On Soul Mates

"Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same, and Linton's is as different as a moonbeam from lightning, or frost from fire." (121)

Such is Catherine's response to Nelly Dean during a discussion regarding Heathcliff and Linton about their souls. Although this is the traditionally accepted view of the soulmate, it can be argued that Catherine's definition does not comply with the desires of today's relationships. Perhaps the soulmate is not a mirror image, as Bronte seems to suggest.

In Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights, Catherine continually defines her notion of the soulmate. She indicates repeatedly that her soul and Heathcliff's are one in the same. She states,

I am Heathcliff - He's always, always in my mind…but as my own being - so, don't talk of our separation again - it is impracticable (121);

She continues, stating

If all else perished, and he remained, I should continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger (121).

From Catherine's perspective, she views the soulmate as one who is of the same. Morton Hunt, author of The Natural History of Love, however, probably would not view Heathcliff as Catherine's soulmate. Indeed, on the concept of soulmates, Hunt states that there is

What we might call the "one-person" theory, the romantic conviction that for each individual there is a "right one" waiting to be found (also thought of as "the only one in the world"). It was the task, and indeed the moral duty, of every unmarried person to wait or to search until that was located (364).

Although Hunt acknowledges this, and seemingly would agree that Catherine had found her "one," he probably would not go as far as referring to Heathcliff as her soulmate. In his text, Hunt describes a "principle source of attraction" as "a sense of completion at finding a soulmate" (369). By this definition, Heathcliff does not fit the description of the soulmate, as he does not "complete" Catherine. While Catherine sees the soulmate as being one-in-the-same with another, Hunt sees the soulmate as someone that completes, as one who fills in a void present within the soul.

Working from Morton Hunt's definition, one can argue that perhaps a more accurate definition of today's soulmate is one who completes and make another's soul whole. This is a soulmate that is different, rather than exactly alike. In choosing one's mate, Hunt describes such a concept, stating

That during the years of dating and growing up most young Americans slowly discarded, or pushed into the background, their image of the ideal mate or dream mate. Often, to their own surprise, they found themselves falling in love with someone whose "type" they had never cared for but with whom they had found a workable degree of companionship and a comfortable sense of fitness, and with whom love derived from, rather than preceded, the recognition of these attributes (367).

Moreover, Hunt states that,

Although sociological data showed that young men and women tended to fall in love with and marry those similar to themselves socially, intellectually, and in other ways that they were aware of, psychological studies showed that within these limits they were often unconsciously drawn to those whose emotional needs and characteristics complemented their own, bearing out to some degree the old adage that opposites attract (376).

If one, for the sake of argument, were to extend these results across humanity as a whole, it could be argued that perhaps similar results would be obtained. Perhaps, then, the most feasible definition of soulmate is one whose characteristics and traits complement rather than mirror one's own, as indicated by these studies. Indeed, even the term soulmate suggests this type of definition. From an anatomical perspective, a mate is one of the opposing sex whose morphology compliments that of the other. It follows that, by word definitions alone, the mate of the soul would then complement the other's soul. Perhaps instead of searching for one's soulmate, one should search for the soul complement.

The definition of the soulmate, according to Bronte and tradition, is an individual whose soul is the same as the other's soul. In such a relationship, one could assume perfect compatibility between the individuals. However, as limited studies seem to suggest, the traditional definition of soulmate is either unobtainable or needs to be redefined.

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