more quotes

 

Over time and with the support of others, it is mourning that will soften your grief and help you find renewed meaning in life. To mourn is to heal.

  A relationship built on near-constant companionship can’t help but leave the surviving person in a deep void when one soulmate dies. The surviving soulmate is confronted with the physical reality of the loss nearly constantly. When you have grown accustomed to orbiting every day around someone whose company you enjoy and have grown to depend on—and suddenly that person is gone—your minute-by-minute existence is thrown into disarray. You have not only lost your best friend and confidant, you may also have lost your breakfast companion, your laundry partner, your sous chef, your walking buddy, your TV-watching sidekick, and your bedwarmer in one fell swoop—and this is to mention just a few of the myriad facets of daily presence you may now be missing."

Sense of Humour. To spend your days in companionship with someonej who loves to laugh, make you laugh, and just have fun is a gift of the highest order. To have that gift taken away must then also be a loss of the highest order.

Vulnerability Soulmates open themselves to one another. Seeing the awesome possibilities enabled by the trust we discussed above, they let down their guards and allow their partners to see them as they are, in all their glory and all their faults. Any initial insecurities, vanity, or posturing they may have brought to the relationship are usually dropped over time. The ego, which worries about false things like appearances, status, and being right, fades into the background, and the soul, which is concerned with truths such as the timeless spirit, the beauty of existence, joy, and love, comes to the fore.

Kindness. When a thousand daily kindnesses are suddenly revoked by death, what happens? The surviving soulmate is no longer attended to and cared for in the same way. It can leave you feeling like the sun got turned off—cold and lost in the dark.

A true soulmate is probably the most important person you will ever meet, because they tear down your walls and shake you awake.

 

You and I have memories, longer than the road that stretches out ahead

Longevity many soulmates seem to get closer and closer as they grow older together. Quite a few soulmates have told me that their years and experiences together are what allowed them to transform into soulmates. They seem to find a “together rhythm,” especially, for those who are also parents, after their children have grown and left home.

Soulmates are often partners who learn to weather adversity as a team. Life is replete with loss, and soulmates join to hold each other up and persevere in the face of challenges such as illness, job loss, financial straits, aging, legal troubles, relocation, crises of faith, childrearing, and, of course, the death of loved ones.

Soulmates try to put their relationship needs above their own individual needs. While they do not lose their individuality to the relationship, they tend to subordinate personal desires that may conflict with the shared goals of the relationship. They compromise and sacrifice, but they do so in the hopes that their investment will pay off a hundredfold in the form of shared joy and meaning. Soulmates put their partner’s needs above their own individual needs as well sometimes.

Adventure Not all soulmates are adventurers in the risk-taking, traveler sense of the word. Sure, some couples literally climb mountains, sail seas, and explore foreign lands. Those who do definitely express their mutual passion for life through physical and geographical exploits.

Yet soulmates whose sense of adventure runs more to the everyday often feel just as united in their passion for life. Soulmates often try new things together. They make room for each other to grow and change. They revel in the day ahead and big and small adventures to come. They also tend to enjoy reminiscing together about shared past adventures. Soulmates seem to look at life this way: We don’t know what’s going to happen next, but whatever it is, we will face it head on with as much honesty and joy as possible—together.

Ritual Soulmates typically share and enjoy many day-to-day activities. What to non-soulmates may feel like neutral or even boring tasks-such as morning coffee or a daily walk—to soulmates may feel like sacred rituals. They can imbue even the most mundane routines with a sense of specialness and privilege (more on that next). Their capacity for presence elevates the everyday to the exceptional, and the exceptional to the extraordinary. Soulmates intuit the power of ritual and tend to harness it more often to express and honor their special love.

Gratitude Soulmates seem to appreciate their good fortune. They move through life together aware that not all relationships enjoy the attributes we’ve been talking about in this chapter. Rather than feeling smug, however, they feel lucky.

The concepts of privilege and gratitude are related closely to honoring. If you feel grateful for something, you honor it. You regard it with great respect. You hold it in high esteem. Soulmates hold each other in high esteem. They regard each other with respect. They honor one another in life, and the survivor continues to honor the partner who died after his or her death.

I've heard it said

That people come into our lives for a reason

Bringing something we must learn

And we are led

To those who help us most to grow

If we let them

And we help them in return

Well, I don't know if I believe that's true

But I know I'm who I am today

Because I knew you

Like a comet pulled from orbit

As it passes a sun

Like a stream that meets a boulder

Halfway through the wood

Who can say if I've been changed for the better? But

Because I knew you

I have been changed for good

It well may be

That we will never meet again

In this lifetime

So let me say before we part

So much of me

Is made of what I learned from you

You'll be with me

Like a handprint on my heart

And now whatever way our stories end

I know you have re-written mine

By being my friend

Like a ship blown from its mooring

By a wind off the sea

Like a seed dropped by a skybird

In a distant wood

Who can say if I've been changed for the better? But

Because I knew you

Because I knew you

I have been changed for good

And just to clear the air

I ask forgiveness

For the things I've done you blame me for

But then, I guess we know there's blame to share

And none of it seems to matter anymore

Like a comet pulled from orbit (like a ship blown from its mooring)

As it passes a sun (by a wind off the sea)

Like a stream that meets a boulder (like a seed dropped by a bird)

Halfway through the wood (in the wood)

Who can say if I've been changed for the better?

I do believe I have been changed for the better

And because I knew you

Because I knew you

Because I knew you

I have been changed

For good

For Good" Wicked

Stephen Schwartz