Check Your Baggage

Did ya miss me? 

School has taken over my life – sorry all, I promise I’m not deliberately neglecting you! 

Either way, I’ve been thinking through this for a while and I’d like to discuss baggage. Usually when you hear the term you think of that melodramatic girl you’re going to have to basically convince that you’re not going to beat her death if she goes to the movies with you. But in my definition of baggage, it comes in all shapes and sizes and can even come in the form of ‘lessons learned’.

First of all, men come with baggage too. So let’s just throw out that stereotype. In fact, in recent discussions in my personal group of friends – it seems the men have more baggage than the women. For one reason or another, usually pride, men don’t take the time to actually get over relationships. They hop, skip & jump right into “Onto the Next One” mode. Which is fantastic, except that ‘next one’ is probably just a rebound and you haven’t actually addressed the reason why your relationship ended. Yes, it usually takes one person to push another over the edge to end a long-term relationship – but all that build up… to the point where you’re both standing on opposite cliffs about to nose dive away from each other – that takes two people. It always takes two people to mess things up to the point where there’s no going back (unless one partner cheated on the other – but I can make the argument that the cheating was the ‘cliff’ or the way out for the cheater). In order to avoid punishing your new partner for a former partner’s mistake(s), it would be wise to truly assess what happened. You didn’t form a relationship with someone by hating them – so if you hate them in the end.. something happened. Figure it out, so that it doesn’t happen again.

Second, if you do the assessment, make it a deep and personal one. Simply taking fights and turning them into lessons won’t actually teach you to solve the problems at hand. For instance, if your former partner fought with you for not spending enough time with them, so now you see your new partner all the time to the point where it’ll make any normal person hurl – that’s not an assessment. Nor is it a solution. Perhaps you didn’t spend quality time with your former significant other, or perhaps he/she was insecure or didn’t trust you, or a million other things. The point is simply doing the opposite of the things you did in your failed relationship is not the way to grow and develop a new one.

Third and this probably the best advice I can ever give – shut up. In your new relationship, forget the old, bury it, send your baggage to the other side of the earth. If you’ve decided to commit to someone new, don’t bring up the old and don’t expect your new partner to give a damn about what happened with your ex. Why? Because the new partner is NOT your ex. Your new partner probably thinks the sun shines out of your ass (especially if you’re still in the honeymoon stage) and will think whoever messed things up with you deserves to be institutionalized. Don’t talk about it. Don’t fight about it. Don’t compare. And for goodness sakes – don’t punish your new partner for your old partner’s mistakes. Just because you were cheated on before, doesn’t mean it’ll happen again. If you’ve assessed your prior relationship and have committed to a new one, we’re going to assume that you’re over your ex. If you’re not, don’t waste anyone’s time by being a new relationship.

Let’s break the cycle people. Just because your ex was a douche doesn’t mean you have to be a bitch to the next guy. Check your baggage before you hurt someone who doesn’t deserve it.