Aligned, Even If Alone

Happiness to anyone reading this moment of my life.

It hasn’t been long since everything shifted. It started in the summer of 2025. I had friends. I had a relationship that felt solid. On the outside, life looked stable, calm even. But that summer began peeling back layers I didn’t know I was hiding behind — layers I thought would not do any harm, layers I thought didn’t need accountability. Layers I believed were harmless ways of protecting myself, when in reality they were quietly shaping a version of me that wasn’t completely real.

For a long time, I wasn’t real in front of anyone. And by anyone, I mean my friends, my relationship, and many other parts of my life. I was so scared of them leaving me that I learned to become that perfect guy — you know, the one who seems “too good to be true.” The one who never causes problems, never reveals the uncomfortable parts, never risks showing the cracks.

I had versions of myself prepared for every situation. One for friends. One for love — and especially there, I used to be very good at curating that version to be the cool, chill guy everyone could easily be around. One for conflict. One for silence. One for moments when people needed comfort. One for moments when people needed distance.

I thought that was maturity. It wasn’t.

I thought adapting meant surviving. I believed that learning how to adjust myself to every environment meant I was growing. But I wasn’t adapting — I was curating. Carefully choosing which parts of myself to show and which ones to hide, constantly shaping a version that would be easier for people to accept.

And that was the first moment I realised something deeply uncomfortable: these people don’t really know me. They don’t know the real me. Because at that point, even I didn’t.

And being real? It turns out that’s lonely at first. Very lonely. You begin to realise that the moment you stop performing, many of the connections you thought were stable start feeling uncertain. You look around and sometimes it feels like you don’t have anyone except yourself.

But that’s also the strange beauty hidden inside tragedy. Because sometimes losing the illusion is the only way you begin to discover the truth. And the truth, at least for me, was that becoming a genuinely kind person begins with being honest — even when that honesty makes you uncomfortable.

For a long time I believed that if I buried my past deep enough, it would stop existing. I believed that if I didn’t talk about old mistakes, they wouldn’t carry consequences into the present. That silence could erase things.

I was wrong.

The past does not disappear just because you refuse to acknowledge it. It waits quietly. And if you don’t disclose it honestly, it eventually resurfaces — often in distorted ways that you can no longer control.

When I didn’t face my past man to man, someone else eventually brought it forward in a twisted manner. And that moment cost me a relationship that meant a lot to me. But if I’m being completely honest, the relationship had already begun slipping away long before that moment.

The real loss started the moment I chose concealment over courage.

And sometimes I think about how different things might have been if I had found the courage back then — the courage to sit in front of her, hold her, and say the truth openly. To tell her that those parts of my past were long gone. To tell her that she was the person I wanted to build something real with. That she was the one who felt like home.

There’s another truth I’ve had to admit to myself.

When someone begins choosing me, I sometimes sabotage it.

I create small cracks in the connection just to see if they’ll stay. I push boundaries just to test whether they actually care. I create situations where their loyalty has to prove itself.

And the uncomfortable truth is that I do it because I’m insecure.

Because somewhere deep inside, part of me believes that if someone sees me fully — not the curated version, not the “too good to be true” version — they might not stay. And to be honest, sometimes they don’t.

So before they can leave on their own, I unconsciously create chaos. I make the situation harder than it needs to be. And by the time things fall apart, it becomes difficult for either person to leave with good memories.

Last summer forced a choice that I had been avoiding for years.

Face the past.

Or run again.

For most of my life, running was my instinct. Escape, escape, escape — the only strategy I had really mastered. Avoiding uncomfortable conversations. Avoiding difficult truths. Avoiding the hurt I caused to others because acknowledging it felt overwhelming.

And now when I look back, I feel a deep regret about that. Regret about not listening when people tried to express their pain. Regret about shutting down conversations that could have healed things. Regret about not allowing myself to sit with the discomfort of knowing I had hurt someone.

At the time, I thought I was protecting myself. Now I realise many of those people were actually trying to be there for me. They were trying to work through things, but I sabotaged those chances because facing those emotions made me uncomfortable.

I regret those decisions. But I also understand something important now: at that time, that was the only way I knew how to make myself feel safe.

And this time, when everything collapsed, I ran harder than I ever had before.

So hard that I lost almost everything.

Maybe that loss was necessary.

Because it forced me to confront something I had never really examined before: some people were attached to the version of me I had curated, not the real person underneath it.

And once that curated version began disappearing, the connections tied to it began disappearing too.

When I finally spent nine months confronting myself — really confronting myself — I discovered something uncomfortable.

People often say they want the real you.

But when they finally see it, they may not always like it.

And that realization hurts more than most people admit.

But during those months I also discovered something that felt grounding.

My real self values accountability.

My real self listens when someone says they’re hurt.

My real self understands that love isn’t about deflection or ego.

Love is not about winning arguments or protecting pride.

It’s about showing up with the messy parts of yourself. It’s about being present even when both people are tired, confused, or emotionally exhausted. It’s about listening to each other without immediately defending yourself.

It’s about holding each other and saying the difficult things: what hurts, what you expect, what you need, how you want to be understood.

That is what love actually looks like.

Love itself is not complicated.

We are.

And even if this real version of me is less liked — even if he doesn’t always have someone to talk with, discuss things with, or laugh with — he feels more aligned with himself.

More peaceful.

Because now he knows that whatever lies in front of him, he will face it honestly. He will be kind to himself, and he will try to be kind to the situation too.

Because at the end of the day, we only live once.

So we might as well live it fully.

~ Shwetank Tripathi