I don’t know if you are still with me and accept the way I am after all?

I don’t know if I just feel comfortable with you or I am really evolving in this relationship?

Am I confused between emotional safety and true personal growth?

These questions I ponder upon — not when we were happy together, not when we parted and found each other again, but at the right time when I am ready to receive lessons. And I am still walking on this journey, aware and conscious.

In the process of your growth journey, the world around you shuts down and the soul becomes quiet.

You will become more conscious and surprisingly see yourself taking the wheel from another perspective.

I see a part of me slowly become the version that I have always wanted to be, but not there yet over the past years.

Nine years in a relationship is long enough to remember everything about someone, yet short enough to still get surprised

Five years ago, my younger self would’ve said, “Yes, I’m already a better man because of this love.” of course I would’ve believed it too.

But deep down, something didn’t feel fully true.

I wasn’t lying—I was just rehearsing a version of me that hadn’t fully grown up yet.

I always had this image of who I wanted to become: grounded, present, purposeful. A man who shows up not just for his partner, but for his life. But for years, old patterns prison me.

And the wild thing? It wasn’t until we broke up that I finally had the space to meet myself. And in that quiet space, something shifted.

I didn’t feel like I had totally lost her — I felt like I was finding me so that I can meet her there again.

Strangely enough, it took our breakup for things to truly change. And not because I lost her—but because, for the first time, I started to find me.

The breakup wasn’t loud or dramatic. It was calm. Honest. Almost sacred. And it wasn’t just the end of our relationship—it marked the end of the illusion I had been carrying about who I was.

I didn’t rush into distractions. I didn’t try to numb the pain. I simply sat with myself. I finally met the version I wanted to become—the one I had spent years building—and I saw both its strengths and its cracks.

The fears I had masked as logic.

The pride I had mistaken for independence.

The emotional absence I had justified as freedom. And I didn’t try to explain it away. I just saw it, and that quiet self-recognition changed everything.

A new perspective

Eventually, we found our way back to each other. But we didn’t return to what we had before. We didn’t try to recreate the old rhythm. We began again—deliberately, honestly.

This time, there was no performance, no pretending. Just presence. There were long conversations. There was vulnerability. I shared the things I had never spoken out loud—the wounds I carried from childhood, the parts of myself I thought were unlovable, the fears I had hidden even from myself.

And she didn’t flinch. She didn’t interrupt. She didn’t try to fix it. She simply witnessed me. No judgment. No script. Just listening. And in that space, I realized something profound: the kind of relationship that helps you grow doesn’t push or demand—it invites. It holds space for you to unfold.

We’re still walking this path together, but everything feels different now. I’m still not the man I want to be, the superior man as described by David Deida in his book—not completely—but I’m closer than I’ve ever been.

I will talk about this book in another post. And the difference is, I’m no longer pretending. Sometimes personal growth looks like doing brave, difficult things. But other times, it looks like finally being still enough to hear your own truth echo back to you.

If you’re in that place—quietly sitting with your own questions—maybe you’re not lost. Maybe you’re just finally beginning to listen.

If you’re in a relationship, ask yourself: Does your partner make space for your truth — even when it’s messy? Are you growing into your highest self, or just keeping the peace to avoid disruption? Do you feel like you can fully be — and still be loved? Because love, real love, doesn’t ask you to shrink. It challenges you to rise.

Photo courtesy by NEOM on Unsplash