I’ve known for a while now that re-engaging in some kind of intimate relationship is my next developmental step. Psychologist John Welwood claims in this article that “real awakening only happens in the charnel ground where we acknowledge and work with our wounds, fears, and illusions.”

I’m not 100% thrilled about the prospect, in part because of my long-standing attraction to unavailable men. This pattern began in my teens (or before) and carried on through numerous relationships of varying significance and duration. The last one, which was blessedly short but painful beyond all comprehension, got my undivided attention. It had me realize that I was the common denominator in all these seemingly mismatched pairings and it was time to explore my own unavailability. I swore off intimate relationships and began therapy in earnest in the spring of 2004.

I have spent a lot of time, money and effort trying to discover the workings of my own relational being. I’m happier than I’ve ever been and I love sharing the house with John, Barry and the cats. But I’m also aware I can’t know how far I’ve come until I actually engage on the intimate relationship stage.

A week or so ago I decided to tune into a course intro called How to Attract Your Soulmate. I was scoffing at myself as I prepared to listen to it, and cringed occasionally as the two hosts kibitzed through the intro, but the first ‘love point’ they revealed hit a nerve. They said that if you want to attract your soulmate you have to give up magical thinking (as in, he’ll find me if it’s meant to be…) and fully commit to being married (or to your personal version of whatever commitment looks like.)

I felt this wave of ambivalence wash over me.  Yes, I’d like to meet my soulmate – who wouldn’t? But there are many reasons not to go there…

Single people are happy for a good reason, as this article attests to, and their ranks are growing. I also come from a fairly non-traditional family (as in, we’re not really the marrying kind) and I’m sure much of that was passed down from the generations that preceded us. My grandmother immigrated from Belgium to marry my grandfather, but then refused to marry him, despite the birth of their first two children, and only agreed when it was time to travel to Europe as a family at the end of the First World War.

But there are deeper reasons. A lot of it is childhood stuff. Memories from that time are in short supply and despite a multitude of therapeutic approaches, there is still much that is shrouded in mystery. I think something got broken when I was really tiny and that’s left a part of me not trusting anyone or anything. Protection mode is second nature and that often looks like giving. Although part of me is longing for love, there is something intolerable about needing anyone, about being on the receiving end.

So I find myself in no man’s land, somewhere in the territory between ambivalence and longing. The few people I have been attracted to since 2004 were all firmly in the unavailable realm, so my own unavailability must still be intact, at least to some degree. Am I willing and able to work with these childhood wounds? Inside I still feel a ‘no’, but maybe with these words I can create an opening for myself, to be willing to work in the charnel ground…

What about you? How far are you willing to go? Or, if you’re in a truly intimate relationship, how far did you have to go to be there? Let me know, I’d love to hear!