I felt drawn to share this chapter from a story I'm working on about a young man's journey seeking his "soulmate". Addresses a number of related subjects. Hope you all enjoy!

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   Gentle but determined, he struck the door with the large iron ring. He did not know if she would be there to meet him, did not know how, when, or even if he would see her, but it didn't matter: He had made his choice. He knew she was there, and that was all that mattered, to be in her presence, to be in her service, even if she was not aware of him at all. He had spent all his life looking for her, had lost her, had found her again, and now that he knew where she was, there was nothing that could end his desire to commune with her.
   Now the doubt was gone and he could see clearly. Oh, the strangeness of the situation had not changed. The idea of meeting the same person in different bodies was one that could barely be believed, save perhaps by some in the far east, but yet there it was. Many times he had pondered whether he was delusional or maybe he was dreaming, but again, the signs were too extreme, and he had even recorded them in order to gauge his grip on reality.
   Without proof, his story would have been - and had been - scoffed at by most anyone. He had consulted oracle after oracle on every step of his journey. He had watched the signs of not only fortune-telling devices but also the divine symbolism that surrounded him in his everyday life. And almost like a novel the cards would tell his story, or the lines in the sand showed a picture of where he was going, a divine madman told him something of what he was that he had forgotten.
   And always, she was there. Always with the same crystal blue eyes, always piercing his soul. The same sweet soft lips that he could feel in his heart almost as if they were his own. The same gentle yet powerful manner that he so prided in himself. The way of losing herself in his eyes as he lost himself in hers, it was something for him that clinched the moment, made it infinite, endless.
   Sometimes she was not even there, sometimes she was a person who was far away. Sometimes he did not even hear her voice, only saw the words that she wrote, but still the connection was overpowering. He would swoon for hours, staring at a monitor full of the most beautiful letters, perhaps so attractive to him only because of his love. But yet her wisdom was always undeniable, and she had awakened him to truths about himself that he had never even considered.
   There was of course some trepedation for him in visiting the house of the snake people. He had heard many stories of the horrific practices they still used and seen some of the products of these rituals. Minds completely warped, bent, and broken until there was only a scrap of the person left, a babbling heap unable live, starving and freezing on the streets, waiting for death. Hearts drained of all energy until there was only an occasional spark of the emerald glow that should live in the chests of all human beings. But mostly it was because he seemed to remember being one of them. He knew what they liked, and it was suffering. Suffering for the sake of itself, for its sharp, gleaming obsidian beauty, for its honoring of the darkest parts of the universe, which is after all most of it. Mercilessness and cruelty for the sole reason of invoking the terror that comes along with being helpless in the presence of one in the grip of heartlessness. Powerful tools on the physical level for creating unbelievable states of anguish: Drugs, torture, kidnapping, slavery, rape, all together at the same time whenever possible, combined of course with black shamanism and precise understanding of energy centers to extend and intensify the effects.
   Psychic vampirism: The drinking of blood to feed the darkest aspects of the soul so they may thrive and grow, not only in the individual but in any they may influence.
   But as much as this repulsed him, his resolve was strong, he knew that she was among them. He knew that the only way he could retrieve her was to become that which he knew was truly evil. But this time, unlike the other lifetimes he had chosen this path, he knew that all things were sacred and equal, and that so long as he was not attached to the light or the darkness, his soul could always be pure and remain clean. He had learned that the wheel of karma, as it is called in the east, fate and the consequences of following particular fates, that this thing was always turning and there was no place for it to go. The only way to move was to leave the cycle completely and arive at a place of stillness. Not stagnation mind you, becoming stuck on one of the spokes, but the peace of infinite motion that lies at the infinite singularity in the center of all things.
   Living calmness.
   Because he knew that she understood this thing, he was not sure why she had retained her attachments to the dark. But, when he thought about it, he realised that he had retained attachments to the light as well. The revelation for him that love was the supreme healer, creator, and beginning of all things was so great that it had nearly shattered his life. When he looked around and saw every person stoicly bowing before the alter of suffering, it broke his heart. But it was not difficult to forgive and move on because he remembered that this was his place before he had remembered love. The truth of the darkness, that suffering and death are integral, create motion, and are the end of all things, this was something we all had already learned. Humanity in the state he saw it was a creature who had embraced the dark night of the soul in many aspects, and taught its children that evil and darkness were the law of the land so they would not become dissapointed when that was their experience of life. But they had forgotten that focus of attention creates reality so the world had come to embody this suffering that was portrayed in the pain of so many denied hearts.
   Another reason he loved her, she understood all of this. She knew and had said in many of her forms that she saw this nightmare that we call living could be transformed into a dream of paradise. She knew that all things are one and that there was never any need for separation. That we did not need to be playing out these dramas of ruler and ruled, of warriors and knaves, of selfishness and greed. However, in that understanding she also showed him neither was there reason for dramas of love, affection, and sweetness: Romance is a thing of the illusion. But for him, such a delightful dream, and seeing as how they were dreaming, why not embrace it?
