S01E12 - Tabula Rasa

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Hello and welcome back to Carry On with Criselda.  I am Criselda.  As always, I am so grateful that you have stopped by to join us today.  Be sure to stay till the end for another special, lighthearted message.

So, funny little story.  I originally attempted to record this the week right before Christmas.  But because things were so busy, I was going to make it a shorter episode because I didn’t have a script written out and I wanted to make sure that I got something out there.  And uh, it was a disaster.  I had some bullet points written out for talking points, but it just didn’t work.  You know, I discussed this in episode 5 about perfectionism.  And it seems that I need to take my own advice.  Sometimes I feel like I have a handle on when to drop the urge to be perfect.  But you know, there’s letting things go and not allowing oneself to become too obsessive compulsive about things, and then there’s knowing where your strengths and weaknesses lie.  And, speaking unscripted is not one of my strengths, at least, not yet.  I want it to be.  Someday, I want it to be.  But this podcast still has its training wheels on.  Really, I truly, truly do admire anyone who can just press record and talk almost without thinking about it.  They have the gift of gab.  Anyway, I just thought I’d share that with you.  I tried.  I failed.  I had to go back and do it the way that I am comfortable doing it.  And that’s ok.  I will get there someday, maybe.  

On to today's topic.  Have you ever been in a situation where you are having a difficult time with a new habit or a new way of being and you’re not sure why?  For example, say you want to improve your mindset, but you still struggle with intrusive thoughts that you can’t seem to shut out.  Then you feel bad about yourself and guilt yourself for not doing a better job.  Or it can even be in terms of a relationship.  Some people jump from one relationship to another, for fear of being alone, without giving themselves time to wipe the slate clean from the person they were before.

In order to allow the new or better thing to play into your life, you must first slough off the old.  Sometimes we have to wipe off the outdated thing or decompress ourselves from what once was, before we can truly accept the thing that we are replacing in order to be effective.  You’ve heard the phrase, “a clean slate”.  In psychology, it comes from the philosophizer, (I’m just kidding) [background laughter], the philosopher, [laughs] John Locke, who in the 17th century theorized that we are born with a blank slate and from an empiricist point of view, we learn and gain all knowledge from what we can see and experience.  There were other philosophers prior to him that had the same viewpoint.  Clean slate makes me think of the late 1800s to early 1900s, before pencil and paper, where school students would carry these tablet or iPad sized chalkboards that they would do their work on.  So, the actual phrase refers, at least in my mind, to starting off fresh or clean or new.  You must erase the old information before recording something new.

I tend to view life this way.  As a child, we grow up learning and adapting to the customs, beliefs and views of our parents, relatives, regional culture, community, etc.  So, the beliefs I grew up with, I would question.  My favorite question growing up was, “Why?”.  But when you have a child that asks this question every single day about everything, you eventually get handed the answer, “Because I said so”.  Later in life, I would learn about things that were outside the box of knowledge that I had been contained in and it forever changed me.  The details of that would be for another episode.  However, what I learned wiped my slate clean for me.  It undid everything I thought I knew.  So here I am as an adult, still learning.  I never claim to truly know anything.  Because I don’t know.  And other people who say they know, I must take with a grain of salt.

But it shows me, as an adult, that things can definitely begin again, anew.  When that slate is wiped, in my experience, it is an adjustment period.  It is an undoing of sorts of what was.  Or the transition of what was, to now become the past.  In other words, a decision that you are no longer going to carry with you anymore or claim it as a part of you.  It will no longer define you.  You decide what defines you.  And make certain you understand, truly understand the “why” of it all.  I personally don’t want to do something or believe something for the inadequate reason that that’s just the way it is or that’s what everyone else does.  No, it has to be a good enough reason and it has to make sense to me.

So, back to the earlier examples, if you want to improve your mindset, stop carrying around the old mindset.  Choose today what you want to think.  Choose today, who you want to be.  Are you in between relationships and you want so much to be in another one?  My humble opinion?  Make sure you clean that slate of who you were before you broke up.  There are so many things about who you were with that person that should be wiped away: beliefs, attitudes, tastes, values, and opinions.  I think it’s very healthy to get with yourself and find out who you really are and what you really want out of life before attaching yourself with someone new.

I think now that we are in a new year, what better way to begin it than to wipe our slates clean and begin again, new.  It’s a new year, a new life, a new outlook.  Our lives are not set in stone.  They are slates that can be easily wiped clean for a do over.  And every time, you have a setback, wipe the slate clean again.  That’s what makes it so forgiving.

Speaking about forgiving, I do hope you will forgive me for bringing a condensed episode today.  Today’s and next week’s episode will be condensed.  Hopefully, the next episode after that, things will be back to our regular routine.  Thank you for listening today.  Until next time, carry on with a clean slate.

Living your day to day life without being understood for your values, your passions, your desire to be the best version of yourself is hard to endure on your own.  It’s the pain of not finding anyone relatable to the struggles you suffer.  Until now.  Time to Carry On with Criselda, the podcast that asks, “Have you carried on today?”.  Nine times out of ten, listeners who follow, comment and share this podcast will get the spiritual hug they came for and breathe out a sigh of ease as they continue their day in confidence and assurance.  It’s the feeling they get when others look at them and ask, “What’s got you in such a good mood?”, and they say, “I’ve got my dose of Carry On with Criselda.”  Check with your inner self if Carry On with Criselda is right for you.  Isn’t it time you got your spiritual hug today?  Carry On with Criselda may cause side effects of encouragement, validation, inspiration, insight, motivation, bed wetting and occasional diarrhea.  Um, forget about the last two.

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