Why do we attract people in our life who are totally opposite to us and challenge us to the core?
A boss, spouse, a relative, sibling? Or, when are we born, the family itself? Or perhaps we go on to parent a child with different nature?
Also, why do we attract people who are similar to us, in whom we see our reflection?
So many aspects of physical life seem to puzzle us. As you ponder on this, let’s take a moment to reflect on this spiritual life principle.
In life, we seek balance, which encases the feeling of completeness. We all want to feel complete, and therefore, we all seek closure to an unfinished business. In balance lies completeness and in imbalance, lies the state of incompleteness or fragmented energy.
Our soul yearns for completeness and, therefore, we keep seeking. In this seeking, we start learning and when we learn we move towards the state of completeness.
Here’s how the above two pieces fit. People who come to our life and throw challenging situations at us, do so for our learning. We should actually be thankful to them for this favour, their volunteering to take this job for us- teaching us towards our goal of completeness, helping us reach there. This is done mostly by people who are close to us — parents, siblings, spouses, friends, relatives etc. Here’s an example to elaborate this point, but before that, let’s understand what learning are we talking about?
These learning are lessons that our soul wants to learn. It could be a learning how to be kind or be compassionate, or to be able to develop trust, or to know how to give love, or receive love, or rise in self-esteem, worth, confidence or help others unconditionally. You get the idea. What is one’s learning depends on what the person’s unfinished business/karmic debt/yearning of the soul is. But know that this is just one aspect of the intricate functioning of the universe and not the whole picture.
I know of a soul who got a rude shock after 17 years of marriage. The mother of two was told by the husband one day that he is leaving her to marry someone else. This lady, homemaker for all these years, living in a male dominated household with meagre income, dependent on her husband, received the shock of her life. Since separation three years ago, this lady has been picking up herself emotionally and financially, with no alimony to support their teenage children. However, now she is living on her own, earning reasonably well and supporting her two children. Unlike before, she is now going out by herself courageously to run own errands which she never did, taking all big and small decisions independently which she never did, she has a purpose for her children and now vision for her future life the way she never had.
Has it been easy for her? Of course not. But through this extreme situation in her life, in her own words: ‘I learnt courage, ’I learnt independence and confidence’, ‘I have become wiser.’ These probably are her learning. Looking from a non-physical perspective, perhaps her soul needed these teachings to feel ‘complete’. Guess who played the villainous part?
This situation is not a justification for the ‘wrong’ that happened to her, but the idea is to look at life from a holistic perspective. No one, but only the affected person knows in his/her inner core, the rightness or wrongfulness of the extent and nature of the situation undone unto the person. No situation can be generalised. Generalisations bring disrespect and disservice to someone’s unique experience.
People who challenge us the most, carry to us the biggest pieces of our learning. When have we ever learnt in our comfort zones? Only in challenging times, do we rise and say; enough. I am tired. I will change this. Isn’t that so? Sometimes, we rise voluntarily. Sometimes situations force us to, through big, shaky events.
Disclaimer: Urmila Rao is a chakra balancing meditation coach, Theta Healer and a sound therapist. All the ideas expressed herein are her own and not professional advice or medical prescription. She can be reached at: milarao2018@gmail.com
