Youth is beautiful, but at the same time dreamy and rich in idealization. Having mostly young girls and teenagers in therapy, I often return to this thought and try, without destroying dreams of romance, bring realism to the views of dear clients. I don’t think it would be a great exaggeration to say that a lot of tears were shed because the following conviction took root in the minds of many: “They found each other and the two halves united into a whole.” Something like this sounds in classical romantic prose finding your soulmate, a loved one, destined by fate. Somewhere inside something should click, the signs of fate will be unambiguous and you will definitely understand - this is it. Is this possible in reality? Is it possible to find your soulmate? Maybe so, only then will you have to admit that you are not a whole person. And then you shouldn’t worry about finding your loved one at all. They talk a lot about finding your own significance and integrity, I don’t want to add and go into this topic, I’ll only say that this is really extremely important, including for building strong, fulfilling relationships. Nobody wants to plug the holes inside their “half”. Does this mean that in life it is enough to find yourself and the most valuable relationships are those that we build with ourselves? Only partly. For some reason, followers of the cult of “self-love” are silent about the true value of the relationship between two loving people, namely the synergy that appears in a couple. What is synergy? This is when 1+1=3 What does this look like in a relationship? When, next to your partner, you can do more than alone (and so can he), when together you achieve more (even if each is in different areas of activity). You take energy, a charge for movement, strength from this relationship, from the interaction between you. It is certainly not easy to create such a couple with such a relationship. Every day you have to go through one hundred and one annoying little things, one hundred and one sloppy phrases, one hundred and one thrown socks and “the wrong look.” And every day you need to return to priorities, what is really important in life. However, if you create relationships, then only this kind and only for this purpose. The search for a half is doomed - first we collect ourselves, and then we look for the same whole.