Marriage Transformation: Looking for a Soulmate and Creating a Soulmate Relationship

Dear Customers, Friends, and Colleagues:

I know that communications from Marriage Transformation have been infrequent over the last two years. I’m ramping up the Marriage Transformation business again, so you’ll now hear from me more often. We have combined our mailing lists and will be sending periodic messages with helpful articles and “what’s new” notices to all of you. Please see below for the first one. Feel free to pass this email along to others! I’m also open to suggested topics to include. Please see the bottom of the message for new ways to stay in touch with me on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.


Looking for a Soulmate and Creating a Soulmate Relationship
Susanne M. Alexander
Given the divorce and cohabitation rates the way they are, it’s time we question the popular but mythical belief that there is only one “soulmate” out there somewhere for everyone. People are approaching relationships with the view that someday they will meet “the one.” It’s much better to think about creating a soulmate relationship in marriage with someone compatible with you.

Think about what believing in these terms sets up. As a single person, you have to hunt and hunt on an endless round of dates, with the constant refrain in your head: Is it him? Is it her? Most people have no substantial clue what or whom they are looking for to even be able to recognize that they have found “the one.” This approach has you focused on the romantic goal of falling in love, with little forethought about what’s important to you in a lifelong mate. And then how do you turn off the voice in your head that starts second guessing and asking, “Well what if I’m wrong?”

It’s very difficult for someone to establish and sustain a relationship or marriage when they are always wondering in a little back-of-the-mind voice whether they maybe made a mistake, and the person really destined for them is still wandering around. Maybe he’s in China for all they know. Maybe there was a wrong turn a few streets back, and she’s sitting in a different restaurant. It’s a recipe for starting marriage without full commitment and with one foot in divorce court already.

The term “soulmate” implies that the partners are rising above physical attraction and that there is indeed a deep and spiritual bond between them. The common belief is that one has to find a soulmate.  It is good to involve your soul in the quest for a mate – praying to be guided through the process of meeting and recognizing a potential mate is a good thing. But, overall, is wise to believe that a soulmate relationship is created. When you think you’ve found a soulmate but you have had little opportunity to share life experiences, the relationship is probably based on complementary emotional needs. You may be two survivors of previous bad marriages or troubled childhoods, or maybe just two lonely people who are overwhelmingly delighted to discover that the other accepts them.

Marriages are strongest when set on a foundation of friendship and compatibility. In spiritual terms, developing a soulmate connection will follow naturally when people are with someone they are friends with, love deeply, and can live with and raise children with peacefully. You take time to discover and develop your spiritual bond, likely with mutual prayer, worship, and practicing qualities of character, such as kindness, compassion, and faithfulness. The possibilities of finding someone to have this type of relationship with are far more realistic than the idea of there being only one person that matches up with you.
Exploring compatibility and creating relationship harmony is a process that takes time and requires a lot of communication. You can read relationship books together, attend relationship skill-building classes, and more. You can participate in activities together that support your exploration of compatibility and character. It doesn’t require living together (the latest research actually shows that cohabitation is no predictor of later marital satisfaction and longevity). Becoming soulmates requires that couples do real things together, not just sit in a movie theater or go dancing.

Participating in community service projects together will let you know quickly about each other’s character and ability to sustain marital life through difficulties. Can you have complex discussions with each other and successfully solve problems together? If you spend time with children, you will clarify whether you can become effective parents together and what your beliefs are about discipline. Can you cook a meal together peacefully--and serve it to your parents?

Once you are confident you have the possibility of being eternal soulmates, and you are seriously talking about whether to marry, it’s then a great idea to find a coach or trained mentor couple and go through a formal relationship assessment. One of the best is PREPARE from Life Innovations. See www.marriagetransformation.com/coaching.htm for details.

When partners are friends and trust, love, and commit to each other, when they learn how to join their lives successfully as marriage partners, they can become each other’s soulmate. Within marriage, you engage in a lifelong process of nurturing your soulmate bond.

© 2010 Susanne M. Alexander
Susanne M. Alexander is a Relationship and Marriage Coach and the author of many relationship and marriage books. 
Note:  The site for our company, www.marriagetransformation.com has been re-done.  Please come visit! And, let us know what else you would like to see… 
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I pray you have many blessings on your journey,
Susanne Alexander, President 

Marriage Transformation LLC
25241 Chatworth Drive
Cleveland, OH 44117 USA
800-501-6682
www.marriagetransformation.com