3 Ways to Clear Your Mind That Aren’t Meditation

It can feel downright impossible to clear your mind most days, right? Chances are you live a pretty faced-paced life, and you juggle a lot of different responsibilities. Which means that you always have a lot on your mind.

Living this way is just plain exhausting. I think we all know that, but it’s even more important to recognize that when you live this way for too long, you start to lose your sense of self. You start to forget what’s important to you and why you chose to juggle all of those responsibilities. And that’s exactly why you need to clear your mind.

You need to make space for self-reflection, self-awareness, and maybe even just a little bit of play.

But how do you clear your mind? How do you create a break in your thoughts so that you can observe your mind and body? So that you can rediscover your sense of self?

Meditation of course! It seems like that’s the answer you’ll get to these questions 99% of the time. But not today! I love meditation, but I also know that it’s not an easy habit to commit to for many people. Being still, which is what mediation requires, is not for everyone.

I’ve found three things that help me clear my mind that aren’t mediation. Maybe they can help you clear your mind as well. (Be sure to scroll all the way to the end for my favorite one ?)

1. Exercise – Of any kind, but my personal favorites for clearing my mind are yoga (the obvious one) and Tabata workouts. If you’re not familiar, the structure of a Tabata workout is four, 20-second intervals of an exercise with 10-second breaks between each one. So, you’re constantly moving, which makes it a great way to clear your mind.
2. Puzzles – Any kind of brain teaser such as a crossword puzzle, logic puzzle, or a hidden object puzzle. Whatever you choose, it needs to be a puzzle that will hold your attention and thereby clear your mind. My favorite is sudoku.