I remember the day my college boyfriend broke up with me.

I was in Washington, DC for an internship and I cannot describe all the ways I was feeling myself. Working to get a degree in International Studies, I took an unpaid gig with the Peace Corps and had my own office before the ripe ol’ age of 22.

I felt like a boss.

A boss with an office and no paycheck.

But I digress.

I remember sitting in my office texting my at the time boyfriend who was still in Florida about a mosquito. I was telling him about this humongous mosquito that had been flying around earlier in the day and he hit me with:

I think we should break up.

But are you not going to respond to my text about this big ahh mosquito first?!

The relationship ended right there.

It hadn’t lasted long…officially anyway. We had been doing this weird situationship thing since our freshman year of college and while there were other guys that I’d go on dates with or hang out with, his name was the one associated with mine.

The summer before senior year he became the first person I ever slept with and so our situationship evolved into a relationship.

And it ended just as quickly as it started.

Four years of being unsure of what we were doing, crying to my best friends (who really just should have slapped me…because I know they wanted to), and hoping this thing was something that lasted beyond the four years of college, and it was over.

And I felt not-a-damn-thing.

At least, not as much as I was supposed to for the guy to whom I had lost my virginity.

The walk from my office to the metro station was about 4 blocks and that’s about as much time as it took me to get over that break up.

I thought I’d be devastated for days and weeks and months.

And all it took was four blocks.
Maybe not even all four.

Something deep down inside just knew that he wasn’t my person.
There were small (and big) flags along the way but the biggest one was how easy it was to walk away when I was supposed to be devastated.

And it makes me think that perhaps there are such things as sexless soul ties.

Now, before I get to postulatin’ let’s establish a shared definition for what a “soul tie” actually is.

::clears throat and slides glasses back up on my nose:: (Which sadly, isn’t even me being funny because I just did it)

For the sake of this post, I am defining a soul tie as the unintended consequences of forming a life-long bond through sex with someone who only serves a short term purpose in your life.

While this term is not explicitly stated in scripture, I’ve heard it used most in spiritual circles. And I think soul ties are real things. I think there are bonds that are formed with people we have sex with.

Sex is the most intimate physical way in which you can connect with someone which is why try as you might, casual sex usually doesn’t result in casual feelings.

But strangely enough I never really felt the unshakeable connectivity that a soul tie often creates (and don’t get me wrong for this, I am grateful. I met Shamar the second semester of my senior year and you all see how that turned out).

And if I’m honest I can say that I have had a soul tie with a man I never had sex with.

So this post is for people who might not always show the intensity of their feelings in relationships, but it in no way diminishes them.

People who feel really attached long after a relationship ends despite the fact they may have never been physically intimate.

And for people who are out here working hard to avoid the soul ties sex can sometimes cause but missing the other ways soul ties can develop in relationships where sex isn’t present.

So here are three ways my sexless soul tie developed:

1. The idea of what could be is stronger than what is.

Sex has the power to distort the way we see someone.

Potential can distort the way we see someone too.

For me, I don’t think I was completely attached to whom my soul tie was (because honestly, he has some douchey tendencies) but who he had the potential to be and who we had the potential to be together. He checked all the boxes on paper. He was ambitious, came from a successful family, had an awesome mom, and in my mind fit the picture of what I thought a good looking (notice I didn’t say good for you) relationship was.

2. He was a MIP (Minimal Investment Player).

Before we talk about a MIP can we just thank my beautiful friend, Emily, for coining this GENIUS phrase?!

Y’all have some MIPs in your lives or in your past so let’s just go on ahead and make this a thing, k?

If he had an airport layover on the east coast, we’d go to dinner.

When it was my birthday, he’d send flowers.

He’d call when his mom was around him so she could see how I was doing.

All of these things were extremely sweet and if we’re real honest, took no actual long term effort or commitment.

That, my friends, is a MIP. And the impact of all of these sweet but non-committal gestures was that he was always on my radar even when he wasn’t around. I could never be completely free of him because right as I was forgetting him, I’d get a call from my parents that went something like, “Nik! You’ll never guess what _______ just sent. He’s such a good boy.”

Yup, even my parents were beneficiaries of the sporadic gifts from my soul tie.

3. I held on to very selective memories.

Have you ever seen that movie, The Holiday?

No, no. Not The Last Holiday with Queen Latifah and LL Cool J, The Holiday.

It’s okay, if you haven’t because I’m about to give you all of the info you need from it for the sake of this blog post–but if you have a rainy afternoon and a good snack you should watch it. It’s real melanin-deficient, but cute nonetheless.

In it, one of the characters is explaining to a new friend why he continues to deal with someone as triflin’ as his ex:

Because you’re hoping you’re wrong. And every time she does something that tells you she’s no good, you ignore it. And everytime she comes through and surprises you, she wins you over, and you lose that argument with yourself, that she’s not for you.

This.

This is why I struggled to cut my soul tie for so long. I was losing the argument that he wasn’t for me because I was choosing to throw away all the crappy stuff he did and when flowers came, or a nice parent gift, or a “Just thinking of you” text, suddenly all I could remember were all the wonderful times.

 

So sis, are soul ties real?

Yes.

Is the only way you can find yourself attached to someone through sex?

No.

Guard your heart in all ways.

Don’t think that just because you aren’t letting someone into your bed they aren’t making their way into other areas of your life.

So snip snip, sis.

We’ve got some ties to cut.

There’s magic in our musings (and our tie-free-souls),
Nicole