How Do You Clear You Head?

We all know the feeling.

You lie in bed, slowly awakening, open your eyes, and either the sunlight or the alarm clock is glowing too brightly. As soon as your mind wakes up, BOOM the clutter of life hits you. 

Random to-do list items, things to tell people, messages you need to send, oh yea, and don't forget to brush your teeth this morning. Things that have been in the back of your mind for days - all hit you at once. And you suddenly find yourself staring into the deep abyss of a cluttered mind.

I know for me this absolutely ruins my day. I'm scatterbrained. Tired. Unable to focus on any one thing. As soon as I start one task, another interrupts and on goes my day.

Unless....

Unless I actively choose one of my "clear my head" activities.

What are these?

These are the activities you consciously choose to do when your brain feels like a cluttered back closet, to refocus and clear your mind, so you can tackle the many things life throws at you.

Why do I say consciously?

I say consciously because many times when you are overwhelmed, stressed and tired you feel like your 'clear my head' activity is the absolutely last thing you should be doing because you have so many other things to be focusing on instead.

However, if you understand yourself well enough, you know that this activity will only make things better and not worse.

So why am I writing about this now?

Because this happened to me today.

I went to sleep last night with plans for a wonderfully productive day. Then when I awoke everything started going wrong and within an hour I froze up due to feeling completely and utterly overwhelmed.

I let myself stay in this state up until lunch. But after lunch I knew what I had to do. 

It pushed against everything I was feeling. It didn't seem important enough. Yet I have learned from experience that when I just can't do life anymore my coping mechanism is RUNNING.

Yes running. For some reason whether I have a good run or not (and trust me the one I just returned from was NOT a good run - going, stopping, distracted, etc...) it still helps me to clear my head, focus and when I return, get down to the grind.

Which is why I find myself writing this post now. All in 15 minutes.

I want to encourage each of you to figure out what it is you need in order to clear your head.

You may find you have multiple activities that clear your head and thats great! For me its getting outside and exercise.

Ultimately its important to understand this so when we experience a cluttered day like the one I just described we have a coping mechanism.

So as I asked above, how do you clear your head?

And - if you've figured out some amazing trick or even normal mundane method please add it to the comments below. I would love to see what others are up too and you never know - it may even give a few of us some ideas.