10 Ways to Declutter Your Mind

As teachers, parents, and therapists, our lives are filled with clutter, whether it’s a desk covered with papers, a full email inbox, a kitchen drawer stuffed with items that don’t seem to belong anywhere else, or an overwhelmed mind trying to deal with too much. A cluttered mind is fatiguing and results in poor performance and poor decisions. You can declutter your mind, just as you can declutter your kitchen drawer.

We’ve all most likely experienced the mental clutter of everyday life. Our minds become cluttered with anxieties, concerns, worries and stresses about things that happened in the past or might happen in the future. We can be bogged down by repetitive thoughts that we feel powerless to change. And our minds can be filled with so many conscious or unconscious expectations for ourselves and others that it can be very hard to have self confidence in your skills as an educator or parent.

How to Declutter Your Mind

Here are some suggestions and tips to help declutter your mind and relieve everyday stress.

Simplify your life.

You might just have too much going on. Take a moment of self-reflection and ask yourself if there is anything you can cut out of your life that is not necessary? Are there any tasks that you can assign to someone else?

For example, perhaps you spend too much time scrolling social media. Cut out activities that don’t add significantly to your life or your enjoyment. Reduce optional activities to make more time for more things you enjoy.

The key here is to find balance in your life. No, you don’t need to quit everything and do nothing but there are some things that can be left out without any sort of significant impact except less stress. We all have things we don’t like doing as part of our lives but working towards enjoying more and more activities with a greater and greater sense of fulfillment leads to a happier, healthier life.

Try keeping a self-reflection journal to think about ways you can simplify your life. Using a self-reflection journal helps you analyze your professional and personal growth.  By keeping a record of your ideas, reasons, actions, techniques, and assessments you can plan for your future and facilitate a positive outcome.

Create habits.

It streamlines your thought process. Eating the same thing for breakfast each day is an example of a habit that avoids having to make a decision. Create daily and weekly habits that take care of your basic needs. Try tracking your habits to have a written reminder to act and to motivate you to continue to reach your goals to simplify your life.

Habits eliminate the need for making decisions.

For example:

• Arrive to school a few minutes early each morning and prepare for the day. It is a good time to plan your day or catch up on paperwork from the previous day. 
• Use your lunch break to de-stress, socialize with colleagues, and relax/rest from a long morning of teaching (30 minutes). If you must work during this time, prioritize your daily responsibilities in order of importance. Don’t check email unless it’s an absolute emergency or if there is something that impacts students’ learning experience. Complete tasks online that don’t require human interaction such as researching buying school supplies on Amazon.
• Leave work when it’s done. Try not to carry tasks home with you. E-mailing about students outside of class time should be avoided as much as possible and only should be done in rare instances where there is a disadvantage for the student if it cannot be completed immediately. Make sure writing e-mails to parents is part of your daily routine instead of waiting Friday afternoon for a barrage of e-mails.

Exercise.

Few things can clear your mind as well as a good workout. Just like we suggest brain breaks for our students, adults benefit from this too! Take a walk, jog, run or hit the gym. It’s great for your mind and body.

Use lists.

Creating mental notes to yourself to do something at a later day or time requires a lot of mental resources. It’s always in the back of your mind, taking up part of your attention. By writing it down, you’re free to eliminate it from your awareness. It’s right there on the paper instead.

No time to write it down? Try dictating your to do lists into your phone and send it to your email.

Use single-tasking to declutter your mind.

Multi-tasking is a mistake. Studies have shown that it’s more effective to do one thing at a time. Complete it and then move on. You’ll stay fresher mentally and accomplish more each day.

You’ll be surprised how mentally draining it can be to try to work on multiple projects.

For example, you’re trying to focus your attention on monitoring a student’s progress and tracking goals, but you keep thinking about another student that needs your attention. It takes away from the quality of your work because you are distracted.

One way to reduce this is to give each project a start and end time. For example, if you have one task that needs to be completed, block out your schedule so that you don’t start the second task until the first one has been completed. This will help you be more effective and efficient.

Make decisions quickly.

Decisions that you put off begin piling up in your mind and take up valuable space and resources. The more decisions you put off, the longer it will take for your thoughts to clear and this can be detrimental to productivity. If there is no pressing need for additional information, make a quick decision today so that tomorrow’s tasks have space in your mind.

Rest your mind each day.

Reading, watching TV, or surfing the internet do not count as a rest. Meditation or sitting alone can be considered rest. Sit outside and enjoy nature. Stay focused on your surroundings and avoid allowing your mind to think about anything other than your surroundings.

The world around you is exciting, and it deserves your full attention. Sitting outside alone can do wonders for body and mind as long as you avoid thinking about anything else. Even doing this for a few minutes, can be helpful to declutter your mind.

Prioritize.

The day is short and the work never lets up. The secret to getting things done? Prioritization! What’s most important for you in your life right now, and what can be set aside if need be? Focus on that one thing until it gets done before moving onto anything else.

To accomplish this task effectively, you need an effective system for prioritizing your workload so it’s not overwhelming or unorganized.

Not sure where to start? Try doing a brain dump and write down everything in your mind. Then take a moment to organize your thoughts into categories and prioritize what needs to get accomplished first.

Do something kind for someone else.

Your cluttered mind is too focused on your own challenges.

Take some time to focus on others rather than yourself. You’ll be surprised at how a clear mind will help you tackle your own challenges head-on with renewed vigor and optimism! The result may be a clearer mind and a refreshed perspective.

Mindfulness Practice

Mindfulness practice helps us become aware of what is happening inside of us. By paying attention moment by moment, we see clearly when our mind is filled with garbage—the kind of stuff that makes it harder for us to live a meaningful life with a clear mind. Being mindful is a type of brain break. You can even do these exercises with your students too!

If you need help with mindfulness in your classroom, Created by certified yoga instructor and former primary school teacher, Giselle Shardlow, Mindful Kids in 10 Minutes a Day: PreK-2nd Grade can help you easily bring mindfulness to children in preschool through 2nd grade!

Need help with older students?

Mindfulness Activities for the Classroom Grade 3-5

Mindfulness Middle School Workbook

The first step is to recognize what mental trash it is that’s cluttering your mind, so you can begin to let it go. Some examples of mental clutter is tough expereinces from your from the past or fears about the future (your own and others).

Take a moment to reflect and be grateful for the good things, the challenging things and even the sad things. If something happens that we don’t like then regardless of how intense our feelings are towards this event or person etc., when we sit with it you may find an underlying feeling of gratitude because without these difficult experiences we wouldn’t be who we are and therefore wouldn’t have the capacity to appreciate all of the good stuff in our lives.

Summary on How to Declutter Your Mind

Clutter is everywhere. Some is controllable, and some is not. The clutter in your mind is under your control.

To declutter your mind, simplify your life as much as possible. The less you have to deal with, the easier it is to avoid mental clutter. Give your mind regular breaks through the day. Use your time as advantageously as possible. Prioritize. You’ll enjoy the peace and clarity that result.