Hand luggage only!

If your New Year's resolution is to find new love, or even to improve your existing relationship, then you might want to think about the emotional baggage you carry with you, writes Lizzie Enfield

- Lizzie Enfield

As anyone who has recently tried online dating will know, there are a lot of people out there looking for partners with 'no baggage'. But this is a near-impossible ask, since we all carry some. Emotional baggage is made up of our past experiences and the associations we make between them, and the way they make us feel. Some of it is heavy and cumbersome, but some of it will be light and life-affirming.

'I prefer to call it luxury goods,' says Susanna, a 49-year-old journalist who began dating a few years after her husband died of cancer. 'We had a wonderful, long, loving, caring and joyous relationship. I am still both bolstered by the fact we had it, and saddened by the fact that I lost him. I don't consider that to be baggage. It's just part of who I am.

Our baggage is made up of emotions associated with past and current relationships, experiences, and circumstances. At its best, it can fortify our self-esteem and sense of worth. If we have had a series of loving relationships in which we felt cared for, nurtured and appreciated, we might carry the associations around with us most of the time, feel good about ourselves, and be able to forge good relationships with others. But when it creates fears, anxieties and self-limiting beliefs, it can start to hold us back and lead to self-sabotaging and unhealthy patterns of behaviour.

Whatever form it takes, it's a natural part of life. You can think of it like souvenirs we have gathered on our travels. Maybe the vase you picked up in Greece still brings joy when you see it filled with flowers. But do you really need the bulky stone elephant you brought back from Thailand? Or does it trip you up every time you set foot inside your home?