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Do any of us get through life without a few emotionally “scarring” experiences?

We all tend to carry around the “emotional baggage” of our unprocessed trauma and past hurts.

According to this article in Verywell Mind:

“‘The term ’emotional baggage’ refers to unfinished emotional issues, stressors, pain, and difficulties we’ve experienced that continue to take up space in our minds and affect our present relationships,’ says Sabrina Romanoff, PsyD, a clinical psychologist, and professor at Yeshiva University.”

Sometimes, the residual negative feelings that ride our backs weigh us down and prevent us from living life in a way that creates joy and personal fulfillment. Present events and situations can act as triggers, which in turn create drama, more issues, and even failure in many cases. Basically, emotional baggage is just a lot of sh*t we don’t need, right?

How do we unpack our emotional baggage and leave it behind for good?

There are two practices:

1. Conscious rituals
2. Physical rituals

Conscious and mentally stabilizing rituals are ways to combat stagnancy when we know our emotional baggage is creating dysfunction or getting in the way of personal happiness.

1. We can accept that it was, not that it is. Practice the mantra “that was then, this is now.” If it’s a specific example (verbal abuse during childhood that prevents us from trusting our own talent comes to mind), it’s important to remember we are no longer children. The feelings of inadequacy do not pertain to who we are as adults. When we learn to recognize that feeling as a trigger, we can defy it. As functioning adults, we are good enough just the way we are.

2. We can stop talking about it with folks who aren’t professionals. No more complaining about a history we can’t change. We can seek help via therapy, but let’s not have our friends join the panel. They mean well but can’t offer much except platitudes. Talking about our trauma(s) all the time makes them crutches. “I can’t do that because of what happened to me.” Negative events in our past should not be used as excuses.

3. We can remove the proverbial stop signs and replace them with yellow blinking lights. It’s okay to “proceed with caution” in situations that bring up memories of our past (bad relationships come to mind), but halting completely keeps us stuck and doesn’t give us what we want. It’s important to remain optimistic even when our experience has taught us otherwise.

Physical rituals are tangible practices that help us leave our emotional baggage behind.

1. We can write them down on a piece of paper and throw that paper in the fire. Seriously. Put it down on a sheet of paper—everything we think may be hindering our progress: for example, “I will never feel good enough because I was told I wasn’t by my own mother when I was a child.” “My ex-boyfriend treated me like an option because I let him, and now it’s keeping me from having a healthy relationship with a person who truly reciprocates my feelings.” “The office environment at my last job was toxic and I stayed in that job way too long.” When we own the hurt or are accountable for whatever part we played in it, we can throw it away.

2. We can donate or toss the big and small material things that act as reminders. Got swag from your last job? Throw it out. Still have cards and keepsakes from traumatic past relationships? Goodbye. Memories can be wonderful, but physical items wedged inside our emotional baggage are reminders we don’t need. They are like stains. We need to remove the stains if we want a fresh slate.

3. We can move away from the pain puddle. Whether it’s family we can’t change, or a location that brings up far too much pain, it’s important to step away for a long time, or simply leave it in the rear view. We can’t think of it as “running away” or avoidance. We must think of it, instead, as putting some distance between ourselves and the people, places, and things that keep the bad memories alive. Moving on is “good change” and it helps us develop our independent strength and resilience.

Emotional baggage gets in the way. It’s good to learn from past mistakes and experiences and we can’t escape them completely. It’s important to acknowledge the role we played (if any) in the negative events that transpire as we journey forward through life. But, it’s more than okay to leave a lot of it behind. Unpacking our emotional baggage and leaving it in the rear view frees us to live healthier, happier lives.

Each new experience deserves our unburdened attention. An empty bag is light. It helps us open doors to the possibilities and progress we may otherwise block because of our fear of history repeating itself.

Here’s a good resource for more information about how emotional baggage can affect our lives in negative ways: Release Emotional Baggage and the Tension that Goes With It.

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