Finding the Love of Your Life
Thousand Reflections by Sandbox
Issue #28
About the Reflections: Sandbox is full of people from all walks of life and background. Here, we try to tap into this collective wisdom by offering a prompt every week and sourcing short responses from the members.
This week’s prompt
How do you find your ideal person? How do you know they’re ideal? For many people, too, those ideals change as we grow. Sometimes when we are young, we look for superheroes, but as we grow up sometimes that changes. Some people have multiple partners over their lifetimes. There’s also differences in how we view “the love of our lives” — for some, it’s a fantasy, for others, gospel. Some consider marriage or love to be a stronger bond even than family, while others don’t.
This reflection is all about the question of finding the love of your life. Have you met them, and if so, what makes you believe that it is the person you will spend your life with? Do you prioritize great physical beauty, wisdom, or both, or something else, or perhaps the experiences you have created with this person? How important is love, is it stronger than family? How do you navigate rough patches? What drives you to each other even in the most uncomfortable times?
Of course, you don’t have to be in a relationship to answer this prompt! We’d love to hear your thoughts on the concept of “the love of your life” as well!
Love is what makes my soul expand, craving to contain infinite Light. In every moment, Love is reaching at me…the dark eyes of the man who just passed by, the cup of coffee in the morning, my friend’s hug, the song on the radio…
And I spend my time looking for Love in every corner of my life.
We grow when we are alone, faced to our bare humanity and frailty, but the deepest growth happens when we are faced to other people. I do believe the relationship with a man is the strongest there is, stronger than friendship, than family. Because that man is the one who can get closest to my soul. Our embrace makes me vulnerable and open, makes me go out of myself to meet him.
I do not believe there is one soulmate. We can love several persons, I do love them, each in a unique way. What makes it ‘the one’ is an issue of timing, walking in the same direction and most important, commitment. It is about choice, every day choice, not fate. The more effort we put into something, the more we appreciate and care about it. The limits we encounter push our imagination and energy to develop around them. This is how we grow. If we run away from a relationship those specific problems will come back later, looking for solving.
I believe in God. God as perfect Love. Any relationship that includes Him is nourished. I have no strength and ‘heart’ to love enough by myself. I stumble and fall in all relationships. That is why I need Him to come and pick me up, guide and help me grow in love. He is the original Love we aimlessly try to find in every second of our life.
We are walking toward perfection and light. Our man or woman is that someone that cracks our hearts open so that more Light can get in. With them we learn to give ourselves up and become who we really are.
Truthfully, I don’t know the characteristics about the ideal person I want to end up with yet. I think we are human and we are born copycats, we like to copy what other peoples do, what movies and society influences us to do. When I was growing up I had similar kind of intentions too: I thought she needs to be tall, good looking, physically attractive, smart and have similar thoughts and values like me. This thought evolved with every single girl I hung out or talked with — I would find some qualities inside them that I found attractive and add them to the fictitious character of my future love. I also wanted to be complemented by the person. For example, I thought if I am not good at something, she should complement me there. That has been the fantasy so far. Also, as I was born and raised in a super conservative Muslim society, I always believed in the idea of having one love for a lifetime and falling only for the person with whom I am going to be married.
I had many opportunities in my life so far to choose a partner, but I moved on after 1–2 meetups with each person because if I asked myself if this was the person I would spend my life with, most of the time the answer was no. Recently I also had a similar experience, though this time I spent more time with her. I usually try my best to be with anyone who approaches me first, which was the case here. But the whole time we spent together, I wanted to learn why she wanted me, and finally we found we are both just two confused souls. I think if there is confusion on one side it can be dealt with, but if it’s on both sides, it won’t bring fruit for the longer term. That’s why we moved apart, but did I love her? I guess for few days, yes, but it was not something I could hold onto for the longer term.
For me love is stronger than family, because it’s a bond to start a new family together and make vows to spend the rest of life together. The children, for example, form the foundation for a new family.
I think that even while spending a lifetime with someone everything will not always be sweet. There will be times when we will feel that we hold each other so strongly we will never let the other go, but there will also be times when we will wonder why this person is still here or why he/she is not dead yet. But I need to find that one unique element that will keep me always attracted to that person, forcing me to come back when I feel like moving on. It’s like moving to a desert island to me, we both need to find that one element in each other which will help us to choose the other as the only one person to move together to that lonely island.
Right now I don’t know what that thing might be. I am keeping an open mind to find that. I think we are having tough time to find love in our generation because we are too confused about what we want, and we have too many options. I guess I am confused too, but I will keep searching, trying to keep my values and principles unharmed. It’s never too late, right?
Finding the love of my life used to be one of my greatest sources of anxiety. I obsessed about who would that person be. Where would I met her. How would we fall in love. After a couple unsuccessful relationships I became more and more convinced that the process of finding such person was of greater and greater importance. That I needed to discard any possibilities that were not perfect. Ideal or else no deal. Then a lengthy story started to take place.
Too long; didn’t read: I burned out and saw a woman I knew for a while under a new light: Irma de Magalhães. I hadn’t considered Irma, awkwardly a homophone for sister in Portuguese, for anything other than the good friendship we had before. But in this sunrise I understood we don’t ever get to meet the love of our lives. It’s impossible. Because we can only create it. Together. For a long time. And that’s not easy. And surely doesn’t happen before you try it out.
