breathe in his smell to feel close to him. Obviously, you want your husband to have something of yours that smells of your own essence too. (If he doesn’t want to wear it, he can just snuggle up with it, of course!)

You could also buy each other necklaces to affirm your mutual commitment to staying close. Wedding bands serve a similar function, but it will be especially powerful if you devote these articles of jewelry to creating and maintaining an extraordinary level of connection. Charge them by holding them in your joined hands. (Place his in your hands, and yours in his, and then place your hands so they’re touching.) Talk together about how you are going to keep this relationship full of passion and intimacy, and vow to each other to devote yourselves to this purpose. Then put the necklaces on each other. Every time you look at the necklaces in the mirror, touch them or think about them, remember your vow and send some loving energy to your partner.

Finally, make plans for what you’ll do together when he gets home on the weekend, and look forward to that time with a wonderful sense of anticipation. Talk about it all week long, think about it and smile, and remember: absence can make the heart grow fonder. With the right frame of mind, I think his new schedule could lead to some really passionate weekends!

– Soul Arcanum

Shifting into a Higher Level of Fulfillment in Love

Copyright Soul Arcanum LLC. All rights reserved. :)
Dear Soul Arcanum:

My name is Anne. Glenn is a man that I have been involved with on and off for the last two and a half years. Our relationship has been very stormy and painful for me. When I learned that I had breast cancer in March of 2006, he suddenly moved away. Basically he was running away from my pain. I went through treatment and am now fine. In February he called me and we talked for the first time in almost a year. In March, he came out for business and we saw each other. We ended up being intimate, which kicked up my attachment again. Our relationship revolved around sex. I wanted a lot more and I felt emotionally starved, yet I couldn’t walk away. I was in denial of the truth – that he wanted me on his own terms, and he couldn’t get too close. I always feel that I somehow want to make it right between us, but I don’t even know what that means. I don’t know how to let go. He has such a strong hold on my heart. He is a great artist and has a powerful shamanic side. I am so attracted to that part of him and the sexual connection is so powerful that I find it wrenching to end all contact, yet I feel that’s the only way to move on and hopefully find a true soul mate. Do you have any advice for me on this painful situation? Many blessings to you! – Anne

Dear Anne:

I chose your question because your struggle is such a common one. I frequently hear from women who are suffering from unrequited love, who can’t seem to get over a certain relationship, or who feel miserably, karmically bound to someone and can’t break free no matter what they do. It can happen to a man, but it’s not nearly as common.

There is a very powerful biological reason that women and men generally approach sex and romantic commitment very differently. It’s not just because they were raised in cultures that taught them to be different – those cultural norms arose from biological realities. The fact is that women have far more at stake in sexual relations than men do: if they get pregnant, they take on the greatest challenge and responsibility I can imagine – that of caring for a new life.

This may also be why women’s bodies respond differently to the sex act than men’s do. Whether a woman is in love with her partner or has just met him at a bar, during orgasm, hormones will flood her body that make her feel like she is falling in love. This doesn’t happen with men, so when it comes to having sex, women have far more at stake on all levels: physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. It is thus wise for women to wait until they know a man well and have established that they want the same things in a relationship before getting physically intimate.

On a metaphysical level, our auras reflect what is happening in our bodies. Just as having sex with someone will cause a flood of physical changes, we create energetic ties to that person in our auras. The more we feed those cords of connection through further contact and thinking of that person with love, longing, or other strong emotions, the stronger those cords get.

When women experience a surge of hormones that makes them feel like they’re falling in love after sex, they begin to feed those cords mental and emotional energy, which in turn causes another flood of those hormones, for what we experience in our minds affects our bodies. This creates a cyclic loop that can lead to a state of obsession. Because the hormones involved are so pleasurable, it’s like being addicted to something like cocaine. Since men generally aren’t experiencing anything like this, it’s easier for them to break things off or move on.

On a spiritual level, many people find lovers who are somewhat hard to get extra appealing, and most of the time, it’s because they have some self-esteem issues they are in the process of working out. Part of developing self-love and wisdom involves recognizing that just because someone doesn’t seem to want us as much as we want them, that doesn’t mean that they are better than we are. These sorts of relationship experiences generally lead us through some deep pain, but on the other side, we end up affirming our worthiness of something better.

