What If You Could Know the Exact Moment You’d Meet Your Soulmate?
Would it change the way you live your life?
*Spoiler alerts for the movie Timer (2009) ahead.
What if you lived in a world where you could know the exact second your soulmate comes into your life? This is the reality for the characters in the movie Timer, an unexpectedly thought-provoking rom-com. Once a person reaches a certain age, they have the option to get a timer implanted on their wrist. It counts down to the moment they will meet their soulmate. The catch is their soulmate also has to have a timer for the countdown to begin.
Some have a countdown of years, others days. Some decide not to get one. But Oona, the main character played by Emma Caulfield, has the rare blank timer. With this, she has no idea when she will meet her soulmate and may never truly know when she meets him if he never gets a timer.
For the characters who chose to have a timer, they have two options: they continue to live their life whether that means they’re single, casually date, or commit to someone who isn’t their soulmate or they wait patiently until the countdown ends. It’s a dilemma they constantly face. After all, would you get into a relationship you scientifically knew was going to fail?
In our reality, we obviously don’t have this option. But what if we did? What if you knew that your soulmate was out there somewhere just waiting to meet you? Would you live your life as if you didn’t know or would you wait and hinder any possible romance until they finally come into your life?
What Does the Word Soulmate Even Mean?
This word is not simple enough to hold one clear-cut definition. Its meaning is unique to the person who is lucky enough to experience it.
A soulmate can be the person you want to spend the rest of your life with. It could be the person that knows you better than anyone else. It could mean someone you will always love but because of life circumstances, you can’t be together. It can be your best friend. It can be your sibling. A soulmate can be anyone you connect to on a deeper level than most.
I believe you can have multiple soulmates in a span of a lifetime. And it doesn’t have to be romantic either. Having a soulmate doesn’t necessarily mean it’s someone who will be in your life forever. The changes and events that might happen to your relationship, in the long run, are unpredictable.
Throughout my almost three decades on earth, there are only a select handful of people I felt I bonded with more than others. How can I tell? By the way I felt around them. They made me feel alive yet they also brought me a sense of calm.
Although many of them are no longer in my life today, I am grateful for everything I have learned from them. If I could take away the pain I felt from each of them, I wouldn’t. Because it wouldn’t have hurt so much to lose them if I didn’t get to experience the high of love too.
Because that’s the beauty of life. It may not always work out. And that’s okay. We are beings that are constantly changing. What we need in our life at this moment can change at any time. Even if a relationship doesn’t last, it doesn’t change how that person touched your life in ways only they can. It’s better to have had the chance to feel a true connection with another being than to not experience it at all. This is one of the many lessons Timer taught me.
Not the One but the Detour
In a world where we have free will and time is not promised, neither is a soulmate. Change, however, is guaranteed. But if you lived in a world where timers existed, would you get one? Would certainty in love make you live your life differently?
In Timer, Oona is obsessed with finding her one true love. But Mikey, her love interest played by John Patrick Amedori, is spontaneous, charming, and exactly what she needed to get out of her rut and learn to live in the moment. He says my absolute favorite quote from the movie.
“See, that’s what’s stupid about the timer. It’s that you have one path and you can’t take detours. I mean, life is about detours.” — Mikey
Every word of that quote hit me. It was contradictory to the certainty that having a timer provided the characters in this movie. For those who chose to implant a timer, they wanted love to be guaranteed not realizing the possible sacrifices they would have to make in order to get it.
When she decided to not let her timer control her life and to take a chance on something unguaranteed, he changed her in ways that only he could. He made her finally let go and embrace every moment rather than waiting for a big one to happen. And what he said perfectly aligns with their story. He took her off her current path and they built a connection together that Oona would’ve missed out on had she not taken a chance to venture into unknown territory.
The thing is, we are shaped by our experiences. We are beings who are constantly changing. If our timer says we wouldn’t meet our soulmate for another 5 years, would we even be the same person? Would we want the same things?
Your soulmate right now could be a completely different person a decade from now. While Oona and her love interest Mikey weren’t meant to be together and knew it from the moment they met, it didn’t minimize or take away any ounce of love they had between them.
The Problem With Guarantees
Sometimes I can’t help but want some guarantees in my life. While a predictable life can seem appealing, it also takes the thrill out of it too. Do I want to know if my next relationship will work out? Of course, but not at the expense of changing the way I approach my life in order to get it.
We can’t wait for things to happen to start living our life. Life truly is about detours. It’s about the little moments, not just the big ones. It’s about every person that comes into your life and leaves a mark on your heart, good or bad.
Personally, I’m not sure if I would make the decision to get a timer for myself. I think that it would make me wait to live my life rather than living in the moment. Even without us having the option to get a timer, we tend to wait for things to happen in our lives. Once that thing happens, we expect to feel changes in our level of happiness. I couldn’t imagine having a timer and just waiting. Whether that be 6 months, 1 year, or blank like Oona’s, it’s a lot of waiting.
When we spend life waiting, we end up not living at all.
It reminds me of the way we are often told to live our lives. Wait for that promotion, wait for the marriage, wait for the perfect moment to do what you want. But waiting isn’t living in the moment.
It Doesn’t Have to Be Forever
The relationship between Mikey and Oona was an endearing one. She wasn’t expecting Mikey to come into her life. He was everything she wasn’t looking for but everything she needed. When life is so planned out and we yearn to find our soulmate with the hopeful promise of forever, we forget what is truly important.
Not every relationship has to work out and not every relationship has to be the right one. Yes, it may have caused you pain that you would’ve rather not felt, but that experience is a part of who you are. Each person we cross paths with molds us into a better version of ourselves and can be taken as a lesson.
I am damn proud of the person I am today. If I had not gone through any type of hardship I wouldn’t know what great feels like. I wouldn’t know how to appreciate both the good and the bad.
Life is easier when we are able to separate fantasy from reality, not because love is not possible but because it’s so much more than what we see in movies. Nothing is perfect and nothing is forever. Endings aren’t always happy. We have to learn to appreciate what is right in front of us when we have it and to be able to cherish those moments even if those people eventually leave our lives.
The concept of soulmates is a unique thing. It sounds good on paper but in reality, it may not be what you think it is. Once you get past the predictable rom-com storylines, you realize it is much deeper than what’s shown on the surface. It’s more than the person you are going to spend the rest of your life with. Soulmates are the people you connect with on a deeper level compared to anyone else. But rather than waiting for them to fall into your lap, life is happening right in front of you.
Time is precious. But the thing with time is that it’s limited. Often, we spend it waiting for the future to happen. We never truly embrace the moment we are in right now.
Let things fall into place on their own. If it’s meant to happen, it will happen. Don’t spend life waiting for something big. Live life like you don’t have unlimited time to live it.
Be your own happy ending. Heck, just be your own happy.
