Have you found “the one?”

Assume the form of a fly and buzz around my office for a while. You’ll hear what I hear every day—people expressing unhappiness about their relationships. 

They’re either unhappy because they’re stuck with someone who doesn’t get them. They haven’t found the perfect person. They’ve found the perfect person, but (s)he can’t commit. Or they’ve met someone else and want to leave their present relationship for it—or else figure out how to not get caught.

But most often I’m asked: “When will I find the ‘one'”?

The truth is: There is only One. There are no two people. The other person is your projection.

In your Vedic astrological chart, your seventh house indicates how you project your thoughts and desires onto the world and the people who inhabit it. Imagine, for example, that everything you see is simply being reflected back to you like in a mirror. Everything you see is just you.

How you see yourself is how you relate to what you see, which is why the seventh house is also the house of relationships or “the killer house.” Relationships are “killers” because when not properly understood, they can really hold you back from achieving your highest purpose in life–which is to be happy and fulfilled.

Recently I read the chart of a man who was suffering in his career. He just couldn’t make it happen.

When I asked him what he was doing he answered plaintively, “sales.”

“But what I see is ‘jazz musician,’” I responded.

“Yeah, I used to be a musician and had a really lucrative career ahead of me, but my wife pulled the plug on that. She thinks it’s a pipe dream,” he explained.

And then there’s another client of mine who confided that if her husband doesn’t “get it together” financially soon, she’s going to leave him. Meanwhile she can’t see how the lack of fulfillment in her own career relates to her disappointment with her husband. She can’t see how she’s projecting her own frustrated desire for herself onto him.

In Jyotisha (Vedic Astrology) your seventh house reflects your desires. The reason your relationships struggle and fail is because somewhere along the way you lost sight of what you really want. Not what you’re supposed to want. But what you’re born to want.

It starts in childhood with your brothers and sisters if you have them. (If you don’t, you get this lesson through peer relationships.) Siblings rival with each other. That’s what they do. The reason they do it is to get attention from their parents—to be validated.

While fighting it out with your brothers and sisters, you learn how to direct the power of your desire to be positively validated—because positive reinforcement feels a lot better than punishment or criticism. You repress the natural desire you were born with (necessary to accomplish your highest life’s purpose) in favor of what brings you praise instead of blame.

Take me, for example.

I’m the youngest of three siblings. My oldest sister is the “good” one who can never do wrong. My middle sister is the “artist,” who possesses amazing creative skills and talents. When I got to school I had these precedents to live up to. Because they were praised for these qualities, I also wanted to be perceived as both “good” and an “artist.” But I couldn’t measure up. My art teacher confirmed this when I was eight. “I guess there’s only one real artist in your family,” she sighed as she viewed my lame drawing.

So rather than pursue my desire to be viewed as a competent artist and therefore skilled human being, I redirected it to something I struggled more with and didn’t want as much—writing.

I also could never be as “good” as my eldest sister so I was bad. As a result, I got attention. For some reason, I excelled in diagramming sentences and mastered language arts—which according to my sixth grade teacher was my “god-given talent.” I also did some bad stuff, really bad stuff. Even attention for something I didn’t care about like grammar or being noticed for shoplifting was better than being ignored or criticized.

Because I never felt obedient enough or skilled enough in creating anything, I married someone who fulfills both desires. A big reason I’m attracted to my husband is because he can do everything, unlike me. He possesses so many skills and talents that even after ten years of marriage, I’m still blown away at what he can do. He’s also extraordinarily good—the product of a nice Catholic family.

But get this. 

The only time we ever fight is when I feel he’s failing at fixing something. Or not properly utilizing his many skills and talents. Or when he’s not being as “good” as I like. As long as he’s fulfilling my deepest desires for myself, then we get along. The moment he stops reflecting back to me what I want to see in order to feel happy with myself, we fight. I question whether I made the right choice. I threaten to leave. I freak out.

The reason relationships fall apart is because the person you’re relating to fails to reflect back what you want more than anything for yourself but can’t express in your own life. In the thousands of clients I’ve counseled about their relationships, this has been true in every case. Every case.

Suppose you want to be a success in business, but on a deep level you don’t really believe that you can. So you attract someone who you think is such a success. As long as he’s succeeding, then you’re happy. The moment he fails, however, you lose your affection.

The secret in relationships is to be the person you want the other one to be.

To do this, you have to identify your deepest desires—the ones that you repressed because you believed at an early age you’d get criticized for them instead of praised. You have to uncover your natural instincts and not talk yourself out of them. I know. It’s hard, but meditation helps.

Then consciously align your actions with them—even if they conflict with life-long habits, like brushing your teeth with the same hand. Feel the fear of blame come up. Observe how your mind presents evidence to dissuade you. Then ask the question, “If everyone is against me and I receive no praise for my efforts can I still proceed?” Experience the wave of “no” as it rises within you. Do it anyway.

In this way, when you’re self-empowered in your own life’s dharma, it’s easy to attract support. You relate to the “other” as you relate to yourself.

Vedic astrology is an amazing tool to not only see yourself and your highest life’s purpose, but to see what is important for you to want. There’s a lot of propaganda in spiritual circles that having desires is bad. I would amend that by stating, “having wrong desires is bad.”

What are your right desires?

Understanding the natal chart of your partner is also profoundly healing. People don’t change. All of us follow our life’s natural expression indicated at the moment we were born. Knowledge is power. It’s also healing and profoundly insightful to know who you are relating to on his or her own terms, and not what you project.

And most importantly, know yourself.

 ~

Editor: Kate Bartolotta