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Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

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Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Relationships

Do you believe in soul mates?

46 replies

murphys · 04/04/2014 12:26

Just that really. Do you think that there is only one person that you are destined to spend your whole adult life with?

OP posts:

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NollaigShona · 04/04/2014 12:29

No.

Some people get lucky, some accept the limitations of their partners, some seek perfection and never find it.

I think the concept of a soul mate is a bit woo.

littlegreenlight1 · 04/04/2014 12:32

No.
Ive had 3 long term serious relationships in my adult life, all beginning with that we are gonna be together forever feeling.
I dont believe in destiny, fate, soul mates etc, but I do believe when you are genuinely sure about someone, with no wobbles, there is a kind of magnetism that keeps getting stronger, not weaker.

With my ex, I "pretended" for years that things would ultimately be ok, what bollocks, I knew it wouldnt, it was just hard to admit.

ThePearShapedToad · 04/04/2014 12:34

I did

He (mr x) destroyed my heart

I have been in love since, strong enough to want to marry that person. He or the next person I love will never be "the one" though, as mr x was.

Thurlow · 04/04/2014 12:34

No, not at all.

I don't understand how, if there is only one person you are destined to spend your life with, that one person magically crosses your path at some point. There are billions of people on the planet. And even if you narrow it down by people who are somehow quite similar to you i.e. background, education and all that, there are still 10,000+ people who could conceivably be your soulmate.

I think it's a nice aim that you will be happy with someone and spend your whole life with them, but not because they are your soulmate.

Why do you ask?

WhoNickedMyName · 04/04/2014 12:36

No.

When I broke up with my first long term boyfriend, who I was madly in love with and thought we'd spend the rest of our lives together, I was devastated. Thought I'd never love or be happy ever again.

At the end of my second long term relationship I knew I'd be ok in a year or so.

And now, I love my DH to bits. Can't imagine not being with him. But I know if it came down to it and we split, I'd move on and get over it eventually.

ormirian · 04/04/2014 12:39

Nope.

If there was any truth in the idea there should be a lot of very lonely people - bit of a bugger if one of them lived on the Maldives and the other in Ulan Bator. Soul mates kept ever apart by the heartless cruelty of immutable geography

There are billions of people in the world. Any number of which might be wonderful partners.

Bowlersarm · 04/04/2014 12:39

No.

I don't think there is just one person perfect for anyone. I believe that there are a number of people you could meet where you would have an equally perfect relationship.

OneMoreChap · 04/04/2014 12:46

Nope.
There's always somebody else who might be as good/better for you.

Most of us - eventually - find one we are happy with and stop looking.

AMumInScotland · 04/04/2014 12:50

As Wreckless Eric put it -

When I was a young boy
My mama said to me
"There's only one girl in the world for you
And she probably lives in Tahiti."

We pick people we hope we can make a relationship work with. Then we work at it. If we're both working at it, and being flexible and compromising (about equally on both sides) then we can sometimes make it keep on working till death us do part.

But the idea that there is one perfect other, chosen by fate? God? what exactly? who is our perfect 'other half' is nonsense, and dangerous nonsense at that.

It leads people to put up with shit rather than admit they didn't get it right, or to fail to work at a relationship because it ought to magically be 'happy ever after' if you find 'The One'

The world is full of people you can build that special relationship with.

murphys · 04/04/2014 12:51

Thurlow

I asked as a friend of mine discussed this with me yesterday. He is going through a difficult patch at the moment in his marriage and he said to me that he is no longer sure if his wife is his "soul mate".

I also do not think that there is just one person out there, I think you (hopefully) would end up with someone who is compatible with you.

He was quite upset so I didn't want to say something along the lines of "Well really I don't believe that everyone has a soul mate" but it got me to thinking how many people do believe it.

OP posts:

AMumInScotland · 04/04/2014 12:56

Sometimes people just use it to mean "the right person for me to be with" though, without actually thinking about what "soul mate" means. He's probably just rethinking whether he can stay in the relationship. Unless he starts saying he could never have another relationship because she was his soulmate and he failed at his one-and-only chance then I don't think you need to worry about his thinking.

Thurlow · 04/04/2014 12:57

Ok, I would have struggled in that situation not to say something as well!

Maybe he'd see it as a relief if he didn't think there were soulmates?

I wonder sometimes if people leave or give up on relationships that could be perfectly happy and compatible because they are looking for some sort of Hollywood, hearts and flowers, butterflies in your tummy soulmate romance that we've been sold - when the reality is that sometimes keeping even a very good relationship together is tough.

fairylightsintheloft · 04/04/2014 12:59

I think you can be soul mates with someone but its not that there is only one of them out there. If by "soul mate" you mean someone who you connect with on that level beyond your connection with most others then yes I believe in them, but its possible to have that connection with more than one person (though hopefully not at the same time)

DrankSangriaInThePark · 04/04/2014 12:59

I do believe in them, yes.

But I don't believe that we are destined to spend our adult lives with them necessarily.

I suppose I mean one-true-love or something.

lavenderhoney · 04/04/2014 13:02

He means he thinks there's someone else out there, and he might have already met her.

I believe in them, but I try not to:)

murphys · 04/04/2014 13:06

He means he thinks there's someone else out there, and he might have already met her

Gawd, this didn't cross my mind. We are quite open, I think he would have told me if he had met someone else..... I hope.....

OP posts:

AnyFucker · 04/04/2014 13:12

No

Op, your friend sounds like he is currently on the brink of, or already having, an affair

Cheaters use shit like this to justify to themselves what they are doing

Thetallesttower · 04/04/2014 13:14

I do believe in soul-mates like a deep soul connection, but I also think you could have that with more than one person- not very often it comes along though.

Thetallesttower · 04/04/2014 13:15

I do believe when you are genuinely sure about someone, with no wobbles, there is a kind of magnetism that keeps getting stronger, not weaker

I love the way you put this, I know exactly what you mean, it is like magnet.

NotNewButNameChanged · 04/04/2014 13:16

Yes. But I think you can have an incredible connection with someone that goes beyond normal friendship that isn't necessarily romantic.

BeforeAndAfter · 04/04/2014 13:19

No. I think there are multiple people out there than we can connect with with a powerful intensity at different times of our lives.

If you're lucky the first person you fall deeply in love with will be the one that you can grow and change with otherwise I think different people impact you at different times of your life. My first marriage was intense and wonderful for five years. Eighteen years on from our divorce I'd probably kill him for all the reasons that I fell passionately in love with him.

Ludways · 04/04/2014 13:23

No I don't. If dh and I split up I'd be upset but I reckon I'd remarry someone I loved just as much.

I don't believe in souls anyway, lol. Also don't believe in fate, I am master of my own destiny, and all that.

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Weegiemum · 04/04/2014 13:24

I think that my dh is my soul mate, but that has come about from knowing each other for 25 years and being married for 19, from going through hard times, being skint, illnesses but also having our 3 dc, wonderful times, homemaking together.

There are probably a lot of people out there who could have been my soul-mate, but my dh is because we've made it that way.

Does that make any sense?

ormirian · 04/04/2014 14:25

Weegie - that's what I thought too. Hoping it can still be true with enough hard work. I think the problem is that people think soulmates are some sort of instant spiritual connection that never fails. Not.

Pobblewhohasnotoes · 04/04/2014 14:32

No.

I love my DH, I don't want to be with anyone else. And it wasn't until I met him that I realised how wrong my ex-bf's were for me.

However I'm sure somewhere in the world there is another person I could be as equally happy with (I have no wish to find them!).

In the same way though, I don't think anyone should just settle either.

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