Operation: "Galaxy Affair"

“Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength; mastering yourself is true power. If you realize that, you have enough, you are truly rich.”

Lao Tzu

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It started like this: he would pick me up for class every morning. No grand gestures. Just presence. On time. Most days. We held hands as if we were afraid to let go. Only the steering wheel dared interrupt. It felt like love. The quiet kind. The kind that sneaks up on you. Tender. Unassuming. Like maybe – just maybe - this was the man he'd longed to be. He'd been trying so hard.

But even in his trying,

deep down, we both knew the truth.

He knew.

And I knew.

It was all a lie.

And if we are honest, at one point or another, we've all worn a mask so tight it practically became skin. We've all smiled through the cracks, trying to hide the parts of us that made us feel small. Unworthy. Ashamed. At some point, we all held our breath in the name of love, only to suffocate while we smiled.

So, who was I to judge him?

This was my story. I was such a one. Who smiled so wide that my lungs, filled with borrowed air, strained to breathe under the weight of giving too much strength to the man I'd loved to freely and unforgivingly take life from me and in no way expressed sorrow when he did. It was through my stubbornness and unwillingness to admit that even though I loved him, his true nature was a crime, and he was killing me – I did nothing. We dared to call it love. But it was a tailored habit, costumed in hope. And I ended up paying a great price – it was unnatural.

He had commandeered my life!

Out of wanting better for him, I tried to fix him because some of me believe that he could have become a man worthy of me to love. I tried to think that maybe – just maybe, he didn't have to be a lost cause. But every stitch I sewed tore wider, unraveling something deeper.

To make it worse, he was torn between two lives.

Two women.

Two beds.

Two hearts.

And its weight showed in his exhaustion.

But he never chose. Why?

Every morning, he came from her bed to my heart – without hesitation, as if love were a commute. And I let him. Knowing he was deceptive and accepting the deception – I still made room. I wasn't naïve, but fantasy was familiar and loyal. And while he was utterly underserving, I didn't make haste to forget when he showed up for me when no one else did. That was the most convincing argument of all. So, I told myself that I wasn't ready to lose him.

But was it him that I wasn't prepared to lose, or was it me that I wasn't ready to find?

What kind of trauma convinced me that my truth was too loud? That my joy was too much? Masks were safer than my real face? How many versions of myself did I audition for this love?

How far did I bury my authentic self until pretense felt safe? I might have laughed if the pain wasn't so great.

I was tired. So tired. And craving more. But I didn't know who to become without him. I was nineteen when he met me. Trying to decide which version of myself to fight for when I hardly even knew who I was made it even harder. So, instead of engaging, I stayed. Not out of strength – but surrender. Being with him was easier than starting a blind investigation into myself. If I had been going to execute a search for myself, my preference would have been to be ready.

So, I did the convenient thing for a while and rested in his arms as though it was a refuge - when we knew it was a battlefield. I sacrificed myself - for him. In hopes that he would eventually see me, honor me, and love me. But it was just a slow suicide dressed in the façade of romance. It was a harsh tragedy. And we both played the game.

I compromised myself – and for what?

Love is sacred. But what protects the sacred from hands too clumsy to hold it? Why would God gift us something as honored as love, only to watch it be corrupted, mishandled, and abused by those who do not know what they carry? I wondered!

How could the love that I dreamt of as a child turn into a life sentence handed down by a man who couldn't understand the depth of what he had been given?

It wasn't right!

It is often said that we are attracted to what we are. And I attracted him—a broken man.

Which then meant - that some part of me was broken, too.

And he, in his brokenness, mistook destruction for passion and latched onto my wounds.

Drank from my joy like it was his to take.

Sipped on my peace like wine.

Bled love from my lips until there was nothing left to kiss.

A devil pretentious enough to beguile me into thinking that he

"LOVED ME"

Hmmmm….

Somewhere deep inside, I believed I didn't deserve love. Not real love. The safe kind. Not the kind that sees you fully and stays anyway. That belief – the one I never said aloud – was the one that betrayed me!

I BETRAYED ME!

I BETRAYED the WOMAN I was BECOMING.

For a man who would never know her

because I believed I had to bleed to be loved.

That love had to survive and come with wounds to be genuine.

It was a lonely and agonizing feeling – living in hiding. I pretended to be something I wasn't and became someone else's mirror for their self-hate until I couldn't look at my reflection. I detested that for me.

Feeling that didn't exempt me from realizing I deserved more because I kept feeling this constant urging, longing, yearning, and desiring for "more" that haunted me into a rage. Rage that turned into anger, frustration, resentment - until I had no peace.

That's when I remembered I wasn't born to be quiet. I wasn't born to be small. I wasn't born to carry anyone's shame as though it was mine. And I refused to lose any more of myself to this madness, fighting someone else's war.

These shadows – of love, joy, peace, freedom, liberation that called me – haunted me not to torment me but to remind me of who I was and what I deserved.

"Operation: Galaxy Affair" was not for him. IT WAS FOR ME!

It was my rebellion.

My resurrection.

My love letter to the woman I left behind.

Telling her to fall in love with herself again.

She had to rise from the wreckage and gather every broken and fractured piece of herself to rebuild the masterpiece she knew she was.

Magnificent!

Radiant!

Indestructible!

A billion beautiful fragments,

magnetizing together to form an unshakeable love affair with herself.

                                                    Because…

If I LOVED ME...

IF. I. LOVED. MYSELF

Then, my brokenness could no longer be his weapon. He'd lose all access and control.

So, I began to love "MYSELF"

Gently.

Deliberately.

Consistently.

To truly heal, I needed to rediscover myself. I had to become whole. I started to make peace with every scar, forgave the girl who stayed – and told the woman that I am now –

"YOU WERE ALWAYS THE MIRACLE."

Because it was the parts of me that I hated that gave him a place to stay.

And if I ever wanted freedom,

that self-hate had to die.

So, he could GO!

Until next time…

Kerique Hoo-Kim