Design websites and mobile apps. Edit videos, simulate real-life paintings. And other applications provides a seamless media. Soul 4 Real Vocals (WAV. Soul For Real exploded on the scene in 1995 with their debut, Candy Rain. Look at their album cover – I’ve never seen four more confused looking brothers in my life. Why is everyone looking in different directions?

• Relay For Life
• Soul 4 Real For Life Album Front
• Soul 4 Real For Life

Most of us define a Soul Mate as a perfect romantic partner that will fulfill every aspect of our being. Soul Mates are in sync with us, they are supportive, sexy, intelligent, funny and will be part of our “happily ever after” story.

The truth is, life is not quite that simple.

What Exactly is a Soul Mate?

A Soul Mate is a member of your soul family. These are other souls that come into our lives for one reason or another, and they can be family, friends, colleagues, neighbors, lovers and even enemies.

We all have a soul and when we encounter other souls in our lives, the friction of the meeting between two energy forces can create different, intriguing and challenging effects. Some souls will feel as though they have known each other from another lifetime, some will clash, and some will feel at ease with the other person’s company.

Essentially some of the souls that come into our lives will help us grow in love and wisdom, while others will aid us in learning difficult life lessons or universal truths.

No matter how fleeting the encounter, each soul that comes into our lives has the potential to provide a significant life-transforming moment; even that one girl that smiled at you from the window of a bus passing by.

Soul Mates serve as mirrors of ourselves. What we see in another soul reflects our own soul.

When we are capable of seeing others souls as ‘mates’, (including our enemies), as members of our family that are there to teach us life lessons, then our whole perception and relation to other people changes entirely.

Different Types of Soul Mates

In our language we have the word ‘friend’, and the word ‘soul mate’ which is essentially romantic by nature. But how would you describe someone that falls in between? Someone who is more than just a ‘best friend’ but doesn’t have the romantic and sexual attraction of a ‘soul mate’?

We need to create new words to express these relationships we have with others. Here are a few words that help to distinguish these deep connections we have in life:

Soul Friend

This is your most common type of relationship connection. These are the people in your life who you have chosen because your ego, intelligence or emotions are harmonious with the others. Essentially, you share the same tastes, interests, beliefs, sense of humor and values.

While this connection is not as deep as a Soul Companion, a Soul Friend’s company creates little friction. Sometimes Soul Friends can become Soul Teachers, but generally you are the one who chooses your Soul Friend as you perceive the world in a similar way to them.

Soul Teacher

Soul Teachers are composed of all the people in your life that have come to teach you a lesson. They don’t necessary teach you intentionally, but often provide challenging situations in your life for you to overcome and learn from.

Soul Teachers often come in the form of family members, friends, acquaintances, old lovers, momentary drifters and even enemies. You attract them into your life because you need to learn something from them. For example, some teach you to cultivate patience for the guy who doesn’t signal before changing lanes, to stop lusting over the ‘bad boys’ that keep crossing your path, or to develop greater compassion and understanding for another person’s way of life and beliefs.

Usually any friction in relationships is due to a failure in acknowledging something within ourselves, or in other words; a resistance to the lessons our Soul Teachers teach us. We can never change other people unless they are open to do so, but we can change ourselves.

Soul Companion

This would come closest to what we commonly define as a “soul mate” with the exception of romantic attraction. Soul Companions can be males or females, friends or family members. While Soul Friends are harmonized with us through their ego identities, Soul Companions experience soulful harmony with us. The nature of a Soul Companion is much more long-lived and stable to that of a Soul Friend for this reason.

Many times the relationships you develop with these people will feel as though you’ve known them for centuries, even from past lives. With a Soul Companion there is a great and deep understanding of the other person, and a feeling that you are both on the same ‘wave length’ of thoughts and emotions. These connections often last for a lifetime.

