Reader Question: I've been reading up on twin flames, but I'm confused about the idea. If we are all just one big "soul" anyway, how do pieces of that collective soul have a twin? Does the idea that we are all "one" contradict he idea of soulmates and finding The One?
This has been on my mind a lot recently as well, and frankly even after lots of reading and meditating and conversations with supposedly enlightened experts I still don’t have a clue. Maybe no one does except those who have had a glimpse of the “other side” and who share that with us through various forms of angelic or channeled communication. I think all of us on this side are just guessing.
The idea behind twin souls is pretty simple and I’ve written about it before, hoping I had at least a rudimentary understanding. It goes something like this: In the dawn of time when souls came into being, they contained both male and female energy (not gender), similar to positive and negative electrical charges. At some point and for unknown reasons (though there are many theories), those energetic components separated, each going its own way, dipping in and out of human lives, gathering experience and forever searching for that original other “half.” That’s the basic story of Twin Souls.
Here’s how I imagine it might have happened. Emphasis on “might.” I’m not a scientist, but this super simplistic analogy works for me. At this time. At my current level of awakening. So that means it’s subject to change as I grow and evolve.
Since souls are essentially bundles of energy, let's picture an atom. The nucleus of an atom is made up of protons and neutrons. That nucleus is surrounded by orbiting electrons. (This is a very elementary description.) When combined, these tiny bundles of protons, neutrons, and electrons make up the atoms that form the elements and molecules that are the building blocks for our perceived world. They are distinct and complete entities, yet it takes each of them to make up the atom, and how they combine themselves determines what kind of “thing” they jointly create.
In this imaginary scenario, let’s pretend an original soul was like an atom. You and your twin soul might have been the proton and neutron forming the nucleus. Some sort of blast occurred, a "nuclear explosion" that sent the proton you and the neutron you flying in different directions. Maybe this blast even blew up all atoms sending all souls flying about. That blast pitched those bits of proton, neutron, and electron into a perpetual quivering quest trying to get back to their original configuration. They searched. They experimented with all sorts of combinations, forming a plethora of new relationships in the form of new atoms, new elements, new molecules, new STUFF! The world as we know it has been in a creative frenzy ever since, a playground of inventiveness.
Of course, when we look around, we don’t see all these bits and pieces doing this dance of combining and uncombining and recombining. Nope, when we look at a tree, we see the tree, not the millions of atoms, all the positive, negative, and neutral energy, that make up the tree. And because we can’t see the behind-the-scenes dance, we get stuck in the mystery of it all. We get stuck in trying to figure it out. We get stuck in trying to find that original configuration thinking there must be something magical about it and ignoring or dismissing everything else that is going on, all the other potential combinations.
From this point of view, all human relationships are like a great big chemistry experiment.
The beauty of this set up is that we can find happiness and fulfillment and joy in any number of combinations. Instead of wasting this life or any life searching for just The One, (the proton to our neutron, our twin soul) to the exclusion of everything else, we can enjoy many, many blends and mash-ups. Maybe we need all those experiences and combinations and creations to help us awaken to this bigger picture. From this perspective, we are all human soulmates, all combinations and potential combinations are beautiful and helpful and useful, and through this dance of combining and recombining, we get to experience the vastness of creation and creativity and come to finally understand who and what we really are. If it’s only through these experiences of combining and recombining that we are ultimately rejoined with our twin soul, that original proton and neutron, then searching directly, with blinders on ignoring the other combinations, only prolongs the quest.
So in this picture I’m painting, the bits and pieces of souls, which each of us experience as being human, would be like the protons and neutrons that make up the atom, individual parts of the whole. So when the atom is blasted and all these bits and pieces go flying out there vibrating and jingling and dancing and trying each other one for size, they’re all still part of the One thing even they are now bits and pieces. Ultimately, they will settle down and come back together to form a picture. Maybe the original picture, maybe a new picture.
Is there only one person out there who is The One? I don’t think so. All those bits and pieces of the original soul or souls, which is each of us, are just seeking to form that big picture again, whether it’s a new picture or the original picture or the next dimension.
That original “proton” to that original “neutron” may be floating around, but the fundamental question as it applies to Twin Souls is whether they find each other again. Do they even need to? Or is their real job to find the next combination? What is really important is that there are lots of opportunities for great relationships, lots of potential wonderful combinations. By limiting ourselves to just one and saying if we can’t find that one we’re not complete, maybe that’s the problem. Maybe we’re meant to enjoy the quest and not be so focused on one narrow and possibly imaginary end result. And maybe figuring that out is the whole point of it all.
Image credit: For a truly imaginative portrayal of who we "become" in new combinations, check out Dita Pepe's marvelous self portraits - imagining her life with different partners. Who would she have become? How would she have lived? Fascinating article and thought-provoking photos. Photographer Imagines Her Life with Dozens of Different Men in Self Portraits.
Anne Wade is Teacher, Writer, Mentor, and Coach for courageous women in midlife and beyond who want to disrupt their own status quo and design life on their own terms, even in turbulent times. She has developed the Becoming Found process of going within to find and address the inner barriers we have all inadvertently built up against love, happiness, health, wealth and any other desires of our hearts. Teaching women to unapologetically shine like a superstar and live their legacy is Anne’s mission.
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