Updated on June 14th, 2020

When your life starts looking and feeling like an out-of-control Einsteinian equation, and you’re running ’round in circles trying to sort stuff out or make things better, you might find yourself longing to just drop everything. Create a clean slate. And start afresh. Easier said than done… Read my experience from a year of doing that and learn how to create a clean slate in your life. So that the New, the Next and the Fresh may come in!

If I reflect on the past year, I see that much of what I’ve been doing has been about

• struggling with unexpected challenges,
• working through endings and…
• creating a clean slate.

I love the idea of a clean slate

Wiping out all that’s happened and brought us to where we are today – like wiping from a blackboard a huge mathematical equation that’s become way too complex, confused and cumbersome, and that we haven’t been able to solve.

Wiping it all out, no ifs or buts. Just like that.

Letting things be whatever they were, drawing a line underneath. No more labelling, futile explanations or justifications, no more trying to work them out. No more worrying and no more puzzling.

With that, shedding the weight of the struggle we’ve had. Dropping the thoughts that were going ’round in circles trying to find an ever-elusive and perhaps non-existent solution. Forgetting about the logic we’ve built around things, and about what we’ve been telling ourselves. No more trying the same, unsuccessful ways – instead, letting go of what hasn’t worked. Stopping the (over-) thinking. Perhaps even calmly accepting defeat on a particular topic. And leaving our cynicism or bitterness about it in the chalk dust we’ve wiped away.

Once the slate is clean…

Imagine the relief and the spaciousness of it! The sense of being able to try again, in a new and different way. The chance to try something different, totally unencumbered by whatever happened so far.

A fresh start, a next opportunity, a new beginning.

Wonderful.

But our real life might be even more complex than the figurative Einsteinian equation I’ve mentioned above… It’s hard to imagine how we would just wipe it out entirely with a sponge, like scribbles on a blackboard!

So how do we create a clean slate in real life?

You can clear the entire slate in one go, of course.

As in: Ending your relationship, quitting your job, selling your home and all your possessions, and getting on a plane to some far-away urban, rural or even wild area, with the intention to start your whole life afresh.

My parents were emigrants from Italy to Switzerland – I imagine their journey felt like starting again on a pretty clean slate! So did my own journey, when I left Switzerland to live in London, many years ago.

But you might not want – or even need – to be quite as radical: You can go more slowly.

You can clean your slate bit by bit, or only partly.

As in: Clearing one area of your life, such as love, work, finances, home…

Or clearing a single issue you’ve been grappling with, such as your dealings with a difficult colleague, a cluttered house, a poor diet, a manic business…

You can even clean a bit of your slate that seems to have nothing to do with what you really want to resolve.

As in: Sorting out your chaotic photo database when, really, you’re longing to start afresh in your job.

You might just find that the energy you get from sorting out one thing will carry you on to addressing the other, too.

Creating space and letting in the New

In one way or another, cleaning your slate is about undoing the knots that keep you stuck, overwhelmed, exhausted, or going ’round in circles. It’s about shedding the weight of what’s too complex, unresolved, or plain wrong. And dropping the heavy stuff we carry with us unnecessarily. It’s about creating space from what clogs up our living space, our life, or even our thinking and emotional energy.

So that the New, the Next and the Fresh may come in. So you may, as per the Buddhist teaching, start again with a beginner’s mind. So you can move forward, or move on in your life.

Therefore: Let me share my experience of clearing my slate over the past year…

7 ways to create a clean slate

Yes, I’ve done – and still do, occasionally – all of them! 🙂

1  End what needs to end

This sounds dramatic, yet it’s something many of us don’t like to do.

So we carry stuff with us that, in our head or in our heart, we know has ended. We just going through the motions to keep it alive, but we don’t really love it or nor are we fully engaged with it anymore.

We might do this for ourselves, or in order not to hurt or disappoint others.

Perhaps you’ve got a longstanding tradition you’ve been upholding, but are not really ‘feeling’ anymore. A role you’ve played for someone that isn’t needed anymore: the confidante, the supporter, or the surrogate mother. A job or other regular commitment that you’ve outgrown. Even a relationship that has become meaningless or stale, and is beyond resuscitating.

If you know it’s time for it to end, end it. By all means do it gently. Compassionately. Kindly. But end it.

Or, even better: If you see that it wants to end by itself – just let it.

2  Give away what you don’t need anymore

This is definitely about shedding weight and simplifying your life and circumstances. Because everything we own, particularly if it’s stashed away and unused, weighs on us energetically and adds complexity to what we think, feel or do.

