There is often a lot of talk about soulmate relationships and twin flames, but not much about karmic relationships. Most people will have a karmic connection with a romantic partner before being with their soulmate. Karmic relationships are essential to your personal growth, and they come carrying life lessons and the chance to release the karmic debt.
One of the hardest things is that if you have a lot of life lessons in your life path or resistance to learning essential life lessons, you may have revolving relationships with karmic romantic partners. Repetitive patterns often hold the keys to any relationship issues, especially if they keep recurring with new love interests. If you feel you are seeking out the same type of relationship or partner traits, you may want to do some soul searching and see if you are resistant to learning or releasing toxic patterns or behaviors.
Karmic relationships typically have some common red flags to help you identify if the relationship you are in or have been in the past was indeed one of these. Still, briefly, they are addictive qualities, codependency, imperfection-focused, feelings of dis-ease, fear of leaving (or missing out), and obsessive thoughts. We will look at each of these more closely.
Addictive Qualities
If you think of this person, you receive a dopamine rush; then there are addictive elements to your connection to this person. The person may also feel the same for you, so if there is tension in the relationship due to outside factors or issues going on that are self-related, it will create waves of ups and downs between the two of you. These addictive feelings are meant to teach you how to become your center of calm and not rely on others for personal happiness or satisfaction. Karmic relationships teach us not to obtain our sense of self-worth from others but from within ourselves.
Codependency
Karmic relationships that center around codependency teach us that we need to have a healthy balance of interdependency and self-reliance. If we rely too heavily on another person for our needs, then we cease to grow and evolve as a person. Of course, this isn't realistic in all situations, but a relationship with toxic codependency struggles to show respect and kindness in every interaction. If there is a passive-aggressive dynamic of codependency in your relationship, then it's meant to teach you a lesson of emotional boundaries. When we become too dependent on others for our emotional needs, we have fragile boundaries. Healthy boundaries help us grow to see the value in ourselves and others.
Imperfection-focused
If your partner is unhealthily obsessed with things they point out are wrong with you, then this is a red flag that the relationship is karmic and meant to teach you self-respect and self-love. None of us are perfect, and whether you or your partner is focused on a need for perfection, the lesson is learning to love others for who they are and not try and change them or you. When we focus on only giving or receiving love based on our worth, that love is conditional and will come with strings attached. What karmic relationships teach us about our strengths and weaknesses is that we should value our opinion about ourselves and not hold others' regard for us up higher.
Feelings of Dis-ease
Have you ever gotten feelings of extreme discomfort about someone you were in a relationship with, someone that made you wonder if they loved you or not? This unease is a dis-ease that can alter our reality and make us believe things that aren't true. Our karmic partner may be teaching us vital lessons about our health and wellbeing and how much lack of value we put on our worth. In this regard, karmic relationships teach us to trust ourselves and our intuition.
Fear of Leaving (or Missing Out)
In a relationship where you or your partner are terrified of the other one leaving or have complete anxiety over them having different activities, then this is a red flag that it is a karmic relationship. Often, this type of fear can be related to trust issues, but that trust can stem from our faith in the order of reality and our faith in the Universe and not the actual person. With this, we need to learn to have confidence in ourselves and our partner and trust that whatever happens is meant to be without reading ill-intentions from others or ourselves. The ultimate lesson with this fear is to accept uncertainty into our lives and allow things to flow in and out without judgment.
Obsessive Thoughts
There are times in relationships, especially in the beginning, when we may have obsessive thoughts about our person of interest. Typically, this will dissipate as we begin to know each other and settle into a relationship. If this doesn't go away, it can clearly signify a karmic relationship. Obsession often indicates a need to control and a lack of balance. We all need to be in a relationship with ourselves that is balanced and centered before others, and obsessive thoughts can be a projection of our inner fears and insecurities. When this is centered in a karmic relationship, the lesson is about learning to see and understand destructive behavior patterns in yourself and others. Life is all about having everything in moderation and not excess.
Conclusion
In the end, a karmic relationship teaches you how to love and be loved. Once you work through what is holding you back from accepting and giving real love in your life, then you will find the right partner for you.