LOVE & FRIENDSHIP

Anam Cara is Gaelic for soul friend. Knowing your soul friend is a vital part of Celtic spirituality since your Anam Cara is able to penetrate the depths of spiritual mysteries and reveal your life’s purpose. Your Anam Cara sees behind your mask and shows you the way of the soul. Your Anam Cara is your teacher, life mentor and spiritual guide.



You are a wondrous, extraordinary human being, able to design, build, and aspire to just about anything you set your mind to. Yet you are fragile. You are limited to time and space. Your life is a sequence of expected and unexpected moments. There is nothing you can truly own or possess. Your life is completely transient. You live on borrowed time. This delicate existence may urge you to look deeper into yourself. But you can never see yourself as others do. The real looking-glass to your life is revealed through your Anam Cara. Your soul friend helps you see who you really are. Your Anam Cara awakens what is already perfect within you.

A bond between friends can be everlasting; transcending death itself. A soul friend has a profound connection to your life that is immeasurable. Such friendship is an ancient link that exists between you. Soul friends compliment and join in each other’s journey. This is the true meaning of soul friend—seeing each other’s eternity from the same perspective.

The Celts pursued friendship on a spiritual dimension through kindred spirit. For them, the Anam Cara friendship established a deep commitment to truth and trust. You were brought together through providence to experience a deeper spiritual life that would take you both beyond your mortal persona.

In an Anam Cara friendship there is no mask. There is an intimate place where your deeper self resides and becomes illuminated through your Anam Cara. The mystery and beauty of an Anam Cara friendship is the coming together of all that you are. In a soul friendship two halves are made one as friend unifies friend.

The Celtic tradition avoided dualism. They would not indulge in a concept of separation or division. They could see that dualism distorts the unique fabric of oneness and gives rise to guilt and fear causing a separation between soul and mind. The light of your Anam Cara does not force this kind of division. Rather, your Anam Cara helps you reform the oneness of your life again.

The Celtic idea of soul friendship opens up the mystery of our inner worlds. It brings us back to the incredible intimacy that exists behind our human form. Should such a deep bond be formed with another, it is said you have found your Anam Cara or soul friend. When you love, you open your life to another. Your protective barriers come down. Your defensive walls collapse. Your soul friend is allowed to enter the deepest, most sacred place of your inner essence. Your life becomes theirs. It takes great trust to let someone in to the inner sanctuary of the soul. When you are blessed with an Anam Cara you have arrived at a most hallowed and blessed place we call home.