Like when you buy new books, but your shelves are full. You’re now wondering where to put the new ones, and they end up in a pile you never look at, or lying about everywhere.

It’s like hiking the Pacific Crest Trail with an oversized backpack that drags you down and nearly buries you underneath it. (If you haven’t read Cheryl Strayed’s account of that, in her remarkable book Wild – please do! You’ll see what I mean.)

It’s good to give away what you don’t need anymore. You might very likely find that you actually don’t need it! 🙂

You could give away books. CDs or DVDs. Pots and pans. Clothes. Shoes. Accessories. Manuals. Plants. Furniture. Sport kits. Training and course materials. And whatever else you’ve outgrown, outused or lost interest in.

I do this regularly. For books, for example, I purposely only have one shelf that runs along my hall. That is one single line of books, across the top of my hall. No more. And when that is getting full, I know I need to start giving some books away before buying any other ones.

And you know what? As I was doing this, last year, I found myself thinking that I wouldn’t mind if I gave all books away! In fact, I felt it would be totally freeing. In the end, I stopped at about half of them – just so the hall wouldn’t look quite so bare… 🙂

But giving away the books I didn’t need any more wasn’t just about the empty space: It was as if, by giving away certain books, I was also drawing a line under a phase of my life I was ready to move beyond. Kind of like a rite of passage, of sorts!

3  Fix what’s broken (or throw it out)

I’m not great at fixing things when they break. Yet I also don’t like it when broken stuff lies about, well – broken. Somehow I feel that it adds unnecessary energetic complications onto the slate of my life that I could do without:

It keeps me thinking Must fix this. And when I don’t get ’round to it, it ends up clogging up my To Do list, forever shuffled from one version to the next. It brings me a pang of annoyance each time, and saps my energy!

Whereas if I manage to fix what’s broken, it raises the energy around me and frees up some brain space, so I can think more clearly about other stuff I want to do.

That’s why last year, I decided to finally fix all that was broken or not working in my flat. I replaced that kitchen light that had been lying dead for ages. Fixed the kitchen counter. Re-hung a picture that had come down. Replaced the cracked glass in a photo frame. And the wheels on my otherwise still perfectly functional suitcase. (I’m particularly proud of that last one! 🙂 )

Small stuff, I know. But it was hugely satisfying to find so many niggles finally off my slate and To Do list!

(Mind you – this point could also apply to bigger and non-material stuff, such as a relationship. Rather than letting it keep you dissatisfied, worried, or angry –  fix it. Or end it – in which case go back to point 1. That’s, of course, a bigger undertaking.)

4  Catch up what needs to be caught up

You know the burgeoning jungle of files and photos on your computer, that you’ve wanted to go through and sort, yet never got ’round to it? The emails you’ve wanted to catch up on, yet always postponed? The friends you’ve wanted to stay in touch with, and never have? The overflowing work in-tray you’ve wanted to clear, and never managed to? That pile of books or newspapers you’ve set aside to read, yet never had the time for?

It’s easy to say I’ll do it later. It’s easy to prioritise these things down, when we’ve got so many other, more urgent things to take care of first. It’s easy to ignore them, get on with the pressing stuff instead, and think that it doesn’t really matter.

But it does.

They’re unrestful, these things we never manage to catch up with, because they’re giving us a subliminal sense that there’s always more coming into our life than we can ever effectively deal with. They make us feel rushed, as we see that there’s never enough time to sort them out. And they give us anxiety when we concede that we’ll never manage to be fully caught up with things.

Me, I cleared some time in my diary this year, regularly, to catch up on this stuff at my own pace, without stress.

I simplified and slimmed down the file structure on my computer, deleting everything I no longer wanted. I started operating an email system where I have never more emails in my inbox than fit on one screen – everything else gets filed away, sorted or deleted. I try and sort admin tasks as they arise – or at least make sure I clear my admin tray once a month. I’ve taken to staying in touch with friends more often, but with shorter communication (so I don’t get caught out by that long email I wanted to write but never have time for).

I now feel lighter and up to date, and I’m also more efficient, finding what I need more easily and quickly. That alone has made the exercise worth my while!

5  Release and let go

We can hold on to things for too long – even when they don’t serve us anymore, or are not good for us in the first place. They tighten us up – physically, mentally and emotionally. When we’re holding ourselves too tight, our muscles become sore and go into spasm. Equally, our thinking becomes rigid, and we get set in our ways.

Like when we hold grudges, ill feeling, or negative thoughts. When we lock in hurt or pain or fear, and all those difficult emotions we daren’t express. Or like when we keep telling ourselves all the reasons-why-we-can’t-do-something, or why-we’re-no-good, perpetuating ourselves as powerless victims, or thinking of ourselves as failures.