Whenever someone continues to go back for more from a relationship where their partner repeatedly fails to consider their needs, betrays them, abandons them in a time of need, or makes them feel they’re not important to them, you can be sure there are self-esteem issues involved.

Often when we are in relationship to someone who has better self-esteem than we do – someone who allows himself to want what he wants and live as he chooses – we are attracted not so much to who he is as a person, but to his self-esteem. We want to feel good enough about ourselves to honor our true needs and desires as he does.

We’re also strongly attracted to people who are living dreams we want to live ourselves. It sounds to me like you would like to be an artist and a shaman, and would like to feel less needy in relationships, just like Glenn. THOSE are the things you’re really in lust with, my friend!

These sorts of relationships don’t come into our lives to fulfill our desire for a perfect partner, but to help us realize our own potential. This happens in an organic way because we are naturally attracted to people who embody what we are longing to become or are in the process of working on.

My advice is to let go of needing this to be more than it wants to be, and take the best of what it has to offer you. In this case, I feel that means allowing this relationship to illuminate your own needs and desires, and how you might begin to honor those better. It will really help if you replace all the exciting feelings you have about Glenn with other things that turn you on, so get involved in your own art, in exploring shamanism, or some other personal passion.

If you want a partner who is passionately into you, let yourself have that instead of trying to be happy with a man who doesn’t want what you want and isn’t willing to compromise on his desires. Once you’ve learned whatever this relationship has to teach you, you will have awakened new potential in this area of your life, and will naturally attract a relationship experience that is better suited to you. You may then begin to work on some other life lesson, and be able to enjoy a healthy, loving relationship with a man while you do so.

Basically, once you love YOURSELF the way you want to be loved, you will attract a partner who loves and honors your true desires and feelings similarly. Just focus on how you want to feel about yourself and your love life, and allow whoever is the best match to your desires to flow into your life and your heart.

I do understand your desire to make things right. I always want everyone to be happy and at peace with me too, but we can’t control how other people feel. All we can do is be lovingly honest about how we feel and what we need to do to take good care of ourselves, while at the same time making it clear that we honor the other person’s need to do the same. Even if others don’t share our feelings or our preferences for the way things turn out, we’ll be at peace, for we’ll know we’ve done all we could do given the divine truth we found in our own hearts.

– Soul Arcanum

Does Romance Interfere with Spirit?

Copyright Soul Arcanum LLC. All rights reserved. :)
 

Dear Soul Arcanum:

I have been working on psychic and energy healing skills for a few years now, and it has been an amazing journey. Some time ago, I met and fell in love with someone. While I feel strongly drawn to him and am very happy in this relationship, he seems to interfere with my conscious connection to Spirit! We broke up for about three weeks once, and during that time, I felt Spirit move back into my life. When we got back together again, however, I lost that sense of connection. I’m getting worried that this relationship may somehow be bad for my spiritual growth. Do you think that this romance could be bad for me spiritually?
– Michelle

Dear Michelle:

Please rest assured that no one feels deeply connected spiritually all the time. After we awaken, we’re not awake 24/7: we all frequently take what we might call spiritual naps. These are usually short little catnaps throughout the day, but sometimes we take longer naps that may last for weeks, months or even years. These “naps” are periods when we’re less focused on spiritual growth and more focused on worldly matters like our careers, families, love affairs, and just having fun. It is entirely normal to go through periods when you feel more and less consciously connected to Spirit.

I also think it’s important to realize that when a relationship affects us in a negative way, the other person is not doing something to us; how we relate to them is the problem. Ultimately, our experience of a relationship is all about us, as it arises from our interpretation of events. We should never blame anyone or anything outside of us for the quality of our relationship with Spirit, for there is nothing more personal in the Universe.

I also don’t see any demarcation between “spiritual” matters and anything else in life – everything (and every relationship) is ultimately spiritual. Our task is to find the deeper meaning in whatever we manifest in life, and relationships of all kinds can be wonderful catalysts for personal spiritual growth.

