Chapter 4: Good Luggage from Bad Baggage

So, what kind of traveler are you? Are you sporting an under-the-seat bag, or does the entire Samsonite line accompany you on every outing? Familiar with freight charges? Do you brag about traveling light when, in reality, you are secretly hoping that the over-packed carry-on you’re wheeling won’t burst and explode its contents throughout the overhead compartment?

It’s pretty much a given that you will be transporting some kind of baggage with you on your relationship road trip. Unfortunately, as we leave one relationship location for the new destination, too many of us decide to keep all the souvenirs—no matter how silly or chipped they are—we’ve gathered during our stay. And because the bag we originally brought with us is now too full, we merely pick up another one, pack up, and go on with our slightly heavier load.

Sigh. Wouldn’t it be nice to carry just the most-needed essentials and trust that you can just pick up anything you needed upon arrival?

It can happen. But first, you need to distinguish the difference between Good Luggage and Bad Baggage—what you should be packing and the stuff you should pack off to some garbage dump.

Bad Baggage has less to do with the actual bags and a whole lot to do with what you’re carrying around. Trust me—serious garbage lugged around in Louis Vuitton is still serious garbage. (Or, I guess in the case of Vuitton, I should refer to it as gar-bahj.)

Bad Baggage is, essentially, lousy love lessons: things you learned that color your perspective about the next guy you meet before you’re even an hour into the date. It’s damaging habits and toxic information from love gone wrong that you’ve somehow convinced yourself are truths to live by. It’s poisonous souvenirs of relationships past that you didn’t leave behind because you figured that you paid for ’em (some dearly) and it just seemed…wasteful…to not bring them along and hope they actually turned into something useful.

RelationTip: If you don’t dump your Bad Baggage before you go for that next date, you will inevitably dump it on him.

Hate to tell you this, but just because something came with a cost, it doesn’t necessarily make it valuable.

With that in mind, I want you to stop what you’re doing right now (okay, not right now—but certainly at the end of this chapter), grab paper and pen, and write down every relationship that you feel violated your faith in love or undermined your confidence. I want you to explore:

Childhood memories. You may not have been dating, but you were certainly learning about relating. The pain and confusion of witnessing ugly interactions between parents (either between mom and dad, or a divorced parent plus significant other) can often stick to the bottom of our bags.

Teen trauma. Hormonal surges make even the shiest of teens feel the urge to put their toes into the dating pool. Unfortunately, this is the age when kids can be most cruel, and when even the smallest of slights can be seen as incredibly humiliating. If the guy you liked made fun of you or laid blows to your ego, you could still be carrying those wounds. You thought that was so yesterday…but oops! It surfaced again.

Dating drama. Your rat radar was wrong. Your gaydar wasn’t much better. This one lied, that one broke your heart. Cheaters, and crazies, and commitment-phobes, oh my! In order not to make the same mistakes over again, you mistakenly store those bad experiences—and you end up with no gems in all that rough stuff.

Feel like you’re writing a novel? Good—keep going. Lay it all out there, right in front of you so you can see those dating disasters come to life. I’m betting there’s stuff there you haven’t actively thought about in ages—like that fifth grade crush who crushed your heart. And I’m betting that some of it still hurts a little. Or a lot.

RelationTip: Write down what worries you—you can only edit and erase what you can clearly see.

The first thing you should do: Read through those pages and sing a verse of Destiny’s Child’s “I’m a Survivor.” No kidding. Look at what your heart has been through, and yet you still picked up this book. Despite any past damage, you still believe that you can be—and find—a Dateworthy person.

Allow yourself a little gloat time. Go ahead. You deserve it. Then…back to work.

The next thing you should do is think about how each of these ugly moments hurt you and write that down next to the incident. For example: You wrote about when you caught Billy cheating with your best friend. This is a “hurt my ability to trust” issue.

Then, go over in your mind how you’ve allowed each hurt to continue to wound you with respect to relationships, and write that down as well. Back to our example: You wrote that Billy’s cheating hurt your ability to trust. As you think about that, you might realize that your reaction to that inability to trust was to accuse the next guy of cheating or lying, even though there’s nothing remotely similar between him and Billy.

Now: Reread those pages. Out loud. And after every item you utter, I want you to say, “So what?”

I know. You’re thinking: “So what? Whaddya mean, ‘So what?’ It hurt me. It was painful. I put on like twenty chocolate pounds!”