   But she wanted more, she wanted to move beyond dreaming, to fully wake up and never sleep again.
   Perhaps this was why she had accepted the offers from the snake to be their queen. The prospect of becoming a queen of the light are equal in the levels of attachment, but so much harder to break from because they are pleasant. Perhaps it was a choice she made in her soul long ago that to be uncomfortable would inspire her to grow, and it usually does with most beings. Perhaps he did not fully understand the fall from grace and she had already been the queen of paradise, and he the king. He was certain they had ruled the underworld before, why not the other way around as well?
   In his understanding, they had already been one. They had been the infinite that is creation, the ultimate energy that makes up every thing of every world and every universe. But this had become dull, stagnant, there was no more to learn by knowing every thing in all of existance so intimately. The only way to experience more was to forget, to split from that which was the all and become something that could experience itself from outside itself.
   The longing he felt to hold her, he realised, was the desire to hold her so tightly that they became one being. That the essences of what they were could intertwine into a new creature with all the energy, experience, wisdom, and feeling of both. However, he was aware this was of course not possible on a physical level, save through some kind of bizarre surgery, or through the demonstrative act of bearing a child with her, so he was puzzled why it was so important to his soul that he be near her. He could simply wait until death, where, if he had not merged completely with the all already, he would certainly be able to locate her and make the connection then, where it was appropriate, and if she truly desired it too. Why was he consumed always with the thought of her and the feelings of her energy? Why all the strange signs, always her animals following him, always her in a new face whenever he had completely given up hope?
   The obvious possibility that she had somehow bewitched him was hard to dismiss. She dwelt with the snake, after all, who used women in particular to capture hearts to suck dry. She did align herself with them, but it seemed only in the ways of honoring their darkness, rather than in the ways of assisting them in atrocities. He had never seen her intentionally cruel in any form, although occasionally a bit unloving toward him. This disturbed him however, and added to his suspicion that something was wrong with his attraction to her. It was another sign that all his life he had pursued women who did not love him, and somehow this never stopped the ache in his heart for them. It was so difficult for him not to yearn for that which he found desirable, and proved to him that the buddhist assertion that attachment to desire leads to suffering was all too true. But his work with that was powerful, and yet still she would return to haunt him, the only desire he could not bring himself to let go of, partly because of how he felt it affected the larger world.
   As he stood before the ancient manor where the snake people held conference, he contemplated why he wanted to rescue her from it. Was it only the small desire he felt inside to be a hero, a savior, the cliche dashing lover who comes to save his princess from the jaws of evil in the last moment? He knew this was part of him, and he had addressed it at length, but there was something more. He was not the only one who knew her and had an agenda toward her. For him it was an eternal undying love, a desire merge, to do anything he could to spark the love in her heart and facilitate that ritual of coming together, but an agenda none the less. For the snake, however, they were not seeking to crown her the queen of her own heart. They wanted to utilize her as a tool to rule all men, to make her the mistress of every heart of every man who saw her, and even every person who did not.
   They wanted to make love into a weapon.
   Her tenderness and grace was the perfect sheild, it made her unassailable by any attack of any kind, the perfect kind of protective manipulation. So beautiful that noone would ever wish to harm her. So perfect and wize that none would be able to argue, even if she ordered the meaningless death of thousands. And her strength was inarguable, she had abilities by nature that few could ever cultivate, even with lifetimes of practice. She had been some of the most awesome workers of magic in history, and often some of the darkest.
   She loved power and glory, and it worried him even further, because he did too in the past, and remembered well where it had gotten him and those around him.
   But there was something real, something in her that truly did cry out for and need his help. He knew that becoming involved with people such as the snake was no little thing and not easy to reverse. He saw sadness and lonlelyness in her eyes too, no matter how well she covered it. He saw that in her heart she remembered him, remembered all he had done for her and to her, terrible and wonderful. He knew that she could forgive him, but only if he could proove forever that his love was real and unconditional. That truly he would give himself for her and it was still a loving act, for he knew the appropriate time and place for such a thing, that it was not something one did simply for the sake of romance and demonstration. He hoped that she would recognize that giving himself to them in order to be near her was not a mere sacrafice out of desparation and love-sickness. He hoped she would see the glint in his eye as he knelt before her as the high preistess and return the unsaid acknowledgement that the true love of creation still burned in both their hearts.
   Unless they had extinguished it, but of course they could only try.
   He heard heavy footsteps approaching the door and considered one last time whether this was a good idea, whether it was worth the danger for someone who may have been enticing him to his doom all along, someone who may never loved have him at all.
   Of course it was worth it. For him, the only way to live life was to experience it. Hell was wishing forever that we had done something, never the chance again to do anything. The door creaked open slightly, he cleared his throat and uttered the verse:
   "I am here. I am ready. I am. I give myself to you freely and with abandon. Do what you will."
   A strong arm covered in strange marks reached out and grasped him firmly by the shoulder. He vanished into the temple, the door shut, and only the silence of the night remained.