I Was a Flight Risk in Love, Until I Woke the Fuck Up

If You’ve Ever Been Ghosted by a Man Who Said He Cared… This Is His Voice

By Zen Prem

At first, he was everywhere.

Calling. Messaging. Showing up like you were oxygen and he hadn’t breathed properly in years.

He made you feel chosen, like maybe this time, it was safe to lean in.

But the second you leaned back?

The second you softened, made space, started to trust?

He disappeared.

Not all at once.

Just enough to make you feel like you were the one who changed.

Just enough to make you question your tone, your timing, your worth.

But it wasn’t you that changed.

He did.

Because it’s easy to chase what feels exciting.

It’s harder to stand still in front of something real and not fucking flinch.

I know this, because that man?

That was me.

I used to mistake pursuit for presence.

Intensity for intimacy.

I didn’t know the difference between chemistry and chaos.

I wanted to feel loved, badly.

But the moment love required accountability, I fucking bailed.

I wasn’t broken.

I was untouched, by my own truth.

Still dragging around wounds I never named.

Still terrified of being seen without the charm, the edge, the persona.

I could flirt. I could chase.

But hold space for a woman’s depth?

Fuck no.

That would mean confronting the fact that I had none of my own.

So I ran.

Quietly. Slowly. Emotionally.

The kind of disappearing that’s hard to explain but brutal to endure.

And while she sat there wondering what the fuck she did wrong, I was congratulating myself for not ghosting, as if emotional withdrawal wasn’t its own kind of cruelty.

I watched her soften.

Watched her offer me the safety I claimed I’d never had.

Watched her dim her voice just to keep me close.

And I still left.

Not with a bang. Not with honesty.

But with the slow fade of a man who never planned to stay once the mask cracked.

She wasn’t too much.

She was just real.

And I wasn’t ready for real.

Because real doesn’t let you hide.

It doesn’t stroke your ego while you underdeliver.

It asks questions.

It reflects back who you are.

It doesn’t let you disappear without seeing what that says about you.

And I couldn’t handle that.

So she stopped reaching.

Stopped reminding.

Stopped pouring into someone who kept showing up with a fucking thimble.

She didn’t lose me.

I lost her.

But even worse

I lost the version of myself I could’ve been

if I’d had the courage to stay and do the work.

I know now:

You don’t need to be more chill.

You don’t need to love harder, stay quieter, or prove your worth to a man still hiding from his own reflection.

You need someone who’s already done the fucking inner work.

Someone who doesn’t run the moment your love asks for presence.

Someone who doesn’t punish you for needing consistency.

Someone who doesn’t confuse “I see you” with an attack.

And I didn’t get here overnight.

First I had to burn everything down.

After my third divorce and fourteen years of marriage, I did what any emotionally constipated man would do,

I dragged my unprocessed baggage into fresh connections and called it “starting over.”

I said I “wasn’t ready,”

but what I really meant was “shit, real intimacy fucking terrifies me.”

I breadcrumbed women who brought full course love.

I watched good relationships die on the altar of my silence.

And convinced myself I was the victim,

while lying through my teeth… mostly to myself.

But fortunately, I didn’t stay that guy.

The charming, avoidant fucked up mess in a nice linen shirt.

Eventually, I woke the fuck up.

Right after life drop-kicked me in the soul, just the way I apparently needed

Not through self-help memes or half-assed apologies,

but through sitting in my own fucked up mess, taking ownership, and finally letting myself be seen.

Now?

I’m seven years into a deeply conscious realtionship

I’m not just in love.

I’m present in it.

Fully. For the first fucking time.

I’m in a conscious relationship with an awakened woman, one who mirrors me when I want to hide, one who won’t tolerate my silence dressed as peace, one who holds me to the fire without burning me.

And through her, I learned how to love for real.

No more performing.

No more disappearing.

No more calling emotional absence “just how I am.”

This time – I’m all in.

Not just for her.

But for me.

For the man I used to avoid becoming.

For every woman I made doubt herself while I hid behind “I’m not ready.”

For every time I called love “too much” when really, I was too small to hold it.

No more disappearing.

No more emotional outsourcing.

No more calling fear “freedom.”

Because real love doesn’t need perfection.

It needs presence.

It needs guts.

It needs men who stop fucking running

who I am now

Here.

Awake.

Accountable.

All in .

I finally woke the fuck up

Noah David (Zen Prem)

If you want to know more about how I woke the fuck up , grab a copy of our book

https://mybook.to/BeyondBullshitToBliss

Beyond Bullshit to Bliss co authored with the woman who taught me what presence actually looks like – Samantha Spiro