You don’t need to burn your old notebooks. Just stop writing on the same page.

You do not have to disown your past in order to stop living inside it. Dramatic breaks with who you were tend to be performances, and they leave you arguing with an old version instead of getting on with anything. The earlier pages can stay exactly as they are, mistakes included. All that has to change is where you are writing now.

Notice whether you keep retelling one old story about yourself to new people. Let it be history rather than a headline. Then spend this week on something that will read well a year from now.