That said, I do believe that romance can indeed derail us from a conscious spiritual path. Where a conscious spiritual path is all about looking deeply into the nature of our experiences and cutting through illusions, romance is all about reveling in illusion. To keep romance going, we have to allow ourselves to get caught up in fantasy and avoid looking beneath the surface. So a conscious spiritual path and a great romance are fundamentally at odds with each other.

Please note that I’m not saying that “true love” is illusionary. True love is what one feels for one’s child, and hopefully, what one grows to feel for one’s partner. True love is constant and comforting; it’s an enduring, solid foundation that supports our well-being and personal growth. Real love is expansive and enriching; it doesn’t detract from anything good in our lives, but rather adds to it.

By contrast, romance is like standing in the middle of a teeter totter. It’s fun, exhilarating and challenging, and it often leads to someone getting hurt. Instead of adding to our lives on every level, it distracts us from everything else that is important to us. How can we do anything with focus and power when we’re constantly struggling just to maintain our balance?

Here’s what basically happens when “spiritual” people like you and me fall in love and fall off a conscious spiritual path. (Please note again that we are never truly off our path at all, for we’re doing just what we need to be doing in order to learn what we most need to learn.):

As we’re falling in love, we spend a lot of psychic energy fantasizing. We wonder about our lover and how they feel about us all the time. We daydream about the future endlessly. We begin to create a fantasy world in our heads of a life where all our dreams have come true. Our lover becomes our hero or heroine, our god or goddess. As we feel cherished and adored, we also become extraordinarily wonderful in our own eyes. We build a beautiful dream world in our minds, and that’s where we live most of the time.

At the same time, our outer routines usually change markedly. We all know the stereotype of the person who is so madly in love that he can’t eat, can’t sleep, can’t focus on his work, never sees his friends anymore, etc. Well, you can bet he isn’t spending a lot of time communing with the Divine via meditation or other spiritual practices either.

We may change a lot of little habits as well. We may rush through meditation in order to get ready for a date, or skip church in order to sleep in with our sweetheart on Sunday morning. We may acquire a whole new group of friends – our partner’s pals. In order to be “nice,” we may go see a violent action adventure flick with him instead of the thought-provoking independent film we’d normally choose.

Sometimes we even put aside our most sacred spiritual pursuits in order to “protect” an important relationship. Lovers can feel threatened by a strong spiritual path, perhaps because they sense that this is truly eternal and far more powerful than anything they have to offer. If we become afraid for the relationship, we may put our spiritual interests aside in order to reassure our lover that he is number one. This is not a long-term solution, of course, because one who has awakened cannot nap forever.

These things are natural, but they tend to derail spiritual journeys, for the energy and attention that we flow into the relationship is energy and attention we’re not consciously channeling into spiritual growth.

On top of all of this, we have to actually stifle our conscious awareness in order to maintain the illusion of blissful perfection. Some part of us is aware of both our lover’s flaws and the emotional foolishness of putting anyone or anything of this world on such a high pedestal, but when we’re in love, we do NOT want to hear about it! So we ignore those intuitions, insights, and inner knowings. We want to believe that this love is magical and will lead us to live happily ever after. We are in denial about the full nature of this relationship, the other person, and even ourselves, and we want to STAY THERE.

By pushing away all but what we want to see and hear about our love, we effectively turn off our own higher awareness. When we tell it to shut up and go away, our conscious connection to divine guidance goes underground.

What’s more, when we believe we have this rare, precious love, we naturally feel very attached to it, and this generates big fear about the possibility of losing it, along with all sorts of issues from the past (and past lives) related to self-esteem, abandonment, vulnerability, intimacy, freedom, security, etc. This launches us into lots of emotional drama, which wreaks havoc with our overall vibration – and we all know that to have a clear conscious connection with Spirit, we must have a high vibration. We might thus say that any relationship that is passionate and/or full of drama is “bad” for our spiritual growth. (Again, however, if we are IN it, there is a good reason we’re there.)

It is possible to maintain both romance and a strong spiritual path, but to do so, we have to remain conscious that we are caught up in illusion when we are feeling “in love.” This is sort of like living in the world but not of it, except in this case, we are living “in love,” but romance is not the whole point of our existence. Some might think this would take a lot of the pleasure out of romance, but I think the opposite is true: it makes romance a much lighter, easier endeavor. When we know that romance is just about having fun, and that ultimately, our happiness and well-being do NOT depend on the state of any human relationship, we can enjoy it a lot more.