Sorry about that (especially about those out-of-love-handles), but will hanging on to it change what happened? No. As a matter of fact, hanging on to all that Bad Baggage only allows those jerks to live on in your jurisdiction. Why in the world do you want to give them so much power over you?

By asking yourself, “So what?” about each of your issues, you’ve just taken the wind out of their heavy sails…at least, temporarily. Now that you’ve been able to loosen that tight grip on your Bad Baggage, set it down…and stay open to picking up some Good Luggage.

dating diary

When I met Craig, I was just coming off a relationship with someone who had lied to me on a daily basis. I insisted on absolute honesty, and Craig told me everything. I never reacted badly to anything he revealed (even if it was a story about a girl flirting with him) to encourage the truth telling.

One night he came over right after the gym and as he showered, I found myself…going through his gym bag. I felt guilty. I felt so bad about my Bad Baggage behavior that he had to endure. But then I came across these pictures of a recent night out with the guys that he claimed had been so boring…and there were strippers in every shot. I wigged out, went into the bathroom, and flung the pictures at him. “You liar! Why didn’t you mention this to me? You know I insist that even if I don’t like what I’m hearing, I always want the truth!” Angry that I went through his gym bag, he finished up and left. Later, he called and said, “I’m sorry. I’m just so used to not mentioning stuff like that because my last girlfriend would actually get physical over stuff like that.” Hmmm…Sounds like I wasn’t the only one carrying Bad Baggage.

Once again, we’re not talking designer labels or name brands here. We’re talking about the quality of what you choose to take with you from one relationship to the next.

Because it actually is a good thing to take some love lessons with you…just not Bad Baggage lousy ones. The Good Luggage love lesson is about finding the positive from past negative experiences. It’s about taking what you’ve learned from feeling set up or hurt and using it in a practical—not prejudicial—way.

Okay. There’s a good reason why I had you go over and over your Bad Baggage list. And why I’ll wait til the end of this chapter to give you a final shred and burn assignment. It’s because I wanted you still to have the evidence of your relating history in front of you so that we can attempt to rewrite—and rewire—what you should be extracting from those experiences.

You already know what kind of negative emotions you picked up from being burned and broken up with. Let’s take our earlier example of Billy to illustrate how to turn the Bad Baggage into a powerfully Good Luggage moment.

Okay, so Billy cheated on you with your best friend. This was a “hurt your ability to trust” issue. The Bad Baggage you carried with that: You were quick to accuse—or at the very least, suspect—the next guy you dated of having the capability of lying and cheating as well. Then you reread, out loud, “I caught Billy cheating on me with my best friend,” and followed it up with, “So what?” And with that, you let go of the handle of your Bad Baggage.

But I know how tempting it is to pick that handle back up…unless you have something better to put in its place. And that’s just what we’re going to do.

dating diary

For the longest time, I was a dating and discarding demon. After a few dates, I could totally tell which guys were whipped and which ones deserved to be, and I was pretty blasé about that. When I met Frank, I felt like I had met my male equivalent—he was outgoing, full of fun and laughter, and I totally knew that he was total relationship material. We had so much in common (including: we both thought I was fantastic), and I knew that this guy would rather cut off his right arm than ever do anything to hurt me. And then I caught that same right arm around someone else a few months later. I didn’t see it coming, and I was devastated—and, for the longest time, so quick to kick every date to the curb if I found myself liking him too much. I didn’t trust them because I no longer trusted my ability to pick the good guys. It took some time to realize that every date was a threesome—me, the guy, and Frank.

Trusting others, trusting yourself…these are just two of the top six sick-to-your-stomach, past-experience fears my readers most often feel. Their question: How do I not allow my Bad Baggage emotions to emerge when I’m feeling one of those fears? My answer: Practice substituting a Good Luggage lesson for them. Let’s take a look at how you can put a positive spin on a negative situation.

dating diary

Darren was funny, smart, and owned some kind of word-processing hardware company. After several disastrous relationships, I had developed a hard-nose reporter style of question and answer, and proceeded to go into it to make sure this guy was dating material. He answered every query with the kind of answers I really wanted to hear. And then, I said, “Too funny. It’s almost like someone coached you on everything I need out of a man.” He laughed and then told me that he had to call his partner. When he came back to the table, he said, “It’s been great, but I really have to get back to the office. I’ll call you…” Kiss. Hug. Parting of ways. And then…nothing. Yet another guy that I really wanted a second date from but who disappeared into some strange Manhattan Bermuda Triangle, never to be heard from again.