Soul Companions share both attributes of Soul Friends and Soul Teachers in that they experience ego harmony with us, as well as teach, help us learn, and grow, without the friction of a Soul Teacher, as Soul Companions lovingly share with us the journey. One of the reasons for such depth and harmony is because they usually share with us the same Soul Age.

Soul Twin

The ancient Greeks believed that our souls were once whole and the Gods divided them into two different halves, and once we found our other halves we would become whole and complete again. That is the essence of Soul Twins.

Finding our Soul Twin often feels like finding a piece of ourselves that was missing. Many describe the feeling as ‘returning home’, or developing a greater sense of wholeness in the presence of the other person. Soul Twins share complementary, compatible life goals and their spiritual natures are often in sync. They also experience immense levels of comfort with each other that cannot be experienced in other relationships, and they compliment each other in many ways through their strengths and weaknesses.

Interestingly, the Soul Age development of a person plays a significant role in Soul Twin relationships. Mature and Old Souls, for example, are more in-tune with finding their mates as they are more capable of experiencing a peaceful, joyous love that is not rooted in infatuation. This love can be grounded in unconditional affection that requires significant spiritual development to first overcome the fears and possessive attachments that are involved in most typical relationships.

In the end, it’s important to remember that none of these relationships are better or worse than the other – they each serve a purpose in our spiritual growth and healing.

Why Soul Mates Come Into Our Lives

There are three ways a Soul Mate can come into our lives, and that is: For a Reason, For a Season and For a Lifetime.

It is important to know of this distinction because once you know why a Soul Mate has come into your life, you can know what to expect from that connection. All too often we find couples, for example, who are still clinging to the dead flower of a relationship that was once blossoming but has reached the end of its season. So lets have a closer look at these:

For a Reason

When you come across a Soul Mate for a REASON, it’s usually to meet a need that has been expressed in your life. This can be for guidance, assistance through difficult times, support, depth of conversations or simply as a presence for you physically, emotionally or spiritually. A Soul Mate can last a moment or a lifetime, depending on the type of Soul Mate relationship it is.

For a Season

Then there are Soul Mates for a SEASON, or people that come into our lives only momentarily. These people may serve as catalysts to share, grow and learn, or they may present themselves in a moment when we need to overcome our fears of vulnerability, or when we need someone to challenge our belief system, or even when we need to discover a passion we were unaware of. Regardless of the reason, these Soul Mates are only Seasonal and leave once their gift has passed on.

For a Lifetime

Lifetime relationships are predominantly Twin Soul connections. They teach us lessons that are so deep, so intricate that they require a lifetime of loving growth with the other to assimilate deeply.

In lifetime connections, the strengths of one person are used to strengthen the other, and the harmony between both Soul Mates is so peaceful and flows so well that they often last a lifetime. These relationships are as rare and as precious as fine jewels, and we should feel immensely blessed if we encounter them during our lives.

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There are an infinity of Soul Mates out there that we will encounter during our lives. While some come to teach us something new, others come to share our joys. While some last for only a few months or years, others last for a lifetime.

With these lessons and shared moments of bliss, we learn to grow spiritually and come closer to finding our wholeness as human beings.

Being diagnosed with any incurable disease is misfortune enough, but society for some reason looks upon the diagnoses of rare diseases as a special kind of grim fate dealt by the universe, the house which always wins. But sometimes — a one in ten million or more sometimes — a person is stricken with a disease so rare, so peculiar, and so oddly beneficial that it could almost be considered a superpower instead of a debilitating problem. Here are 10 cases of rare diseases that resemble super powers.

Liam Hoekstra, The Superkid

When Dana Hoekstra and her husband adopted Liam Hoekstra at birth, they never expected that he would turn out to have a condition so rare that doctors don’t even know how many people are afflicted with it.

