Question:

I've tried my hand at matchmaking, but so far I've been a dismal failure. I set up five couples, and none of them worked out. Most of them said I wasn't even close. Yet I thought each time that they were perfect matches. I have a friend who has made seven successful matches - and she didn't really know the people that well at all. Am I missing something? Is there a secret to matchmaking that I don't know about?

Answer:

The human soul is like the flame of a candle. Every soul has a presence, a light that fills the room. Each one of us has our own flame, with a hue that is uniquely ours.

When two people come together, just as when two candles come together, the room is now filled not with two lights, but one. Their respective auras combine to create a new light that is more than the sum of the two of them. I am me, and you are you, but when we come together we create a we that is not just you plus me—it has a light and aura of its own.

This is why it is hard to guess how two people will get on together. You may know each individually, but you don't know that third element—the new light that arrives when the two are together. We may think two people would be perfect for each other, yet when they meet there is no energy between them. They may have bright candles individually, they just don't merge together well. Similarly, we often look at a couple and think, "I would never have put them together", yet they are obviously well suited. While their individual candles may seem different, together their flames create a beautiful light.

A matchmaker can't determine whether there will be chemistry between two people. Your job is not to attempt to match souls; it is to try and match people with similar values. A similar taste in music or a common interest in frogs will not make a relationship last a lifetime; common attitudes to family, marriage, G‑d and life will. If you know two people whose priorities and beliefs are basically the same, even if they seem such different characters, set them up to meet. The rest they can discover for themselves.

Every new couple is a new source of light for the world. Even if you haven't been successful, don't give up making matches. Who knows, maybe one day you'll light the right flame...