On Finding "The One" (and a little story of what could be better than that)

I grew up with stories like Cinderella and Snow White...

And later in life, another kind of fairytales found me - the kind produced by Hollywood. 

There was always a “the One”: Harry had his Sally, Kelly had her Dylan and of course Carrie Bradshaw had Mr. Big. 

There was really never a doubt for me that relationships were about finding “the One” – that person who would be in tune with me, there for me, would understand me and know what I want, think, feel, when to seek my presence and when not to without me uttering a word.

Even when I started working on myself and I turned the attention from the others towards me, I was still secretly hoping this will help me be more visible or recognisable to “the One”.

I started opening up to the possibility that maybe there isn’t a Mr. Right or a “the One” out there when somebody bluntly said it to me. I was angry at that person back then and hoped she was not right, but since then, it just happened that the idea of finding “the One” became weaker and weaker. Until it finally dissolved as if it has never been there.

It might sound as resignation, but it is not. I was able to let go of it because I realised the alternative is so much better. 

The way I see it now...

There isn’t anyone out there to fully understand us, appreciate us, love us, be there for us (and most of us find it out at some point). However something better is possible: being with real people. People who, like us, sometimes shine and sometimes falter, are exceptional at some things and completely suck at others. People who sometimes are fully there for us, and sometimes seem completely gone, who sometimes love us and sometimes hate us, who have a life with us and a life without. 

Of course they will frustrate us (something which “the One” would never do, right?) but over the years I came to see that these moments are not the “problems” we were taught they were. They are instead invitations to knowing and loving ourselves more, as well as to connecting deeper with our partner, date or lover. These moments have been dressed up as something to avoid, but what if they are the gold?

Moments like these are many in our lives and sometimes many during a day. Opening to them, even in the depth of frustration, has been one of the best (even if not the easiest) things I did on the pathway to true connection. 

***

One such moment that comes to my mind...

For some time, my partner and I shared his headphones because of their super-duper feature of noise-cancellation. We would put them on, one of us at a time, when working on something... and puff, our loud neighbours were not be in our ear anymore. 

The sharing worked quite fine for a few months… until my birthday came. 

With much joy and excitement in his eyes, there was my man, introducing me to my birthday present: a new set of headphones, just like his. 

Was I happy?

You'd think so, no?...
Well, not me... I was furious and I didn’t know why. I felt guilty ‘cause I could see how much he was convinced he made the perfect choice. But in the end I couldn’t hide it. I was not happy.

I started ruminating on how he had been probably not happy with sharing his headphones all that time, and on how this gift was not necessarily for me, but rather for him (so that I leave him alone). “And then he expects me to believe that this present was for me, and even a well-thought one?!”. 

I felt betrayed, abandoned and taken for a fool.

But you know, one thing I learned in all these years was to not rush into a reaction and instead take time to feel what it is in me that gets triggered. This kind of visceral reaction is always a sign that a wound has been touched inside, one that has been in there for a long time and needs to be seen, recognised and, by that, healed. 

Pictures came up of me playing with richer kids in my childhood, who were sometimes mischievous (as kids sometimes are) and not wanting to share their toys or other times even isolating me because I didn’t have cool toys like theirs. 

I don’t know why, but I never felt I could share this with my parents (didn’t feel they would understand) so I kept inside this big pain of not being accepted by the kids as I was, of feeling not good enough, of feeling all alone, abandoned.

All that pain, that feeling of inadequacy, but also of injustice was coming up on this occasion. I don’t remember how – maybe in a long walk, or maybe meditating – but I felt to take time to be with all of that, to feel it again the way I haven’t allowed myself to feel it back then. 

It’s something I didn’t know how to do years ago, but in time I learned to open to the sadness, the anger, the fear that the story will go on repeating for my whole life, the helplessness… It can be messy, and those of you who made this kind of experience for yourself know this. But then slowly, something inside relaxed, the tears dried up, the chest felt more loose, the breathing became deeper. 

There is peace at the end of such an experience. And quite frankly, bliss. 

We start to feel a deep acceptance of what was and deep feeling that we are okay, “there is nothing wrong with me”. 

In that calm and peace, I was able to see my man in a new light. With my story gone, something in the energy had shifted enough for me to see how he is different from me. He, a little bit more than me, appreciates his independence. He thought I was the same and that for me, borrowing the headphones was an inconvenience (not the chance for connection, which was how I saw it, given my history). He genuinely thought that having my own would make me happy. 

And even assuming he was bothered by me borrowing the headphones, wouldn't it be touching to realise he never let that slip?!

A warm and sweet feeling enveloped me, knowing and feeling myself more, knowing and feeling my man more. 
 

Such moments are all the time there when we are with someone, like little presents, waiting for us to unpack them. 

And looking back, I'd never swap them for Mr. Right no matter how McDreamy he would be :). 

With love, 

Radha