I don't believe in the concept of "soulmate" or "Mr. Right." I know there are many people in this world I could (did) love. Some were right for me; others were not. The love I felt was not automatically better and more true for the ones who were right than for the others. Would that it were so. Life would have been much, much easier. There is an element of choice in love. Some people don't like that idea. They prefer to believe in the romantic, fairy-tale ideal that one "falls" in love, and one doesn't have any control over whom one loves. I think these people confuse love with infatuation and lust. Simple attraction can come suddenly and unbidden, but that is not love, although it can contain the seeds of love. Love grows and ripens. It must be nurtured and cherished. This happens by choice, not by chance. We are not helpless creatures in the clutches of Destiny. Life is like a river, and we are like kayakers upon it. The river has a current, a flow that tries to lead us in a particular direction. However, we have paddles and rudders, and we can choose our own courses, although it may be easier to follow the current. We choose. We are in control of our own kayaks. "The One Big Love" is the stuff of fairy tales told to children. Adults make their own magic and write their own stories, and we don't always live happily ever after. |
TOBL is a myth, pure and simple. Yes, there are many people who believe that they've found it, but there are just as many who felt the exact same and then found out that it wasn't. Plus, the idea that it's THE ONE Big Love is rather depressing. If TOBL is real, can one only have ONE true love throught one's life? If so, have I already found and lost mine? If not, does that mean the love I had for Gus wasn't "real"? What rubbish. No, TOBL is a fairy tale, and fairy tales, although nice to listen to once in a while, make HORRIBLE teachers. I believe in true, pure love, but I do not believe in The One Big Love. I don't believe that love will conquer all, that love makes everything perfect, that everyone has a "soulmate" somewhere in the world, or any of that fanciful garbage. Love just is. Some of us are lucky enough to find it. Some of us find it and then lose it. Some of us find and lose it several times over the course of our lives. Some of us never find it. Some of us find it but don't recognize it. Some of us see it where it never was in the first place. (This woman lost her husband, Gus to depression a year ago.) |