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Sustaining a soul-hearted partnership with ourselves is the groundwork for the shared experience of soul-hearted partnership. This means maintaining trust in our connection with source, listening to the voice of spirit through our hearts, releasing negative patterns, and manifesting intentions for a more fulfilling personal life. It requires continually letting go of the life we have chosen until now so we can cocreate the life we want to share with a partner in the future. Using conscious awareness, we can witness how spirit guides us to opportunities and choices that result in a life based less on fear and insecurity, and more on spiritual transformation. But it is equally important to realize that sustaining soul-hearted partnership with ourselves necessitates constant personal evolution.

Often in relationships, because we so desperately want a fairy tale romance, we block our access to spiritual information and make excuses for relationship deficits. Trying to make the relationship work at all costs, we ignore the surfacing of patterns. Needy and afraid to be alone, we begin doubting our ability to generate opportunities through intention, and we ask ourselves: “What if this is the last chance for me to be in a relationship?” “If I leave the relationship, will I end up alone?” and “Can I earn a living and take care of myself on my own?” Such behavior leads to stagnation in the same kinds of situations we have experienced in the past.

For these reasons, we have to take time to be alone and discover how to sustain a soul-hearted partnership with ourselves before entering into a new relationship with another person.

Like the life cycles we move through as the years unfold, relationships also have life cycles—some lasting for only a brief period and others a season or a lifetime. To make suitable choices in relationships for particular periods in our lives, it is helpful to look at three major types of relationship that, together, can satisfy everything from need fulfillment to spiritual growth.

First, there is transitional relationship, based on momentary needs. This type of relationship includes casual encounters for the purpose of sex or friendship, healing, ego validation, overcoming loneliness, or dealing with a desire for control and security. During transitions, intense times of self-healing and personal discovery, we tend to initiate relationships with people who exhibit negative patterns to which we are attracted, or who are releasing such patterns themselves and in a position to assist us in learning to love ourselves. We are drawn by the energy of these people, in transition themselves, as a way of stabilizing the unsettling period in our own lives. The mutual exchange of energy, while temporary, can be satisfying and supportive. As long as both individuals are aware of the purpose of their relationship, their needs are being met, and they are observing healthy boundaries and treating each other with respect, they can both benefit greatly from the experience.

The second type of relationship is contractual relationship, in which individuals come together to create something for a common purpose. The most customary form of contractual relationship involves childbearing, usually in a marriage. A contractual relationship can also exist for such purposes as establishing social status or developing a business enterprise.

Finally, there is true soul-hearted partnership, in which both individuals have a fully realized relationship with themselves as well as with each other. In such a relationship, partners can develop spiritually in concert with each other, and thus the relationship can last a lifetime without becoming unhealthy or unfulfilling. And because it is a partnership between equals for the purpose of spiritual growth, soul-hearted partnership can be seen as the ultimate form of spiritual relationship.

Our longing for love often convinces us that all relationships are meant to last forever and keeps us from distinguishing between the various types. Knowing the life cycles of different types of relationships helps us adjust our expectations accordingly, ensuring that we actively maintain lifelong relationships and willingly let go of temporary ones. Many couples fall in love and marry blinded by physical attraction, which makes them feel alive. This form of transitional relationship usually originates when individuals are vulnerable and looking for an experience to either transform us or ground them.  But as the steam of lust and infatuation clears they see the relationship for what it is and become dissatisfied.

Much the same can be said of contractual relationships. Despite their shared mission and positive aspects, we must be aware that such relationships are not complete because they are usually not based on a genuine partnership in which each person is independently fulfilled. Therefore, it is essential to discern, through the use of conscious awareness, whether a relationship is based on the common core values of love, trust, integrity, intimacy, and a soul connection or is merely functioning in fulfillment of an agreement or as a temporary distraction or emotional crutch.

