We All Have Baggage

We all have baggage. Stories we didn’t choose. Wounds we didn’t cause. Survival patterns we learned just to make it through.

Some of it comes from childhood. Some of it from heartbreak. Some of it from grief, loss, trauma, abandonment, betrayal, or simply living in a world that doesn’t always feel safe.

We carry what we had to carry. We became what we had to become. Not because we wanted to but because we needed to survive.

And for so long, we’re taught that healing means being lighter. Easier. Less complicated. Less emotional. Less sensitive. Less “too much.”

But healing was never about becoming smaller. It was never about erasing your past. It was never about pretending your pain didn’t shape you.

The Right Kind of Love

The right person doesn’t fear the weight of your story. They don’t rush your healing. They don’t minimise your experiences. They don’t ask you to be lighter, quieter, easier to hold.

They don’t make you feel like your pain is an inconvenience. They don’t treat your trauma like a problem to solve. They don’t pressure you to “be over it already.”

They simply sit beside you.

In the mess. In the pauses. In the silence. In the tears you don’t have words for yet. In the moments where you don’t even know what you’re unpacking only that it hurts.

Safety Before Solutions

They listen without trying to fix you. They hold space without making it about them. They offer safety before solutions. Presence before pressure. Understanding before expectation.

They don’t interrogate your healing. They don’t compete with your pain. They don’t centre themselves in your story.

They just stay.

And sometimes, that’s the deepest form of love there is. Not grand gestures. Not big speeches. Not dramatic promises.

Just consistency. Just patience. Just presence.

Love as Safety, Not Performance

Slowly, gently, you begin to learn something new:

Love doesn’t mean being perfect. Love doesn’t mean being healed. Love doesn’t mean being finished.

It means being safe enough to be honest. Safe enough to be messy. Safe enough to be real. Safe enough to be seen in your becoming.

It means being held in your growth, not judged in your healing. Supported in your process, not pressured in your progress.

Real Connection

Because real connection isn’t about having no baggage. It’s about finding someone who chooses to sit beside you while you unpack it.

Not to carry it for you. Not to control it. Not to define you by it.

But to remind you quietly, gently, consistently that you don’t have to do it alone.

And maybe that’s what healing really is. Not the absence of pain. Not the erasure of the past.

But the presence of safety. The presence of love. The presence of someone who stays.

Some people help you escape your past.
The right people help you feel safe while you heal from it.