How many of you feel you have a lot of baggage in your life?
How many of you believe it’s ALL emotional baggage?
If you could draw a pie chart, how much would you say is contributed to emotional verses family or relationship baggage?
Let’s take a step back and define Emotional Baggage first!
The word EMOTIONAL is defined as – a mental state that arises spontaneously rather than through conscious effort accompanied by physiological changes (Paraphrase from Merriam-Webster Dictionary, 2013).
The word BAGGAGE is defined and referred to as trunks, bags, parcels, suitcases filled with one’s belonging while traveling; aka luggage (Paraphrase from Merriam-Webster Dictionary, 2013).
After a few minutes of research, I was not able to find a suitable definition for Emotional Baggage besides from Wikipedia! So let’s try to use both definitions to make a point here!
If we put the two together we can define EMOTIONAL BAGGAGE as – an everyday expression that we may display through general concern for unresolved issues of an emotional nature; that can mean also carrying all the disappointments, wrongs, and trauma of the past around as one heavy load (Paraphrase from Wikipedia Dictionary, 2013).
We can summarize EMOTIONAL BAGGAGE as – emotional turmoil caused by some issues in someone’s past; it can be painful memories of anything such as rejection, sexual or physical trauma, hurt, mis-trust, etc….
Here Is A Food For Thought – Do you know why we have a pound limit for our luggage when we fly?
Besides the technical airplane mumbo jumbo reasons, it is simply because we have to learn to fly with a lighter load; we have to learn how to let go of some things before we can move on to our next destination or next phase in life.
Ultimately you want to be free from of all the EMOTIONAL BAGGAGE in life right? That can include financial debt, pain, abuse, trauma, relationship issues, etc… Whether you realize it or not, all of these things are attached to your emotional baggage in life.
Here Is Another Food For Thought – How do you feel when you are at the check-in counter and the person at the ticket counter asks you to remove items from your luggage because it is over weight?
Basically they are asking you to travel lightly, right? But what does that mean? For me – at that moment I feel like I don’t understand ENGLISH because I was sure before I arrived at the airport that I did not want to leave anything else behind right LOL). Have you ever felt like that too?
The point is that you feel territorial and unsure if you want to let go of anything else in your luggage! That is how we have to look at the EMOTIONAL BAGGAGE we don’t want to let go of too!
Ok so now you have finally gotten on the plane and flown to your destination! You are at baggage claim waiting for your luggage to arrive right? What are your thoughts at that moment?
No one expects to loose their luggage but the moment yours does not show up, you freak out right? I know I do lol!
This shows us how much we are emotionally attached to our baggage! Even more we are attached to materialistic things, things that should not make or break us! Those of us, who like to carry a purse, carry so much emotional baggage right up under our arms every second of the day! Do you realize that?
So let me ask again! How much of this do you carry with you on a day to day basis and how much can you say is unwanted baggage?
“Everyone comes with baggage. Find someone who loves you enough to help you unpack” a quote from My Pink Visions, 2013.
The question is ARE YOU READY TO UNPACK IT, TO STOP LEAVING IT WHERE OTHERS CAN SEE IT AND CONTINUE TO TRIP OVER IT? (Let’s get more into this discussion in next month’s post!)
Signing off,
Dr. D