Lessons Learned or Emotional Baggage?

[Opportunity]

I recently found an article about moving on from a failed relationship and improving yourself to meet new people.

 

The article stated that the unfortunate experiences in our lives that have hurt us, the experiences some of us might say taught us valuable lessons, are in fact not lessons at all, but emotional baggage we carry with us into our next relationship. Letting go of what happened and the pain involved with it completely was the recommended course of action.

 

What do you guys feel about this? Does the pain brought on us by those that have wronged us leave scars that even hinders the relationship we have with those thereafter? Or are there truly valuable lessons to be learned by loving and losing love?

[Nidania]

I don't see why you cannot take an unfortunate experience, learn from it, and then let it go. How is that emotional baggage?

 

There are lessons to be learned from each relationship. But the pain does have to be let go at some point, if only for your own health and sanity.

[newwave]

Unfortunately some people never recover from emotional baggage and that's the saddest thing of all. People often give up great people because they are so scarred from previous relationships.

[WockaWocka]

I think accumulated experience helps you become more mature and capable of being in a strong, healthy relationship. My parents were each other's first dates, first loves, etc and have somehow managed to stay together 40 years. But they were both escaping terrible home situations and managed to grow up together. It's rare for this to happen today. Most everyone we meet has been around the block several times.

 

My guess is that the author is saying unexamined past 'trauma' from relationships is emotional baggage and you have to analyze it and learn from it. We learn to put our guards up but nothing is worse than trying to date someone who is still angry at their ex, or worse has extrapolated their experiences to be angry toward an entire gender.

 

I think 'emotional injuries' suffered in relationships aren't that much different from, say, a physical injury like a sprained ankle. Are you going to let it immobilize you and sit at home and wait for it to heal? Or are you instead going to get some crutches to get around, treat it with ice, and do some exercises to restore strength to the muscle? The active approach lets you get on with your life and maybe even come out stronger in the end, while the passive approach creates a lot of scar tissue that inhibits your mobility. The choice is yours.