Born of a father who was reported to possess incredible strength, Liam was diagnosed with myostatin-related muscle hypertrophy at the age of three. It wasn’t appearing sick that prompted Liam’s parents to have him examined by doctors, but his seemingly super-human strength. Liam could lift five-pound dumbbells and perform multiple chin-ups when most kids his age struggled to complete even a single one.

Myostatin-related muscle hypertrophy was first discovered by scientists in the 1990s, and even then it was only recorded in Belgian Blue cattle, a cow renowned for its unusually large muscle mass. In 2000, a German boy was reported as having the condition, but the “disease” wasn’t officially entered into any medical literature until 2004.

What doctors do know about the condition is that Liam possessed almost 40% more muscle mass than others his age, has an extremely fast metabolism and close to no body fat. Remarkably, the condition causes skeletal muscles without any detrimental effects to the heart or any other areas of the body.

While experts say that Liam’s condition will become truly noticeable in his teenage years when he begins to look misleadingly as if he’s a protein-chugging steroid addict, we may never know; Liam’s parents have refused multiple television interviews and pulled him out of the spotlight in order to give him a normal childhood.

Williams Syndrome

Williams syndrome is a genetic condition that effects 1 in 10,000 people worldwide. Somewhat uncommon yet not as rare as Liam Hoekstra’s super strength, doctors know a great deal about this syndrome and how to treat those who have it. While the physical ailments related to Williams Syndrome are serious and can be life-threatening, the mental effects of this disorder are less than daunting and can almost be considered a blessing — or a super power — in themselves.

Getting the bad stuff out of the way, Williams Syndrome can cause cardiovascular disease, developmental delays, and learning disabilities due to the 26 deleted genes that characterize it.

On the brighter end of the spectrum, those with Williams Syndrome are naturally kinder, more cheerful, and more social than the rest of us. While most of us are walking around glum and moody, grumpy that our car got a flat tire or because some daily tribulation didn’t go our way, those with Williams Syndrome are naturally able to find true happiness in the face of serious complications.

Although those with Williams Syndrome often struggle with speech development, spatial relations and abstract reasoning, most who have this condition also possess an affinity for music so great that there are entire programs and centers dedicated to teaching music to those with Williams Syndrome alone.

Marfan Syndrome

On the subject of music, Marfan Syndrome is a disorder that could be considered a musician’s best friend. Marfan Syndrome is a genetic disorder that effects the connective tissue, causing those who have it to typically grow taller than others and possess longer limbs and fingers.

Although Marfan Syndrome can be somewhat painful since it is characterized by a weakening of the connective tissue and therefore may effect the sac surrounding the spinal cord, it can possibly be attributed to skyrocketing the careers of certain famous musicians.

Sergei Rachaminoff, a famous Russian pianist, is believed to have had Marfan Syndroma, as is Niccolo Paganini, a violinist so proficient that many people actually accused him of selling his soul to Satan in exchange for his musical prowess.

Savant Syndrome

Most people immediately think of Savant Syndrome when thinking of Autism simply because it is the type of Autism most commonly featured on television and in movies; Ran Man and A Beautiful Mind are probably the most famous examples of Savant Syndrome on the big screen.

Savant Syndrome, while debilitating in the way that it is caused by larger and more threatening central nervous system disorders, causes a person to display extremely proficient skills bordering on genius in specific areas such as math, art, or music.

Psychiatrist Darold Treffert attributes these extreme skills to a near-perfect memory, which he claims all Savants possess.

And although only 10% of Autistic people have Savant Syndrome, only 50% of those with Savant Syndrome have Autism; the other half suffer from an entirely different central nervous system disorder or disease.

Remarkable Savants include mathematical genius Jedediah Buxton, scientist Temple Grandin, artist Gottfried Mind, and numerical genius George Widener.

Lords of EPO

While many athletes are illegally “gene doping,” or taking drugs meant to boost their athletic performance via genetic and cell ‘alterations,’ some athletes (and non-athletes) are believed to have been born with genetic mutations which naturally increase their chances of winning.

