8 simple ways to clear your mind

Sometimes it’s important things that we're afraid we won’t remember so we try to hold onto them…Many times it’s trashy thoughts that don’t bring us anything, but steal our joy, creativity and productivity. At that point, if there’s a little bit of sense left in our head, we try to step back and clear our mind from all this garbage. These are 8 healthy habits to help you clear your mind that when done regularly help reduce stress, anxiety and overwhelm naturally.

Constipation of the mind

We heard everything in life should be constantly evolving, changing, recycling, upcycling… and the mind, the thoughts we’re thinking should be no exception.

Whenever we feel down, uninspired and really blaaah, we know our mind has been filled with thoughts and information that it doesn’t actually use and that information starts to feel scary and overwhelming.

That information, those thoughts, need to go somewhere, so we can have some free space in our mind and get back to being happy, healthy and productive.

There are a few things We like to do on a regular basis to clear our mind to at least, seem like a normal human being and not like a confused mess.

8 Simple Ways To Clear Your Mind

1. Brain dump

A brain dump is when you take a piece of paper and write down everything that goes through your mind at that moment.

If your mind is racing, it will be hard to keep up. But when you do it, you’ll feel relieved and renewed. Like a baby who only has one thing in mind: FOOD.

This is a important practice we do almost every day and it truly helps us move on and remain focused.

In that brain dump you can write anything: to do’s, recurring thoughts, plans, nice to have’s, anything that is going through your mind. We like to do this in the morning, after a nap, but sometimes we do it in the evening depending on how we feel.

2. Exercise

You can do any type of exercise, really, but whenever we're feeling overwhelmed and like we can’t do anything, we usually go for Pilates. It’s the only thing we feel like we can do at that moment other than looking at our phone. 10 minutes in and we're ready to do something good.

Moving your body in a mindful way and focusing on your breath can be relaxing and helpful in clearing your mind.

3. Take a Nap

We remember when we were working a desk job 4 years ago, every day around 2-3 pm we'd hide behind our screen and take a tiny nap. We would look down, holding our head between our hands as if we're thinking so hard, trying to solve a math equation that could win us a Nobel Prize.

In reality, we were taking a nano-nap. Smaller than a micro-nap. It lasted like 1-2 minutes, maybe even seconds. But it was so refreshing. We like to believe that our boss didn’t see us, at least he didn’t say anything.

Naps are needed sometimes. Sometimes you’re so exhausted that you start thinking of unnecessary things. Things that don’t serve you. In general, when you’re tired you can’t be your best self: you make worse food choices, you can’t think straight, you can’t exercise, you can’t focus…

Sleep is a time to reset and clear out what needs to go, so you can start fresh. Your mind isn’t an exception to this. So make sure to get enough sleep, even if that means taking a nano nap in front of your boss.

Related: How To Sleep Better, 7 Habits That Work

4. Let it flow

Sing, whistle, knit, paint, DIY – whatever it is that makes you feel like you can take action and produce something right now, even if it’s not solid.

Something creative you can put all your energy and focus into. Something that makes you happy and helps you focus on the present, so you forget all your worries, forget all your cares…Downtooooown. (that’s all the lyrics we know from this song).

We found a few options that work for us: we like to DIY stuff, sometimes we just decide to sing while doing the laundry and sometimes we like to scribble things on a piece of paper. They look like a toddler made them. But that time is precious, we let things flow and this helps us get away from all those thoughts. To see them for what they are and to dismiss them.

Related: 11 Simple Things To Do Every Day To Relieve Stress

5. Go out for a walk

Walks aren’t just there to make 10,000 steps a day, check that off your list and brag about it on social media. Walks can be a meditational and calming practice if you’re not chasing a number.

We used to do this every day: we would walk in the park, on the beach, wherever we were. And we would make an effort to notice the nature around us. This used to be simple for us, maybe a year ago – we'd see the fruits on the trees, the rabbits, ducks, the grass, even mice and snakes (really!).

Today, if we don’t make myself pay attention, we're racing through our walk while we're still absorbed in our thoughts. To the point that we don’t see anything around us.

It goes: thoughts, thoughts, a squirrel, nice, thoughts, thoughts, thoughts. Back home.

So since we've noticed this, we're making an effort to stay present and appreciate nature, because we find it healing to the mind and to the body.

We're not saying you shouldn’t track your steps or use walking as a tool to lose weight and to track your progress, we're saying walking can be so much more than that.

6. Clean your space.

You don’t need to go Marie Kondo with your house.

Just keep it as tidy as you need it to be. Get rid of the clothes and items you don’t need anymore, give the items you want in your house their own space and keep them there.

Having a clean and organized space has been such a big relief for us.

And we're not tidy. We're not clean, sometimes we wonder how we're actually a woman and not an ogre. But even We know, whenever we roll our sleeves and clean our apartment, suddenly our thoughts also start to calm down and make sense.

So, do it.

7. Talk to someone. Anyone.

This is something we never thought was helpful for us in the past. But we changed our mind the moment we actually started talking to people. And not just people, people we didn’t know. Like someone we met at an event, the taxi driver, complete strangers in the street.

You can exchange ideas and thoughts with people you’ve never met before.

You don’t need to be looking for advice, don’t have to be vulnerable and share your entire life, but if you need to solve a problem, sometimes talking to somebody, even if that’s a stranger can give you a new perspective.

Even if these people don’t give you feedback or advice, the simple act of voicing your thoughts or ideas can help you process them, make sense of them and clear your mind.

8. A Different Kind Of Detox

If you get into a pattern of thinking the same thoughts over and over again, it might just mean that you’re repeating the same actions, seeing the same things day after day after day.

Get away from it all for a day or two. Stop looking at your phone and social media or TV or whatever you’re consuming.

Often you need a change scenery to get out of your head, to see that there’s more to life than what we’re surrounding ourselves with. Obviously, there is, we just forget it from time to time.

Whether you’re hanging out on social media for too long, hanging out with the same people, doing the same things, change things up and do a detox from all of that.

We crave change. And when you do this detox, you’ll come back with a new, fresh perspective.