The Myth of the Soulmate: A Love Story or a Spiritual Trap?

There comes a moment in a woman’s life when she realizes that romance—once the center of her existence—is no longer her axis. It's not a rejection of love, or a hardened heart. It's a soft revolution. A subtle turning inward.

For years, I believed my soulmate would arrive like a storm—breaking open the sky, rearranging my fate, making sense of the chaos I carried. I built altars in my mind for him. I shaped my decisions around the hope of meeting him. And I blamed myself when the myths I inherited didn’t manifest.

But something shifted when I began to decenter romance from my life. I stopped living as if I was in waiting. I stopped measuring my worth by whether I was chosen, desired, or claimed.

Instead, I asked: what if I was the one I was waiting for?

That question began a profound feminine transformation. I started to see how deeply the soulmate archetype had been used not just as a symbol of connection—but as a control mechanism. A way to keep women orbiting around the idea of “completion.” As if we were broken without a partner. As if healing, purpose, and power were found only in the reflection of a romantic other.

When I released romance from the center, I met other parts of myself I had long abandoned. The part that writes. The part that rages. The part that rests. The wild woman who is not afraid to be misunderstood. The inner child who doesn’t need to be rescued, only remembered.

In the absence of romantic obsession, I found space for real self-healing. I began doing shadow work not to make myself “more lovable,” but to become more whole. My dreams became my lovers. My silence became a sanctuary.

It wasn’t always easy. There were moments when the cultural programming whispered that I was “falling behind,” “too picky,” or “emotionally unavailable.” But the deeper I went, the clearer it became: decentering romance is not a loss. It is a liberation.

This is not a manifesto against love. It is a love letter to wholeness. Romance can be beautiful. But it should be a choice, not a cage. A chapter, not the entire book.

When a woman decouples her identity from being desired, she becomes dangerous—in the best way. She stops performing. She starts creating. She becomes the storyteller, not the story being told.

And in that moment, she becomes her own soulmate.