– Soul Arcanum

When You Can’t Live Without Him/Her

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Dear Soul Arcanum:

I have searched long and hard for a true blue psychic, and something just led me to you. I love a man whose name is Jimmy. We broke up last March over a misunderstanding, and it has been an extreme emotional roller coaster ride ever since that day. Since our breakup, I have sent kind, loving correspondence to him to let him know how I feel. I even remembered him on Christmas and sent him a gift and a card. Life has truly been a struggle. I know that one should not just wait around for love, but having someone special is extremely important to me at this time in my life. I can’t imagine life without this man, for I have always felt that he was the one for me with all of my heart. I know that he has issues when it comes to showing and expressing his emotions, but it never hindered me from pursuing him the past seven years. I do not push him in any way; I give him space to follow his heart in his own time. I have even prayed that God would take my life now and allow me to come home, because I really do not want my life to go on without this man. This is how much I truly love him. Last night I even prayed to God many times to allow this to happen if Jimmy was not going to come back to me. He may be a self-centered pig at times, but this does not diminish my love for him, because I have seen a beautiful side of him that not many people get to see. Will Jimmy come back and give this relationship another whirl, a real try he truly puts his heart into? I would really love to hear from you. Thank you for your time.
– Diane

Dear Diane:

My sweet girl, I wish I could whisk you off to a beach in Mexico for a year or so. By the end of that time, you’d be so over Jimmy. You’d be happily engaged in a whole new life, with a whole new sense of hope and possibility.

First, no person is so fantastic that life is not worth living without them. Barring extreme physical pain due to terminal illness or something like that, thoughts of suicide are always very short-sighted. When I read for people who don’t see life as worth living, Spirit often suggests they watch the movie “Joe Versus the Volcano.”

In that film, Tom Hanks’ character is a hypochondriac who learns that he is dying. He accepts the offer of a millionaire, which entails becoming a human sacrifice by throwing himself into a volcano. He has to travel halfway around the world to get to this volcano, and en route, he awakens spiritually and discovers that his life is indeed worth living. We watch him blossom from a miserable, anxiety-ridden man clinging to a bleak existence, into a bright, joyful free spirit. Only when he faces his own mortality for real does he begin to fully open to everything that is beautiful in life that he has been missing.

I encourage you to rent this movie and let it speak to your heart and soul.

Now you have to realize that what you describe as love is not really love, but rather obsession. When we’re caught up in romantic obsession like this it’s very hard to see it, so I understand if you are vehemently shaking your head and saying that I don’t understand. I know, because I’ve been where you are. I believed it was really love too, and wound up wanting to die, just like you.

My own obsession was named Dan, and my entire purpose for living was for him to love me back. When we make someone the center of our universe like this, we make them our God. As no mortal can fill those shoes, we are setting ourselves up for a lot of disappointment and heartache when we do this.

It’s not that we’re fundamentally pathetic. In fact, most people who fall into this pattern have very deep spiritual natures but a lack of spiritual teaching and direct experience of divine grace. We’ve been raised to make romance EVERYTHING. Our modern holy grail is a “soul mate.” We’ve been duped into believing that romantic love is the highest thing we can hope for. When romance then leaves us in a miserable heap on the floor, it’s no wonder we decide that life is just not worth living.

The energy underlying obsession is a very powerful force. The more you tell yourself you don’t want to live without Jimmy, the more energy you send to this force, and the harder it is to break free of it. You feel incomplete without Jimmy because you’ve literally given away your heart and soul to him.

Here’s another lesson we all have to learn eventually: Deciding that we don’t want to live without someone is actually a good way to send them fleeing. It’s a pretty heavy trip to put on someone’s shoulders. Most people feel suffocated by this sort of emotional dependency.

Making someone else responsible for our will to live is never a healthy or attractive thing to do. It leaves us clingy, vulnerable, grasping and draining. We won’t find true fulfillment in love until our own hearts and spirits are whole, until we see ourselves as complete expressions of divine beauty.

