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Why There Isn’t Room For Baggage In Your Relationship–Part 2
When you’re carrying around excess baggage from past relationships, there’s bound to be trouble. One way or another you have to find a way to deal with that. Why? Because if you don’t, there won’t be a man out there you won’t scare away, and you’ll be blaming them instead of yourself and your baggage. It’s time to permanently stow it and get on with your life.
Where it comes from
First of all, you may think you don’t have any baggage. You’d better think again love. We all do if we’ve been dating any amount of time at all and, in your 40s, you’ve been at it awhile. Bad marriages, screwed up childhoods, broken hearts, cheating exs. All of that leaves a mark believe it or not. Few walk away unscathed.
I’m a perfect example. I grew up raised by a narcissist believing I wasn’t important; that my feelings and needs didn’t matter. This was validated over and over again and, by the time I began dating, had taken a firm hold. Bring on four marriages with men who picked up on that and validated it even more over time, and you’ve got a girl who allows men to make her an option rather than a priority. Fast forward to the first relationship after the last divorce, and you’ve got a full blown disaster. You’ve got a girl who allowed a man to cheat on her, ignore her, and lie to her for a year. Worse yet, I blamed him. Sure, he was an ass, but the cold, hard truth is that I allowed him to do it. There’s baggage. Trust me.
Identifying the problem
The first thing you have to do is figure out exactly what you’re dealing with. What’s in that big damn suitcase you’re carrying around with you? In my case, it was a feeling of being unimportant and of not being good enough for a relationship.
You have to know what’s broken before you can fix it. Look for patterns in your relationships. What kinds of men are you attracting? Do they share common characteristics or habits? Maybe most of them made you feel a certain way or were controlling or were cheaters. Whatever the case, you’re going have to look deep inside yourself to figure out what old beliefs you are carrying around that is causing you to attract that kind of man.
Using my example, since I felt unimportant, I often chose men who, at the least, had narcissistic tendencies and believed their needs were more important than mine. This manifested itself in many ways from not calling to standing me up to cheating to simply ignoring my feelings when I was sad or hurting. These were men who sacrificed my needs without a second thought if they felt their need was more important. Assclown #4 regularly harped on Kira for not keeping a clean room and every other little thing he could nitpick about. When I pointed out how much it hurt me for him to constantly criticize my daughter, he said he had to make his point. Period. He didn’t care that I was hurting. His own need to make his point took precedence.
Ridding yourself of the baggage
First, you have to understand that like attracts like. You, and no one else, are the one who attracted the assclowns. Whatever you believe, you manifest. If you believe you aren’t good enough, you are going to attract men who believe that as well.
There are any number of tools and strategies that can help you do this. Choose one belief and work from there. Start simple. Begin with positive affirmations. These are very easy to formulate and use on a daily basis. Take the belief andI restate it in a positive way. Then simply repeat it to yourself several times a day. For example, if the belief is that you aren’t good enough, restate it to say “I am deserving of a healthy, caring, nurturing relationship.” Simple. If you struggle with writing your affirmations, do a Google search. There are literally thousands of resources online.
Next, use visualization. People used to laugh at me, but whenever I couldn’t sleep at night due to work stress or relationship problems or whatever, I visualized putting the problem, or the person, in a box. I would watch myself putting it, or them, in the box. Then I would visualize taking the box to the curb and watching the garbage men carry it away. Others I have know have visualized writing the problem down and then tying it to a balloon and watching it float away. If you need something more concrete, try writing it down and then burning it. Visualization can be tricky at first, but with practice it gets easier to accomplish.
Finally, remember that if the beliefs are really deeply embedded in who you are, you may need help ridding yourself of them. Don’t be afraid to reach out to friends and family or find a good counselor to help. If you choose to enlist friends and family for support, be sure to ask people who make you feel good about yourself. At this point, the last thing you need is someone who reinforces the negative.
Don’t expect results overnight. After all, many of your negative beliefs may have taken years to manifest. Expecting to rid yourself of them immediately is unrealistic and will definitely hinder your progress.
Fake it til you make it
The biggest part of your success is attitude. It will make you or break you. A positive attitude will go a long way to getting rid of all of that old baggage.
Use that positive attitude to fake it til you make it. Project happiness, security, and confidence instead of fear and insecurity. You may be a hot mess when Mr. Potential is late calling or cancels a date, but don’t you dare show it!
You should be the picture of peace and harmony on the outside. He should have no idea that you’re falling apart inside. Do your best to respond it a way that exudes calmness. Do NOT let him see your freak out.
Handling a freak out
When it happens, and it will happen, you have to have some kind of support system to help you deal with your freak out. Begin by using your positive affirmations. Create new ones if the situation calls for it. Repeat them to yourself until you begin to feel yourself calming down. Focus on the good feelings you’ve had with Mr. Potential so far. Remember that text that left you grinning from ear to ear? Close your eyes and remember that grin, that feeling and hold onto it.
If you can’t calm yourself, reach out to someone who can help you. Call a girlfriend and ask her to talk you down. It’s best if your friend knows the situation and that you may need her to help you contain your freak out from time to time. Explain the situation and then listen. If you don’t really listen and absorb what your girl is telling you, you are wasting your time. Open your mind and let yourself absorb what she is saying. Chances are she really does see the situation more clearly. Let her distract you. Go for a beer or an ice cream. Find something to keep you occupied until the freak out subsides.
Whatever you do, DON’T call or contact him until you are in control of your senses. Remember that old saying never let ‘em see you sweat? It’s especially true in this case. By the time you see or talk to him, you need to be the epitome of the girl he enjoys being with.
Final thoughts
Old habits are indeed hard to break. A lifetime of really believing something to be true doesn’t disappear overnight. More importantly, no matter how hard you work to clear those beliefs and how successful you are, there will be times when they will rear their ugly heads. Don’t get discouraged and don’t assume the worst. Realize that you are human and that you may backslide here and there. It happens, but you can deal with it. Hopefully, by the time it happens, Mr. Potential knows you well enough to understand. If not, well much as it sucks, you have earned yourself another opportunity to grow and learn.
Thoughts?
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searchingwithin May 26th, 2009, 7:57 am
I have learned that the little nasty voice in the back of my head, gives you clues as to what a lot of those beliefs are. I am still working on figuring out if I am reacting to a real red flag, or whether I have been triggered by the baggage, and reacting in the present, to what only appears to be the same, with the help of my imagination.
searchingwithin´s last blog post..How Will We Love?
lisaq May 27th, 2009, 6:20 am
Oh yes, it does! We just have to listen to it so we can get rid of them. It’s hard to know the difference sometimes.