It’s not about individuals finding something they need or want. But about two (or more?) people building something they can. It’s not about finding someone with whom we want to spend our life with. It’s about finding someone we want to serve. And that is, etymologically, the definition of family, i.e. a group of people with whom you share blood ties or a servant relationship. A tribe. An organization. A commitment to a shared future. And to better serve, to create a better love, we don’t need to prioritize physical beauty, wisdom, or anything else.
On the contrary, if you prioritize any of them you can only get some mortal fragments of fantasy. The person will become uglier, fatter or not as perfect as the younger ones. You’ll think you’re wiser and your other half will at least be relatively dumber. Or just the fact you’ve lived more will make you more prone to find new defects and take note of new things that annoy you. So, to find the love of your life you only need to look out for their hands. And to answer three handy questions:
- Does the person that attracted you have hands that want to build a better world? And if so, what’s their actual experience in at least making the day of other people, or even your day, better?
- Are you strong enough to hold their hands, unconditionally, when they need some extra balance, strength or just warmth?
- Does that person want to hold your hands and also support you when you least want help, and are you capable of accepting their service, especially as it comes from someone that would ideally not be exposed to such a fragile state of yours, as it ruins the romance?
If and when you find a match, any rough patches can be steered by such dexterous hands. Even if not easy, those answers will guarantee you arrival at good port. The journey won’t be dry. But water makes both softer. Positive that any old storms won’t be new again. And will make you wonder that perhaps weddings should be replaced by celebrations of good processes, not of good hunting skills. Here’s to a world with larger rings to be worn on the wrists of the hands that hold better hearts.
The Myth of the One
Narrated ad nauseum in movies and romance novels, the goal of your love life is to find or be found by the one. The one is everything you ever wanted and more. The one may not be perfect for everyone but is perfect for you. From the instant you lay eyes on each other, a feeling of implacable destiny draws you to one another and you soon discover that you are soul-and-body-mates. You will meet, overcome all obstacles, and live happily ever after, married with children, one big happy family — and then the credits roll. Because in real life, even though sometimes experiences that feel like that do happen, things aren’t that simple.In fact, I would argue that believing and living with that mythical notion is deleterious for three reasons:
First of all, by believing in that myth you have more of a reason to quickly ditch people when things get hard. You would say to yourself, or have that be said unto you, “He/she can’t be the one, otherwise things wouldn’t be that hard.” But whenever relationships get serious and profound they get hard, but they’re worth it — sometimes. However, you wouldn’t know it if you use your belief in the myth of the one to rob yourself of any opportunity to discover that.
Secondly, believing in the myth of the one at times can lead you to attempt to force someone who is almost the one to be 100% the one by pressuring them to do or be things they don’t want to do or be. Thus, ruining a good relationship that might have had bloomed further because a real person didn’t measure up to an imaginary one.
Thirdly, believing in the myth of the one can lead you to be with…no one — because no one is “good enough”. However, it is prudent to remember that prolonged inexperience in relationships, does not lead anywhere other than emotional and sexual frustration. It also leaves your relationship judgment blunt and you end up making fewer and less astute decisions. So that even if you do come across some-one, you wouldn’t be able to tell, or if you did, you might ruin what you could have made to work had you not been so inexperienced.
The question you need to ask is: “What reason or evidence do I have for believing in the myth of the one?” Look around. Not one. So why are so many captivated by its allure?
I don’t like talking about the love of my life. It gets complicated, because it was complicated, and there’s a past tense, and then I have to rearrange the sentence to say “one of the loves of my life.”
I have met one of my soulmates. I know that because he made me a better version of myself, he challenged me, I fell more in love with him the more I knew him, and most importantly, he knew me, without needing to be told. He just knew.
He can’t have been THE soulmate, because that wouldn’t do, because time and circumstance being what they are, “us” was never really something that could last.
I believe in love, that we love often and greatly. Relationships and love are not always the same thing, and in order to have both, it’s about more than just love — but time, circumstance, commitment. I have met one of my soulmates, and a couple of the loves of my life. Perhaps at some point, one will be in the right time and circumstance to allow commitment.
In the meantime, I try to love just as deeply each time, because while heartache aches, love cannot be restrained.
“My face is mine, my hands are mine. My mouth is mine. But I’m not. I’m yours.”
I was introduced to this thought today, but it seemed like I always knew it — or that I’ve known it for about 5 years and 3 months.
Vulnerability. Growth. Time. Peace. Trust. Honesty. Support.
In order to love, I became patient. In order to be loved, I became vulnerable. We all have our downfalls, our scars, our fears and reservations. We all second guess, build walls and mistrust. We do it to protect ourselves, to keep others from hurting us, to avoid more wounds.
The thing is, pain still comes — it can’t be more measured than love itself, nor predicted. In order to love and to be loved you ought to allow yourself to be vulnerable. Pain comes regardless, so let it serve love. It’s about allowing another to step in, to know your flaws, your bad days, your worst hours, take some of what’s yours. It’s about offering the exact same thing.
With every tear, a laugh. With every confession, a bond. With every mistake, an opportunity to learn. With every fear, a conquer. Time seems to go forward and backwards, existing through changes and connections. You’re made of yourself and another. You’re connected through this vulnerability, this honesty, this support. You grow together. You’re made of yourself and another, a shared skin. And, in each moment, you embrace one another. An embrace that becomes quieter in each of those moments. An embrace in which you feel safe and peaceful. That embrace is Home. I’m at Home.
“My face is mine,my hands are mine. My mouth is mine. But I’m not. I’m yours.”
This is the second part of our February series on Finding Love. The first part is here. If you enjoy this series, be sure to click the green heart to recommend and follow the publication so you never miss an issue!