I’ve seen this sort of relationship dynamic many times, and always the person who is made God is far from deserving of that honor. I could see putting someone on a pedestal if they really were Christ-like, for then it may actually be true that we may never meet another person like them. Usually, however, the thing that is most special about the people we cling to is their indifference to our feelings. At some level we believe that if we can get this cold-hearted, self-absorbed “cool” person to return our devotion, then we will have proven to ourselves that we really are lovable.

These romantic obsessions represent someone from our past – usually the parent it was hardest to win attention, love and approval from. They can also be people we loved in past lives who rejected us. By being unmovable and indifferent, they offer us another chance to prove ourselves worthy of their attention, affection and respect. Through these relationships, we try to go back and heal some of the holes in our hearts from earlier experiences.

Our true goal is not to gain their love, however, but to learn to love ourselves enough to leave this tortuous experience behind. We may think we adore a lover more than life itself, but we can only truly love another to the degree we love ourselves. When we want to die for the lack of one individual’s returned affection, we aren’t loving anyone involved; we’re just desperately trying to find someone or something to fill the empty place inside of us.

I wish I could spirit you away to that beach in Mexico, but you don’t really need me to anyway. You don’t need anyone outside of yourself to save you or make your life worth living, because it’s already worth living, Diane.

I recommend you either find a higher calling to devote yourself to, or take off on a big adventure. If you already feel like dying, what have you got to lose? You’re here – you might as well do something important or interesting. The more you devote yourself to this higher purpose or lose yourself in this new adventure, the better you will feel.

Give the best of yourself to someone or something new, and after a while, you will realize that you feel better about yourself and about life. Your energy will detach more and more from this obsessive vortex as you put your heart and soul into relationships and undertakings that actually return your energy. This will lead you not only to new peace and happiness, but to more fulfilling experiences in love too.

There are no shortcuts to true and lasting happiness. You have to stop being a slave to romance and reach for something truer and more lasting: a sense of your own divinity, a personal relationship to Spirit/ the Universe/ All That Is, a reverent appreciation of life’s endless blessings and joys.

– Soul Arcanum

Can You Have More than One Soul Mate at a Time?

Copyright Soul Arcanum LLC. All rights reserved. :)
 

Dear Soul Arcanum:

My lover Ellen and I share a deep connection. Recently, she met another man she also feels connected to. Whenever she sees him or talks to him, she becomes very distant. We have talked about this, and it seems to me that she has a problem dealing with feeling connected to two men. I have an intimate relationship with her and her children, while this other man is a close friend. She can’t handle it when we are in the same place at the same time. She tries to separate us, and even avoids one when time has been spent with the other. Many times one of us has told her how rude she is being. Her behavior has begun to cause a lot of disharmony in our relationship. I understand that she has a connection with this person and I respect that, but how do I deal with my feelings of jealousy and anger for how she is handling this? Is it possible to have one soul mate as a friend and another as a lover in this lifetime?

Dave

Dear Dave:

Yes! Everyone we’ve ever truly loved, whether in this life or another, is a “soul mate.” They can be friends, lovers, children, parents – even arch enemies.

While a mainstream approach to your situation might dictate you deal with this as an “emotional affair,” you’re obviously spiritually beyond the mainstream. In fact, your dilemma is a common thoroughfare on the journey to spiritual enlightenment, for as we evolve spiritually, we begin to identify less with the fear-based “laws” and “rules” of man, and open more to what is “natural” both here and beyond. When we study other cultures and animals, for example, it becomes clear that monogamy is relatively rare and therefore probably a cultural construct. In spiritual realms, there is also much more freedom; in the astral, free love is the norm. The details that separate us here in the physical such as race, gender, religion, marital status, etc. all fall away in the astral, where we are so engaged in the moment that we are open to pretty much everything.

So as we evolve spiritually, we naturally begin to question societal norms and to listen for the truth in our own hearts. While we’re ultimately moving toward greater embodiment of love, compassion, truth, etc., at first it’s like we’ve got spiritual training wheels, and we tend to tip too far one way and then the other as we make choices that are a mixture of spiritual idealism, guilt, love, fear, generosity and selfishness. We may grasp the right idea, for example, but embrace it for the wrong reasons.

