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I’ll never forget the first time we talked a few years ago.

It wasn’t across a table or standing in line for a coffee. Instead, our first meeting was across thousands of miles using a technological bridge. Yet it was explosive, igniting in me an unforgettable fire that I felt nothing but the need to surrender.

Surrender, we did.

Though neither of us could understand the pull, the gravity between us was undeniable. Soon electronic messages became phone conversations, which became our first physical meeting.

We approached the first moments of sharing a physical space much in the same way. I was nervous—something I was not accustomed to being. We had no expectations or nothing to be nervous about, but something within us seemed to suggest that this meeting was going to be unlike any other. 

We felt each other long before we knew each other and knew each other long before we met. 

It was surreal and strange. It was new, yet familiar, unique but perfect. It seemed—destined.

The fear and nervousness ended when the elevator door opened, and we embraced for the first time.

We were two poets bound by a common heartstring, two individuals bound by a single source. We had followed each other for years, then followed a process that led us to walk hand-in-hand down Pearl Street in Boulder, Colorado. Here we were, two people raised in the shadow of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, finding each other in the shadows of foothills in a town 1500 miles away.

The Universe works strangely indeed.

That night we acted as though we had known each other forever. The conversation was easy and the attraction wildly distracting. She excused herself to use the restroom, and I found my thoughts wandering into questions of doubt. What if the distance was too much to bear? What if she isn’t who she seems to be? What if?

She returned and sat down beside me. She grabbed my hand, and I became lost in a swirling sea of emotion. I looked at her, and I saw a hundred lifetimes flash before me. I wondered how many lifetimes we had faced together and how many more we would see. How many times had we replayed this scene in our existence? How many times have I loved this soul?

I heard a voice within me challenge my distractions. “Focus on this moment, on this now. Focus on this life, for the only purpose the past served was to get you here, now. Live in this moment and give it the focus it deserves. Then, see what happens.”

I returned to her, and she became the target of my heart’s meditation. Every question I had was answered not by words but in the energy of love and contentment. The calmness of her touch calmed the fears I once struggled with. Gone in that moment were thoughts and desires. Everything had been replaced by the serenity of being right where I belonged at the moment I needed to be there.

“Love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation.” ~ Khalil Gibran

The challenges were many after she flew back East. The trails I walked seem lonelier, the sunrises and sunsets less beautiful. Something was missing. She was missing. I went back to a quote attributed to Chris McCandless, who wrote it shortly before his death, “Happiness is only real when shared.” While I found joy in the trails I walked and beauty in the Sunrises I saw alone, they seemed less real without her there to see them. Something felt torn from me upon her leaving, and it left me wondering if my nervousness at meeting her had anything to do with her eventual departure. The answer seemed pretty evident to me.

There was also gratitude. Gratitude in meeting someone who seemed to fit into my space naturally. I also felt gratitude in having only temporarily lost focus on my time with her and gave thanks to the Spirit who had reminded me to focus on the moment.

Today we have lost touch, not talking after an argument, the gist of which I cannot even remember. The strange thing about humans is that despite our varying relationships to the soul, we can still have an emotional and physical experience. I love the soul of that woman. It is as much a part of me as my own flesh, but our minds and emotions make it tough to coexist. We have our reasons, and they will remain intensely personal, but the reality of my existence is that I can still feel her presence in my being. That’s the thing about twin flames uniting: once they’ve found each other, they’ll always be within each other, even if they choose not to be together.

But who knows? Maybe at some point in this life, or even in the next, we shall meet again.

~