Going around the circle, each person shared a few words that captured the essence of their heart’s deepest desires for 2026. My teacher closed by sharing, “May everything I seek in others I find within myself.” His words have been resounding within me like a bell ever since.
What we don’t allow ourselves to embody, we seek in those around us as a balm for our soul. Yet, what the soul truly yearns for is to be whole and complete in itself.
As children, we learn to play a specific role in our family dynamic. Certain behaviors are rewarded or better received, shaping our perception of who we need to be in order to receive love, affection, and attention. Despite our parents’ best intentions, there are parts of us that are undernourished or neglected.
When we meet people who allow themselves to embrace those qualities or ways of being that we have repressed, it captivates our attention. This dynamic is often captured by the adage that opposites attract.
For me, I felt an irresistible allure to people who were extroverted, radiated self-confidence and relished being the center of attention. This was the role my father played in our family and one that I didn’t feel I had access to. After years of dating people like this, I realized that being around people like this kept me more firmly rooted in the same familiar role. I didn’t just want to be in relationships with these types of people, I wanted to nurture these qualities within myself.
Society and the media perpetuate this idea by leading us to believe we need to find someone to complete us. There are many storylines of people seeking their better half, but not many where the protagonist independently seeks wholeness within themselves.
Recently, I listened closely as a mutual acquaintance shared how he kept falling into the same dating pattern. He was attracted to women who were spontaneous, impulsive, and adventurous. They followed their impulses without a second thought, something he hasn’t allowed himself to do. He described a time when his former partner convinced him to change their well structured holiday plans at the last minute, which turned out to be one of his best holidays.
Everything he was seeking in a romantic partner was what his soul longed for within himself. I told him that he could keep dating women like this, or he could allow himself to embody more of those characteristics.
If he kept seeking these qualities in another it would likely just keep him more firmly rooted in his current way of being. When one person holds a certain polarity, it’s common that we feel we need to hold the other end. The more spontaneous and erratic the partner, the more solid and firmly grounded he would need to be.
I inquired about what his wildest dream was. He confided that he would love to quit his job, get a van, and travel the world. There it was. The part of him that longed for adventure and to live a carefree life, which he kept seeking in romantic partners.
In his free time, he watched videos of people who were living the life he longed for. He rattled off stories of men who had synchronistically met romantic partners while pursuing their dreams. By following the call of their soul, these men were living in alignment with their truth. They weren’t waiting to meet someone who could save them from their current life and motivate them to pursue their dreams. They were doing what they loved and that allowed them to cross paths with people who had the same passions and interest. If they met that same person before making the leap, it’s likely they wouldn’t have been a match.
I was recently talking to another man who shared that he was waiting to meet the right person to help convince him to pursue a new life abroad. In retrospect, this could have been a flirtatious comment that was lost on me in the moment. Regardless, I shared that I’ve been wondering if looking for something external to come into our life before following our dreams is the ultimate procrastination technique.
Our ego will invent endless reasons to stay firmly in the safety of our comfort zone. We tell ourselves we’ll take that step once we meet someone, land the right job, save enough money, and the list goes on.
All the while, there’s a knowing deep inside that there’s more to life. Our soul whispers to us through our desires and dreams. While the temptation is strong to look for someone else to save us, it’s through becoming the one we’ve been waiting for that we find our bliss.
May everything you seek in others be found within yourself.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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Photo credit: Andrik Langfield on Unsplash