I ran into him at a club about a month later, and I confronted him. “You really want to know?” “Yes, I have to know!” I said. “Well,” he replied, not looking at me, “I felt like you were interviewing me for some kind of job. Talking to you just wasn’t any fun. It’s like you were this robot with a list and no personality.”

Ouch. Okay, “It’s not you, it’s me,” would’ve stung less. But in the long run, the truth was kinder and another step toward Dateworthiness.

Lesson learned: Casual, flirty questions? Fun and flattering. Interrogation tactics? Downright scary.

Now that you know how to replace Bad Baggage with Good Luggage, let’s talk about paring down to the essential items. Good Luggage is all about getting down to a few, well-made, well-thought-out, easy-to-carry pieces that travel well. It’s about getting the type of information that’s important to keeping you from being hurt without making you sound like a dating drill sergeant. It’s a subtle fact-finding mission to avoid a disastrous rerun situation.

RelationTip: Reduce your queries to just the essentials—if there’s too much checking out, he will check out.

Packing for your Dateworthy destination is a lot like packing for any vacation: You want to take your time thinking about the items that you can count on to make you look good and that work well when they are put together. Once you make sure that they are in good condition (you never want to let them see sweat stains!), pack them the night before…and last minute, throw in that one flirty, colorful, fun new accessory that goes with the essentials, but which gives your look a little originality.

Got that? You’re packing pieces that make you feel confident and pulled together without too much effort so that you can concentrate on the date at hand. You want to make sure that while you’re practicing Good Luggage techniques, the wonderful, original fun person that is you comes shining through. Let’s break it down to the essential stuff.

Have a few “stock” stories on hand that highlight your Non-Negotiables (fun, interesting stories about guys who cheated or smoked or were uninterested in basic hygiene). Even if they’re your personal experience, say it happened to a friend to keep the mood light. It’s an easy way to let him know what you find worthy in a person, and in turn, gives him the idea that you understand your own Dateworthiness as well.

If he says something that immediately sounds a little odd or downright disconcerting to you, don’t file it in the overhead compartment for a best-friend analysis later. Ask, “What do you mean by that?” in a casual, friendly way for further info. After all, it’s possible you just had Bad Baggage reflux and heard the story differently than it was meant.

Be aware that lots of questions lobbed at you—and almost no information from him—could mean he’s carrying some seriously banged-up Bad Baggage of his own and he’s less interested than insecure. Always try to end every third answer with, “And what about you? I bet you’ve got some interesting stories about that!”

Carry on, but don’t allow yourself to get carried away. Never—I repeat, ever—do any kind of alcohol on a first date, especially if it’s your first time out with your Good Luggage. You cannot believe the way alcohol stains the brain and all Good Luggage lessons go down the drain!

Just when you though you were Bad Baggageless…you come across some awful accessories in a hidden compartment. Check them out before checking in, and chuck any of the following:

Shun comparisons. If he looks like your ex, sounds like your ex, walks like your ex—that’s probably due to a physical typecasting thing you did. If, however, his personality is just like that awful ex, duck!

Leave Miss Trust—or Mz.Trust—in either extreme, at the door. Ms. Benefit of the Doubt is the best of both worlds.

Fend off fear of failure. This is not a contest—it’s a date. And even if one of you gets voted off “Has Potential Island”—so what? There’s another reality dating show right around the corner.

Skip the sexual healing. Heading straight for the sack is unsack-tisfactory and the best way to do some serious damage to the Good Luggage and self-worthfullness you’ve worked so hard to claim. As you read on, you’ll understand why just because you can have sex whenever you want to doesn’t mean you should. As a matter of fact—to just say no when everyone else is saying yes makes you the ultimate challenge.

Correct selective hearing. If he says, “I change girls the way I do socks,” don’t assume that he’s laundry-challenged and wearing the same ones for weeks on end. I can’t begin to tell you how many letters I’ve received from ladies who write, “He said he doesn’t know if he’ll ever commit again, but it could be because he was hurt really bad by some awful woman and he just needs some time…” Hear what he says. Really listen. Mull it over later. Keep it in your no-spin zone. And then, if you decide that you are both on different pages, move on.

Good Luggage from Bad Baggage—finding a positive lesson to live by instead of dwelling on the negative aspect of crappy experiences—may take a little practice. Don’t put it off—deal with the Bad Baggage now before the load gets any heavier!

CHAPTER 4