EPO, or Erythropoietin, is a drug intended to boost the red blood cell count and therefore the user’s oxygen intake. Those with a naturally higher red blood cell count are prone to better athletic performances without all the sneaky illegal stuff.

Real Life Daredevil Sees Using Sound

While blindness isn’t exactly a disease, it is remarkable that some have turned this disability into an advantage with the use of echolocation. Scientific research supports the idea that the blind can adequately use echolocation to determine the locations of objects. Isn’t that sort of what the superhero Daredevil used to locate (and eradicate) his enemies?

When compared in a study, blind people with no experience with echolocation performed much better than vision-possessing people, also with no experience with echolocation. Considering the fact that our senses become heightened to compensate for those which are taken away, this only makes sense.

Relay For Life

There’s also the case of Ben Underwood, a teenage boy who recovered from his blindness (caused by cancer) so well that he continues to play sports, ride his bike, and rollerblade around unassisted.

Soul 4 Real For Life Album Front

Totally Fearless

The idea of being scared of absolutely nothing is, in itself, pretty scary. But not to Jordy Cernik, whose loss of his adrenalin gland has left him unable to become frightened of anything.

Cernik underwent an operation to remove this gland after a rare condition which caused arthritis and brittle bones caused it to become problematic. Although he no longer feels fear because he is unable to produce adrenaline, the natural painkiller contained therein is also gone, resulting in constant pain for Cernik. Despite his major difficulties in life, Cernik’s post-operation activities included skydiving and ziplining for charity. He says he will do “whatever helps raise money, the more daring the better.”

A Painless Life

Getting tattoos, giving birth and even working out would be a whole lot easier if we were just able to turn off the annoying pain that yells at our brains to cut it out. But life is not all laid back leisure for Ashlyn Blocker and others who are afflicted with a rare disorder that prevents them from feeling any pain at all.

Described as Fearless, Blocker’s parents have to keep an extra-watchful eye on their daughter, who has a congenital insensitivity to pain called CIPA; without natural alarms to tell her when she’s being hurt or physically threatened, Blocker is completely unaware of her own safety or lack thereof. Besides ignoring pain, her body is also completely unaware of extreme temperatures — leaving her more susceptible to burns or hypothermia than most others.

Since CIPA only effects the nerve fibers that deliver messages of pain to the brain, Blocker is able to differentiate between textures, feel hunger, and feel the warmth of cuddling. However, the disorder is incurable and will effect her — both negatively and positively — for the rest of her life.

Magnetic People

The existence of magnetic people has been a subject of heated debate for a very long time. While there has never been any scientific evidence proving that those claiming magnetic ‘superpowers’ legitimately exist, people continue to come out yearly with claims of magnetism.

While it is easy to scientifically test for magnetic fields, no such tests proving human magnetism have ever been produced. But does that alone make it fake?

Possibly; many believe that those displaying magnetic properties either possess sticky skin made so by chemicals or glue, a good grasp of the way friction works, and an affinity for leaning slightly backwards so the metal objects don’t slip right off them. But it’s still fun to believe that somewhere in the world is an extremely disgruntled person, annoyed with all the fakers, who truly can walk around with forty spoons stuck to their head all day.

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Super Giants

While they don’t suffer from any specific disease or disorder, extremely tall “giant” men have always been regarded as somewhat superhuman. And their height, despite its advantage in sports at the very least, has a number of debilitating side effects as well.

Extremely tall men have had to do little to gain fame and recognition. Al Tomaini was an 8’4″ circus giant in the 1930s who wore size 27 shoes and went on to marry a double amputee who was only 2’6″; Bernard Coyne was over 8 feet tall and refused entry into the US army in the late 1800s due to his height; Robert Wadlow was born in 1918 and still remains the tallest man to ever have lived, at 8’11”.

But all of these men died relatively young from health complications caused by their rapidly growing muscles, which their organs were not able to adequately support.