Contractual or transitional relationships can become soul-hearted partnerships when there is a mutual desire for spiritual growth and an adherence to its core values. But when there isn’t attempting to sustain these temporary relationships can cause suffering, especially those based on a short-term physical or emotional dependency. Unfortunately, people who automatically think a relationship should last forever may fail to assess the purpose of their relationships and thus confuse transitional or contractual ones with the lifetime soul-hearted type. Some people even marry partners they know are incompatible, making a commitment to cherish the union until death do them part—a decision likely to be disastrous to both parties, especially when the relationship’s purpose has been fulfilled early on and there is little spiritual basis to continue the union.

It is important to see transitional and contractual relationships for what they are: a means of coping with a difficult or transformative period in life with the help of another person who fulfills our needs, helps us grow, and adds joy to our circumstances. Such relationships, when entered into honestly and lovingly, can be beneficial if they propel both individuals along their chosen spiritual paths. Yet once their mission is fulfilled, it is usually time to let go and progress to another level of relationship, for which the transitional or contractual partner may not be appropriate. In such a case, we can honor the partner by expressing gratitude for their being, lovingly release the relationship, and move on. For our own well-being, it’s important that we do not make transitional or contractual relationships committed ones or stay in such relationships beyond their spiritual purpose.

In temporary relationships such as this, we often experience a struggle between our heads and our hearts that keeps us from listening to the voice of spirit. We close the eyes of the heart, succumbing to our fears of loss, rejection, and scarcity and diminishing our sense of ourselves for a momentary “fix” of physical attraction, emotional security, or personal calling, leading us to make pattern-driven, unenlightened choices.

To avoid settling for a relationship that inhibits spiritual growth, it is crucial to be aware that strong sexual attraction often characterizes the first stage of a new relationship based on infatuation. Physical attraction can, however, diminish our ability to observe the relationship from a healthy detached point of view. This is when we fall head over heels—or more often, “head over heart.” As a result, we can become attached to a relationship physically or as an emotional crutch, and lose our common sense and our trust in ourselves to make informed decisions.

As we continue the inner spiritual work necessary to sustain our full self-expression, we may declare an intention to enter into an intimate relationship with another person. In preparation for such an event, we can use the spiritual principles we have learned to assist us in interviewing potential partners so we can choose discerningly.

Many people spend more time and energy interviewing prospective plumbers, landscapers, and Internet companies than potential partners. Because of lust, neediness, or fear of being alone, we allow impulse, infatuation, and patterns to influence these choices.

Instead, we can interview potential partners by using specific spiritual principles. First, we prepare by listening to the voice of spirit through our hearts, which will assist us in maintaining a healthy detached point of view and activating conscious awareness. Next, we observe various people we are considering dating, are currently dating, or are in relationship with and ask our hearts these questions: “Does this person demonstrate a fully expressed relationship with themselves, and is this evident in daily life?” “How do I feel about myself when I am with this person?” and “Do I see myself as being happier in this relationship?” Ideally a potential partner will be trustworthy, loving, playful, and exude a sheer love of life. When we are with such a person, we will feel inspired, safe, and free to express our true being. The individual will take responsibility for their own weaknesses, show integrity in the enlightened choices they make, do the inner spiritual work for personal transformation, and increasingly develop to their fullest potential. The following qualification mantra is helpful to use when interviewing potential partners: “Who you are, I must love. How you act and treat me, I have to like. And most of all, my loving heart has to be earned.”

Excerpted from Soul-Hearted Partnership, Creating the Ultimate Experience of Love, Passion, and Intimacy by Debra L. Reble, Ph.D., 2009, www.soulheartedpartnership.com

More about Debra Reble..

Debra L. Reble, Ph.D., is a licensed psychologist who conducts a private practice and facilitates workshops and seminars that focus on enhancing personal transformation and well-being. She also is the founder of HeartPaths of Cleveland, Ohio, a company dedicated to providing materials that inspire full self-expression. In addition, she is a director of Foundation in Light, an international nonprofit educational organization devoted to the integration of light through the heart into human experience. In her role as director, she assists in presenting workshops, retreats, and consultation to promote spiritual growth and self-realization.

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