“Soul mates”… For most people while growing up, this means they would find the perfect person to fall in love and live happily ever after… until death tears them apart. A perfect little fairy tale, very easy to believe. This is how simple life could be. The universe has a plan to lead us to this one person. And that’s all we would ever need, right?

As we are getting older, we learn just how complicated this world can be. There is no fairy tale ending, just one long journey that gets more complex as time goes on. We find ourselves constantly reflecting, changing, and growing. Yet, despite becoming more confused about life, we have also begun to fall madly in love with it. And while we may once lived our lives in pursuit of one person to save us and sweep us off our feet away from all our problems, we may now look for people to share in our moments. Some of these moments might be romantic, but most happen in the spaces of daily life and the embrace of community and friendship. These are moments shared briefly, but with people who have changed our everything.

Maybe those defining moments are what truly make a “soul mate.” For whatever reason, you and another human being share a space, one which you might never be in again, and it feels alive. It feels familiar, yet enticingly foreign. Somehow, by coexisting with another, you learn something about yourself you never knew. It goes beyond an exchange between people; a soul mate leads you to reflect on who you truly are.

These moments are captured boldly in our minds as life changing defining points:

It was that day we started as strangers but ended in a warm embrace.

It was when we sat on the floor, sharing a cup of tea and heard each other’s stories through laughter and tears.

It was when they cooked and shared with us delicious dishes made from their poor remanence.

It was when we hugged each other and didn’t have to explain why.

It was when we watched them finding finally a safe and welcoming place for them to live in the world.

These people are meanwhile a very significant part of our lives. Some of them may not be there for much longer; some may be there forever. It doesn’t matter how long we shared our time, it just matters that we lived together. We learned together, we grew together.

It is really unbelievable when you think about it: There have been billions of people, millions of years, infinite moments. And yet, we have crossed paths with people in that one special and finite space, making timeless connections. Somehow, we ended up together. The sheer unlikelihood of our meetings makes them even more significant.

Some people think that soul mates are meant to complete you, to fill some emptiness. But if we give it consider about it, soul mates are meant to show us where we are whole, to show us a fullness and a worth that we didn’t know was there. They force us to reflect on who we are and what we live for.

All we know is that we are never going to restrict ourselves to leaning on only one person defined as our soul mate. We need all kinds of relationships in our lives. No one person will ever save us. We can only learn how to better take care of ourselves, with the things we learn from encountering others.

We challenge you to reflect. How much of yourself have you shared and seen reflected in the lives of others? When have you let yourself be vulnerable and been supported? Feel the embrace of relationship. Grow with people. Let them reveal your worth and notice the worth of others. Do not get lost in worries about the future or insecurities of the past. Just embrace the energy and power in the fleeting moment shared with another.