Writer's Block: The one that got away

[omorka]

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Not as stated, no.

See, I think the idea of "the one" is silly. "There's only one girl in the world for you, and she probably lives in Tahiti." (And can I just point out that Mickey Dolenz singing those lyrics is all kinds if ironic?) Seriously, if that were true and souls were randomly distributed, most of us would have to go to China or India to find our lifemates.

I don't think I'm "half of something" (to skip to the Proclaimers, who also covered the song I just quoted). To the extent that I think anything like a soulmate exists, it would be the other people who share my matron and patron deities, and ours is a union of motive purpose, not of romance.

Now, I should qualify that. I don't actually think we're randomly distributed, and the idea that some of us have karmic links of some sort - that we appear in each others' lives over and over in different roles in different incarnations - is sort of both intuitive and comforting for me, although I admit I don't have a lot of evidence for it. But I don't think it's the same role every time. And I suspect that if you're lovers every single time, that that means you're Doing It Wrong, that there's something you're supposed to be learning from that role that you're failing to learn, so you keep doing it over and over until you get it right.

And I think of it (natch) as not being limited to a pair of people. I mean, that would be selfish and insular, almost solipsistic. I suspect that there are groups of souls that find themselves together over and over again, siblings in one life, lovers in another, co-workers in a third, liege-lord and faithful servants in yet another.

Comments

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

I have never believed in the idea that there is only One True Soul Mate for any given person, or that if you love someone and it turns out not to be forever, than that person was obviously the Wrong One. Neither of these notions is borne out by empirical evidence.

[morgi.livejournal.com]

While writing a guide to Catholic weddings for non-Catholics mebil came across one of the takes on soul mates--a soul is split into two before being sent down to earth, and the halves are supposed to find each other.

I'm six years younger than he is. He looked over at me and said "You really ARE slow!"

[dbzmerciter2005.livejournal.com]

Now, I should qualify that. I don't actually think we're randomly distributed, and the idea that some of us have karmic links of some sort - that we appear in each others' lives over and over in different roles in different incarnations - is sort of both intuitive and comforting for me, although I admit I don't have a lot of evidence for it. But I don't think it's the same role every time. And I suspect that if you're lovers every single time, that that means you're Doing It Wrong, that there's something you're supposed to be learning from that role that you're failing to learn, so you keep doing it over and over until you get it right.

I agree with this part. I'm still trying to figure out who everyone is in my past lives, but I do agree with this.

I also believe that we meet some people for a reason, and it's unavoidable. An example would me my Japanese teacher that I had a crush on. If I didn't have her the way things played out (IE for my 301 and 401 classes) I would have had her for 401 anyways since she taught 401 since she got there. It was inevitable, and, if you believe in astrology in all, it was pretty clear it was too. (My sun is in cancer, her moon is in cancer, and, since we're pretty sure she was born in the early afternoon, her moon ended up almost on top of my sun, which means we were destined to meet.) I wonder who she was in a past life, at least in relation to me.

[(Anonymous)]

Given that the population of the earth was half what it is today when I was a lad I fail to see how we could really expect to see the same souls over and over. Clearly the number of people we encounter who have a large number of previous lives is smaller than the population itself. Each generation would either have a number of new souls, or borrowed souls from some other type of being.

Personally I'd be a bit shocked if the math worked out that more than a small percentage of the people I know today stood any chance of being able to be people I knew in previous lives.

(This assumes I had previous lives in any manner that would make knowing people possible. I'm not sure I concede that point. (I didn't believe in reincarnation any of my previous lives - why start now?))

[bibulb.livejournal.com]

See also the extra tidbit in Spider Robinson's "Soul Search" addressing the intersection of reincarnation and population growth.

[peoriapeoria.livejournal.com]

Well, nothing says some people aren't here more than once. The karma might seeming be a bit odd, but, time is more an issue to critters as they are in the world.