Emotional Baggage: I know It’s There But I Can’t See It

My emotional baggage was there, I knew it. But I couldn’t see it. That is how I started with my emotional baggage. I had read of emotional baggage so many years ago. Over the years I started to sense my emotional baggage. I wasn’t happy. I wasn’t unhappy all the time. But the unhappiness was uncontrolled, unbalanced, and more than I wanted. I could SENSE the emotional baggage. But somehow I couldn’t find it.

What to Do?

I found an interesting story a few months ago about drawing. It isn’t really a story. It’s like a description of how things are. I can’t remember where I found it. Anyway, it was very clear, and simply connected to my life in so many ways.

No Picture in Mind

The author said something like, an artist does not start with the picture in mind. The artist just starts to draw and slowly the picture comes out of the artist… out of nowhere it seems. And it evolves into a picture. This really hit me because it gave me the freedom to try without having a clear picture in mind. How can you have a clear picture of no emotional baggage, especially if you aren’t sure of what emotional baggage you have?

Emotional Baggage and Pictures

So why is the clear picture so important? Well, it all comes down to goals. It’s hard to achieve a goal if you don’t know anything about the goal like what it looks like, where it is, or how to get there.

Motivational Misleading

I read a lot of stuff about motivation and productivity. Most of it contained some version of goal setting. Stephen Covey who wrote “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” made it one of his necessary habits. He said, “begin with the end in mind”. It seems so simple, yet bewilderingly impossible for me so much of the time. I’m sure he had good intentions. However, it made me feel like I could not get started. You see, I did not have an end in mind. I had no clear goals or ideas. It’s hard to envision zero emotional baggage when you can’t remember what it’s like.

Optimism Helps

Of course, there were some times when I did have a goal in mind that I actually achieved (maybe there were lots of times like this) but those achievements were either simple and concrete (like climbing a mountain) or they fell into another group that I call abstract. What I mean is I did not have a concrete idea of what I wanted to accomplish. I only had a vague fuzzy idea. Sometimes I had no idea of how I could reach my goal but I continued anyway. I had a vague hopeful optimism that somehow I could do it.

Emotional Baggage is a Bit Different from Other Projects

Begin with the end in mind is silly advice for someone trying to get rid of emotional baggage that they are not aware of in a direct sense. Some people could not recognize their emotional baggage if it hit them in the face. This describes me just a few years ago. And yet, I had distinct feelings, like walking down the street feeling that some intangible part of me was awful and I just wanted to tear it out of myself. But I could not touch it, see it or find it.

What to Do (part II)

The best thing you can do in this situation is simply start. Start looking at yourself. Start reviewing your life. As much as possible make it a continuing habit to keep reviewing your life regardless of any feelings of success or lack of success. This is a clear case of “Just do it” without expecting anything.

Slowly Evolve

As you do it, slowly over the months and years, you will grow better at doing it. Then as if out of the mist, shapes will start to form. Then the shapes will become clearer. Before you know it, you can see the emotional baggage you had wanted to get rid of in the first place. Then it is simply a matter of time and effort. And as you continue, you will start to see more shapes evolve out of the mist. And then you can get your proverbial ducks lined up and shoot them one by one.