“decide” sometime later in the relationship to have children for variously different reasons, in which case the parenting is some kind of secondary outcome or even and “accessory” to their original attraction
   What is this force which attracts our ideal sort of partner? We all know what it is that enjoins us with bad ones. It's called immaturity or just plain bad judgment! When we separate, we just shrug and say – “Oh well, that just wasn't meant to be”. For those who come upon the right person, they say – “It was just meant to be”. Either such statements of “meant to be” and “not meant to be” are meaningless, and meeting the right partner is purely accidental, or else they have some basis in natural laws which are intuitively accepted, even if not fully understood. These very special “meant to be” relationships can explode in a “love at first sight” reaction, or else they can develop over time through the maturing of love between two people. A common term these kind of partners use is “finding one’s soul mate”. Another is “finding their other half”. Other half? That sounds awfully like the concept of Shiva and Shakti to me! This is not to mean that as individuals we are incom-plete, and that we must search until we find someone else who will make us whole. It is more the case, that through the intimate link with that person, we can discover our own wholeness.
   According to tantra, shakti (the cosmic egg or energy) unites with shiva (the cosmic sperm or consciousness) long before any physical acts of reproduction take place. Long before you actually meet the “right” person, and long before you reproduce with that person, your consciousness is out there looking. In your dreams, in your waking yet subconscious thoughts, in your hopes when you go to a party, in your eyes when you first meet someone attractive, in your conversa-tions with likely people, Shiva and Shakti are longing to meet and join. Whereas some would say that this is just lustful biology, it is much more than that. And, whereas some say meeting their perfect partner was a miracle, a surprise, an act of God, which they personally had nothing to do with, it is not really a surprise at all because they already had a lot of energy invested in it – they just didn't perceive it, consciously. The shakti was working but the shiva was asleep at the wheel. All that was missing was the time, the place and moment of connection. The other person was looking in identical ways too, and one day, those two beings met. The way to become more aware and more involved with such events is to wake up your shiva, wake up your awareness, become more conscious of what your

  
mind, your heart, your soul are actually doing 24 hours of the day.   
   This whole issue is called destiny or dharma. Yoga says that it is not something too vast, too philosophical, too impossible to understand rationally. The more a person comes to know their dharma and lives in alignment with it, everywhere they go and everyone they meet will be seen as part of that dharma. The “right” people will appear at the “right” time. The “right” events will unfold to assist the manifesta-tion of that destiny. All the “wrong” events will be seen as sign posts of the way not to go. So, the first step is to realise one’s own parenting dharma and then to link with another person who has realised (or is on the path to discover-ing) their own.
   This kind of dharmic link or spiritual union is extremely important in the yoga of relationships and family. If a couple are both seekers of the truth, and understand that it is dharma which has brought them together, and that this metaphysi-cal union is also a part of the procreative process, then any children they have will be a product of that union. Conception, pregnancy, birth and parenting will all be seen as an opportunity for spiritual growth and further manifestation of the couple’s oneness. However, if the nature of the relationship is not in harmony on the metaphysical level (what is called a non-dharmic relationship), then any union on the physical level (sex) and product of that union (children) will only ever be incomplete. Sadly, for many people their relationship is full of karma (non-dharma). All too frequently conception is seen as a purely physical act, pregnancy focuses solely on the physicality of the mother and baby, birthing is experienced as primarily a physical trauma, and parenting brings mainly uncertainty and confusion about the challenging changes of the relationship and their life.

Unseen Factors of Manifestation
   Everyone would agree that human reproduc-tion is the process of creating offspring from the sexual union of male and female, but yoga says that there is much more going on prior to this obvious physical construction of life. Modern science's investigations into the meta-physical (beyond the physical) realms of creation have not been as diligent as the ancient spiritual sciences, which still lead the way in this area. Yoga and tantra maintain that in all of life, the same principles of creation apply, and that in humans the rules of reproduction work identically on the psychic, the intellectual, emotional or the physical planes. But the difference between all the other life forms and ourselves is that, in humans, sexual union (usually) occurs out of some conscious, commonly