What if we could just release all of that, and let it go?

Like having a good massage that releases the knots in our muscles. Like opening our hand, and seeing the balloon we’ve been clutching, soaring effortlessly into the skies. Like opening the door to a cage and watching the little canary that lived inside joyfully fly out into the world.

Releasing is a great slate-cleaning exercise!

As someone who’s been into personal development for a long time, I have released a lot of stuff over the years: physical and muscular tightness, unhelpful thinking and behaviour patterns from early life, old hurts and pain, limiting beliefs and unconfidence, challenging emotions…

Yet it seems to me that the task of releasing is never-ending, as life chucks ever-new stuff at us! :- )

So over the last year, I’ve worked particularly on releasing the effects of what we hold in our energy. And I have to say: It’s a whole new releasing level for me, and a highly effective one, too!

6  Cleanse, clean and clear

Figuratively speaking, this is just like wiping off the smudges off your slate. Or the encrusted food stains you left on it when you tried to solve your equation over dinner. Or the mathematical detritus you accumulated whilst trying to find a solution: pathways you scribbled down that led nowhere, that turned out wrong, or that that you abandoned. 

All of these clutter up your slate and make it harder for you to see what needs doing in your life. They lower your energy, motivation and enthusiasm.

So in real life, you could declutter your home – and then clean it regularly. Clear an atmosphere that is thick from a heated discussion or a fight, with an apology, or a joke (or literally, by opening a window – seriously!) Dust off the specks on your computer screen. Get a rose quartz crystal to cleanse the atmosphere in your office from electro-smog.

A friend of mine recently got in touch with people she’d cut out of her life some years ago – for good reasons – explaining and apologising. That’s a kind of cleansing, too, I guess. Another friend of mine changed her last name, because the one she was given had negative connotations. Another way of cleansing.

Me, I did a good old body detox exercise: Light diet and liver-cleansing foods and herbs for a few weeks. And I started having regular Epsom salt baths to keep my energy clear. I found that both helped me with post-flu tiredness, and also with stress… Looks like I’ll repeat the exercise in the future, then! 🙂

7  Update what’s out of date

Sometimes it’s good to hold on to old stuff.

For example: For years, I held on to an almost archaic operating system on my computer (remember Windows XP?), simply because it worked very well, and I knew that newer versions had been reviewed as cumbersome and not as good. And because I don’t subscribe to the philosophy that every week, month or year we have to have a new version, gadget, toy – or whatever it is – so that companies can sell us more stuff. (And we inundate our planet with the old stuff we throw away.)

Nevertheless:

When I finally did update my operating system – and not only that, but also my whole IT system and broadband connection, it felt a bit like a revolution! 🙂

With everything now lighter, more powerful AND interconnected via Cloud, and – see point 4 – my newly slim and slender filing system, my work is now more efficient and better supported in a way that suits my life. I feel that I have finally arrived in the 21st century… 🙂

The other thing I’ve felt compelled to update was my look: Colours. Clothes. Shoes. Make up. Hairstyle. I’ve no ambitions to be(come) a style icon, nor am I particularly obsessed with fashion. But I got older, and things in my life and around me have moved on, too. So I felt the need to adjust for that…

It’s remarkably refreshing, updating your look: a real cleaning of the slate by leaving behind aspects of yourself that are no longer important – along with your old clothes. An opportunity to express who you really are today. And a great act of self-love, and investing in oneself!

Now, for you perhaps it’s other things that need updating: your flat, for example. Or your garden. Your exercise routine. Your brand and company logo. The way you make and keep track of your appointments. Or the way you do your food shopping, call a taxi, or book your holidays. You tell me – the possibilities are endless.

One thing to remember…

If all of this sounds daunting, consider this:

Some of the ideas above are bigger projects, and best done over a stretch of time. Also, you don’t need to update everything all the time. Just be honest with yourself, and you’ll know when it’s time for a slate-clearing exercise!

My Italian mum always likes to be al passo

It means being in step with life – up to date, caught up on things. It means you feel there’s a good balance of what’s coming into your life, what gets done, and what’s leaving your life. It means that you’re on top of what’s going on, and coping well.

I must say, I like being al passo. It’s joyful and restful.

And creating a clean slate is one of the ways I use in order to do that!

Over to you

What kind of clean slate could you use in your life?

Which ones of the ways I suggest here appeal to you? Which don’t?

What are your experiences with creating a clean slate?

I’d love to read your views! Why don’t you share them in the comments box below? 

Photos: Pixabay