The other day, I was talking to a very dear friend of mine and she had accused me of being mean because I didn't feel guilty about carrying emotional baggage. She had accused me of being callous and selfish and even accused me of not having empathy. But what I want to ask you today is do you have any idea of what emotional baggage you carry around with you?
Did you realize that when you get up every morning, you go through all of your emotions out in the open? Did you realize that you are not exempt from all of the emotions that are swirling around inside of you? If so, then you are guilty of carrying emotional baggage. And if you haven't realized that, then maybe you should think about what it means to be human.
In the book of Acts, Jesus says that apart from Him there is no man that trusts or serves God. However, in the book of Galatians, Paul states that we have fellowship with the sinner that has received the grace of Christ. It seems like we can either choose to walk in the footsteps of our Brothers, or we can walk on our own path as far away from our brothers as possible.
If we are to love one another, then we must be willing to let go of our feelings. But many people don't have the ability to let go of their emotions even when they know that it's wrong. In fact, there are some individuals who carry around more emotional baggage than their next door neighbor. And if we are to heal ourselves, then we must learn to release all of our emotions, not just to our Brothers but to our fellow human beings as well.
One of the most powerful pieces of advice in this Christian book is to do the work. There are several sections that provide a variety of psychological quizzes to determine the degree of emotional involvement we may have in all the things happening around us. After you complete the tests, you will find that you might have different thoughts, beliefs, and emotions all tied to the same situation. In other words, your situation might cause you to believe that it's all right to carry emotional baggage, but it could also cause you to believe that it's wrong. Doing the exercises will help you to understand yourself a little bit better.
The last section of the book examines how your reaction to your situation will affect the relationship between you and your brothers or sisters. You'll see how your actions and emotions will either strengthen or weaken that bond. I like that this book addresses brotherly love as well as the love between a sister and her brother. Although I felt some of the analysis in this section was a little shallow, I do acknowledge that it was necessary because it goes to the heart of what makes a relationship strong or weak. This book teaches readers how to get past the betrayal of siblings and move on from there.