I've been working in let go of "new age" ideas that I immersed myself in growing up because they do not work for a happy life. There is quite a good article on "spiritual bypassing" floating round the internet and it sums up why.

My ex and I had a crazy connection, full of very intense coincidences and believing we had dreamt the same dreams etc. Losing touch with reality type stuff. All that did was mess up my head, get us attached and enmeshed - while there was really dark stuff going on that made her really not the partner I needed in my life. Upon leaving her, I was more gutted at the boundaries I had allowed to be broken and felt awful about myself.

Going forward, I'm believing that holding out for a relationship til you find someone who ticks all your important boxes and doesn't come with red flags (and who feels that way about you) then nurturing that relationship is the way forward.

But, then sometimes I think of that hard relationship that messed me up - and realise she was every lesson I hadn't fully learned up to that point and she drove each lesson home. Maybe soulmates aren't what we think and they actually come into our lives to scare the crap out of us until we learn what it is we actually want to do and want to avoid! Be careful what you wish for.

So, I wouldn't be wishing for a soul mate now, but a life partner. Not some ethereal thing that transcends reality - but someone who I could actually have a viable day to day relationship with who doesn't do my head in, or violate boundaries.