How To Finally Find The One

Looking at how it's best to let go of the need to find the 1. Instead it works to open to possibility and wonder and love and all that is juicy in life and juicy in you. This is what activates partner contracts and tells the world you are open to connect.

Transcript

How To Finally Find The One

As you might imagine, questions about "The 1" are some I'm most frequently asked, such as:

• Will I ever meet the 1?

• Is there a 1 out there for me?

• Is he/she the 1?

• If she/he isn't the 1, why are we together?

• What was the purpose if he/she wasn't the 1?

• What can I do to find the 1?

• Have I missed the 1?

• What if I never find the 1?

Everyone says these with a bit of tongue in cheek at this point because so many people are yodeling about there not being a "1" and we need to be less Disney princess and more realistic about relationships and our lives. So, we affect to be realistic and even a bit sarcastic and jaded. Yet underneath this bit of realism and jadedness is the yearning. I tune into the yearning first because it's going to tell me volumes about the situation before I ever open the client's soul book.

So, let's get this part out of the way first. Is there a 1? For most people, no. And Hallelujah! Having a 1 out there, or having a soul mate as this type of relationship is more commonly known, is one of the most miserable lifetimes to try to survive. Imagine throwing two darts at each other from 1000 miles apart and hoping they meet tip to tip in the middle with everything and the kitchen sink flying around in between them. This sounds romantic but in the end it's mostly tragic. If one of the partners doesn't arrive somehow, if they decide not to go through with it, if they get killed accidentally, if they don't manage to be born, what happens to the other partner? Well, they wait around for the 1 who never comes or they try to reconfigure everything about their life in order to make themselves available to someone else. For those very, very few who actually do manage to come together, it's a really tough life until it happens. Yes, it's bliss once they manage it, but don't try this at home, kids. 

For the rest of us there are many people who could be made into our "the 1." This is why I look at the yearning being given off. First because the yearning influences what contracts the person is activating, what type of people they are searching for/screening out/pulling in. Second, to see what they are actually looking for. Many people don't realize this, but when they imagine the 1 they aren't imagining an actual person or an actual relationship, they are filling a need. Either they are looking for a "Get Out of Relationship Work Free" card or they are looking for the perfect person who will meet all of their needs and make everything perfect forever and ever. Amen.

The thing is - Life is hard. Just the logistics of being alive is hard. Food in, waste products out, managing not to fart when walking in front of someone (or not getting caught at it), too hot, too cold, cold and flu season, getting to work, getting back from work, paying the bills, paying for stamps and internet so you can pay the bills, getting the right clothes, getting enough sleep. It's exhausting just to think about. Then add all the social interconnecting because we're social beings. Then add spiritual journeys because there's that to attend to...and leisure and pleasure and just plain R&R... It goes on and on and on....

Well, winning the lottery would fix some of these things, not all of them, but still. However, finding the 1 seems an easier, more attainable goal and would solve most of them more satisfactorily. We'd be happy and happily going down the road of life with half the burdens we had before and most of our wishes fulfilled or at least on the horizon.

What a lovely fantasy which turns people into commodities or prescriptions. To remedy negative emotional issues, self-worth deficits and identity crises, take one human once a lifetime and call me in the afterlife. *sigh* But life doesn't work that way. Oh, we do have relationships with people which are about attempting to heal things in our lives. There are people who come into our lives to be the prescription for our family of origin issues, our lack of self-worth, our need to form a new identity. You know the person who has a type, who is constantly dating one person after another but they are all the same person, just a new model every week/month/year? Yeah, they are working through their issues. Not in bad taste or bad judgment, but working to heal something, usually unconsciously and in the wrong way, but still. 

Others enter into relationships which are long term, but not about forever. These relationships have a purpose, lessons to teach, growth to help us achieve. They are long term contracts and they are meant to end once a certain level of becoming, of healing, of achievement has been reached. They aren't failed because they end, they are successful if they end well, end at the right time, end in the right way. They are successful if everyone walks away pained, but all right eventually. Mending takes time no matter how well things end, after all everyone has been together long enough for it to be part of their identity which is changing.

