I believe a person can have many great loves in a lifetime, but not all at once. Love isn’t something that gets erased when it ends, it leaves a mark, a lesson, a piece of who you become.

Each great love teaches something different. Some teach resilience, some patience, some show you what you deserve and what you’ll never accept again. Even if they’re gone, the love was real, and it shaped me.

I’ve learned that carrying small flames for past loves doesn’t mean I’m unfaithful. It means I’m layered. The real devotion belongs to the one I choose in the present. One person gets my fire, even if the others remain gentle embers in memory.

Because love isn’t just about feeling. It’s about choosing. It’s looking at all the possibilities and saying, “I choose you. I stay here.” That choice is what makes love true.

And if one day love ends, it doesn’t mean I’m doomed. It means I’ll grieve, yes, but I’ll also trust that another great love is possible. My heart doesn’t run out. It grows with each one.

Maybe one day, my “Jinwoo” will appear. Not a shadow monarch, but a real man with quiet strength, selfless, steady, and driven. Someone I can count on to do what’s right. And if life gives me more than one love along the way, each will be unique, each will be real.

When I was younger, I used to think negatively of people who divorced and moved on, or of those who kept dating later in life. I thought, why start again? When my client at 73, the same age as my mom, told me he was dating someone, I admit, my insides cringed. But now I understand. Age doesn’t cancel love. Divorce doesn’t mean failure. Moving on doesn’t erase the past.

I see it differently now: every stage of life can hold another chance for love. Just because one story ends doesn’t mean another can’t begin. People of any age, with any history, still deserve companionship, affection, and joy.

I won’t be a cheater just for carrying love in my history or heart. I’ll be a woman who lived fully, who loved deeply. One great love at a time.