I don't believe in soul mates anymore. I realize that some of you may have abandoned the notion of them some time ago, if, indeed, you ever held the premise as a possibility. Perhaps you think it woefully naive of me to have ever considered it, as I now do.

To be fair to myself, I should maybe say that what I am calling "soul mates" now was what I always thought of as God's will. The way I interpreted God's will is that there is one person out there for me, that He, in His infinite wisdom, would lead me to at the right time, just in the nick of time. And I still think that. But the idea that there is only one person who could make me happy, who will, as a by-product of fate or destiny, or whatever, "find" me, well that's the hoakey, vain thing I've given up. I will end up with one man. But there is no particular one man who is meant for me, exclusively. In terms of probability, there are any number of men with whom I might be happy, compatible, and have a successful marriage. And giving up such an antiquated philosophy is liberating.

How many men have I fallen for, to various degrees, believing that this one was the one? The number is embarrassing. How could I have felt that way about so many people? Blame it on my youth or my inexperience. In any case, the soul mates test fails. And the idea of meeting my soul mate has led me to hang on, hoping against hope, long after wisdom dictated that I should move on--that it just wasn't going to happen.

I've also met a number of men that I find attractive for one reason or another, lately, and that has led me to understand that it's not about the whole package (that being the feeling of being twins separated at birth, that "he's just like me" feeling). It's about meeting someone at a time that's mutually convenient when you're each sexually and emotionally attracted to the other, and you have similar enough goals, or you're both equally confused about who you are, and you're both game for the adventure of syncing your lives up.

It's not that I don't think God orchestrates events in our lives, but that orchestration is the stuff of the ordinary. And meeting someone that I could potentially marry is also based on who I am and what I'm doing, and whether or not I want it and whether or not the man in question also wants it--and wants it at the same time that I do.

I realized a week ago that my paradigm has shifted, that the burden of watching and waiting for a mythic soul mate has lifted, and it's made me a lot more receptive to life in general.