Are You My Karmic Mate or Soul Mate?

Like many of you, I am looking forward to Sex and The City 2. From the trailer, it promises everything we’ve come to expect from the luscious Carrie Bradshaw and her sexy cast of bff’s - haute couture and hot romance. During this one, they get to take an exotic adventure and that spells exotic fun, but there’s trouble in Abu Dhabu and his name is spelled A-i-d-a-n. When Carrie runs into him in a Morroccan market and she gets that starstruck look in her eyes, once again, we ask the question (yet again): who is right for Carrie? Is Mr. Big really The One?

Here’s my criteria for a soul mate relationship:

-Your relationship feels comfortable and familiar.

-You feel a compelling connection you can’t rationally explain.

-You feel right in the presence of this person.

-You bond over synchronous connections.

-You’re excited and stimulated by one another’s presence.

-They may play a recurring role in your life.

-The overriding emotions you share on a daily basis are joy and love.

In karmic mate relationship two individuals respective heart memories line up to finish karmic contracts with each other. These contracts pre-existed before birth. Common karmic meetings revolve around transforming an old pattern, repaying a debt, healing an injury, resolving a conflict, and often all of these at once.

Here's the clincher: karmic mate relationships start out similar to the soul mate relationship with similar fascination, joy and that irrational and compelling feeling that we've known each other before but that's just the hook to do the deeper work. In time (weeks, months or sometimes years), the connection triggers ancient patterns, pain and ancient history in one or both partners. 

Occasionally, after two people have hashed out the source of their attraction (which eventually feels more like a compulsion to resolve old karma, than attraction) it can continue in a new form, but mostly these relationships are predestined to end once the exchange completes. The love affair, friendship, mentor (we have many karmic mates, ie, people we 'fall for') has run it’s natural course. We've settled what we've needed to settle and therefore the attraction fades away. If karma has actually been resolved & completed, ideally both people leave the partnership feeling complete and wishing each other the best. If it has not, well, animosity, unforgiving and frustrated passion are popular ways of keeping the relationship going ...into the next lifetime.

So, Aidan and Carrie? Big and Carrie? Who are they to each other, really?

Come back to find out.