When I look at the contracts between people in relationship I don't often see forever scheduled in them. I have seen 'forever' scheduled a few times, though, which can be a lovely thing. These usually look almost braided because a good couple who is moving forward in their personal lives or in their professional lives, shares. One stays still and grounded and keeps the home front in balance while the other pushes at their career or their education or their spirituality and such. Then they come to a balance point of achievement and the other moves forward. Like walking, one moves then the other. Relationships struggle when this rhythm isn't there or is off. I have seen contracts where people meant to stay together forever, but one or the other has either stopped or is refusing to do something they agreed to do in the contract. They aren't growing in a certain way, won't deal with issues they have to get through, are refusing to accept their half of the responsibility in the relationship, just want out or are ending the contract on their side. Most often I see short term contracts which are activated for a goal or a purpose which is right in the moment for both parties. 

Something we applaud in ourselves and in others is the willingness to do for others. Always being there when people need us, always willing to lend a hand, give advice, or just pitch in even without being asked. This is the kind of person we think of as wholesome, good, and perfect. However, it is also the person we will probably know the least about, will often have the most secrets and possibly be one of the more lonely people in a crowd. All of their doing focuses the attention away from themselves and onto those receiving from them. It's like a firehose of giving which keeps us from ever reaching or connecting with the source. Often the most giving people are the ones with the lowest self-esteem. They struggle to have relationships, often feel they don't deserve them for some reason, and so seek to earn them through good deeds.

People attempt to buy relationship thinking this is the way to connect. They feel their worth is in what they can do, what they produce, what they have to offer rather than intrinsic to their being. They therefore do for the other person and expect a return on the investment, which often never comes. And because their worth is in direct proportion to what they have to offer, their self-esteem takes a hit when they don't get the return they feel they deserve so they then attempt to "pay more" by doing more in order to get a return or allow more people into their lives who need things done for them. In the end they feel burned out, used, empty, and still looking for people who want to connect with them and just love them for who they are. The problem is all the giving pushes people away and focuses attention on the product and not the person doing the doing. If we allow ourselves to be seen, if we value ourselves as highly as we wish others to value us, then the doing stops being a means to buy relationship and becomes a natural expression of connection, allowing others to value themselves and us in kind.

We choose partners who help us grow up, who help us learn to love, who support us in learning what our families didn't teach, who teach us hard lessons, who provide our children their DNA, who point us to the path we're meant to take, who provide us with the kick in the pants we need to do what we're meant to do, who teach by bad example, help us learn about good boundaries, bad choices, what our true value is, and that wisdom isn't a gift, it's what we become from all those experiences.

No one partner is meant to do or be all these things. If we have only one partner, how much do we miss out on in this amazing vast tapestry of life and of what we can be if given half a chance. Having a partner, a loved one, a sweetheart is not a goal, some brass ring which says we've made it. Having a partner is part of life. In my tradition when a young woman comes of age part of the ceremony is her tasting something bitter, something sour, and something sweet because these are the components of life. Partner, no partner, your life is your life and it will have all of these things, each to be savored and honored for their suchness. If we can't deal with all of them we will suffer. If we can't honor the partners who come into our life for their roles, then we have missed the point. We have missed the lessons and the opportunities they have offered us.

Is there someone for each of us who is right for us? Will there be someone with whom we can let our shoulders drop down out of our ears, take off the armor, and finally exhale? If you want there to be, then there will. But first you have to get rid of the yearning for this person to be a commodity, an answer, a rack can hang all of your personal baggage on, the one who takes over all responsibility. Let go of the need to find the 1. Open to possibility and wonder and love and all that is juicy in life and juicy in you. This is what activates partner contracts and tells the world you are open to connect with real human beings who are like you and want you just as much as you want them.