I feel that all three of you have entered this spiritual territory where right and wrong fade into endless shades of grey. It’s actually a sign that you’ve become self-actualizing, which is what this publication is all about. Some of the traits of “self-actualizers” include: extraordinary openness to new ideas, experiences and people; being extremely non-judgmental; being highly conscious of your experiences and reflecting deeply on them; being self-aware and self-honest, and thus able to live in harmony with your true values; searching for “truth” and genuineness in relationships and experiences; honestly seeking “reality” as opposed to avoiding, repressing, etc.; loving and accepting yourself, others, nature, the universe; unpretentiousness, simplicity, spontaneity; gentleness, shyness; self-direction and self-validation; having few but very deep relationships; high creativity; a deep sense of spirituality often accompanied by mystical experiences; a strong sense of ethics that is personal as opposed to learned; endlessly exploring questions that have no clear or definite answers.

As you can imagine, questioning cultural values, living in the moment and being extraordinarily open to new people and experiences will tend to lead to some interesting relationships and situations, such as the one you three are now in. While you’re all attuned to the boundless nature of love, Ellen has gotten stuck in that grey area where spiritual truth collides with practical reality. She has tipped too far to one side in embracing the “right idea” for the wrong reasons.

Meanwhile, your spirit is telling you that even if there is enough love to go around, something here is just not right. To your credit, to be in relationship, it helps to have an idea of where you stand. If this guy is really just a friend, why can’t all three of you be friends together? If he’s more than a friend, then when you have needs, will she be there for you, or will she be off with the other guy? These are valid questions. While you can respect her right to love as she loves, you must also respect your right to have emotional needs and desires of your own.

While free love may reflect a higher spiritual truth, the bottom line is that it is very hard to make it work here on earth, even when everyone involved is happily enrolled. I have seen many attempt it but no one truly succeed long-term. Years ago I personally went through a period of intense awakening when it seemed like I had more spiritual/ sexual/ creative energy than I knew what to do with. I was perpetually “turned on” by life itself, and so afire with creative energy that I barely slept. Mystical experiences were commonplace, and I “loved” everyone I met. As I got swept up in this fiery transformation, I became blind to others’ feelings just as Ellen seems to be. From this experience, I learned that I must master my energy instead of allowing it to master me. As we all know, power is neither good nor evil; it’s what we do with it that matters. If we don’t channel our desire/ energy constructively, it will become destructive.

Over time, the shine and thrill of relationships naturally diminishes, both because we’re bored with the “same old thing,” and because in order to keep them going, lots of rules and compromises have diluted our pleasure. When relationships begin to feel smaller than our passion and energy, then people who don’t know how to make the relationship bigger and deeper become restless and have affairs or explore free love or start nitpicking and provoking fights to have something to do. People eventually break up, and then of course, the same pattern repeats itself in every subsequent relationship, which is why so many people are frustrated in their quest for “true love.” Personally, I have come to see the wisdom in focusing my efforts and energy on a monogamous spiritual partnership. While I may have many “soul mates” like Ellen’s friend in my life, in the spiritual partnership I share with my husband, he comes first. Because we’ve learned to go deeper and deeper with our connection, this feels like a blessing, not a sacrifice.

As I see it, you have two choices. You can communicate how you want to be treated, and then if she doesn’t want the same things you do, let it go and open up to something better. As I can feel you really love her unconditionally, however, and sense that she’s a true kindred spirit, you could hang in there and help her find her way through this by seeking out that deeper path and gently leading her there. For information on how to do this, I recommend books by David Deida, as well as the practice of tantra, especially as concerns relationship as a spiritual path. Another great resource is the book The Unimaginable Life: Lessons Learned on the Path of Love by Kenny and Soul Arcanum Loggins, which details the authors’ own journey through this grey area. It’s available at amazon.com. Read it together; I was delightfully surprised by its honesty. Perhaps if you offer Ellen a relationship path that promises all the new ideas and intensity she can handle, she’ll be turned on by your depth and devotion, and intrigued by the prospect of exploring whole new worlds of experience with you.

– Soul Arcanum