Git Got Messy: How I Safely Reverted to a Clean Commit Without Losing My Work

🧩 The Situation

I had a working build from six hours ago. But after a flurry of local experiments and edits, I found myself in a tangled mess of changes, errors, and untracked files.

I wanted a clean slate, but I also didn’t want to lose the ideas and partial work I’d explored.

Sound familiar? This is one of those real-world Git moments where theory meets panic — and experience begins.

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😰 The Problem

• A lot of uncommitted and untracked changes
• Multiple edits across files, unclear which ones were still useful
• Errors creeping into my local build
• No recent backup branch
• Fear of losing something valuable in the cleanup process

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🎯 The Goal

• Revert to the last known clean working commit
• Avoid losing any useful progress
• Get back into a calm, focused state for development

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✅ The Solution: Backup Before You Nuke

Instead of resetting blindly or stashing everything temporarily, I went with the safest and cleanest option: creating a backup branch before resetting.

Here’s exactly what I did:

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🌿 Step 1: Create a backup branch

git checkout -b backup-changes-apr20

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💾 Step 2: Commit everything

git add .
git commit -m "WIP: Backup of work before reset on Apr 20"

Even half-baked code is safer when committed. It becomes traceable, restorable, and searchable later.

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🔄 Step 3: Switch back to main

git checkout main

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🧹 Step 4: Reset and clean up

git reset --hard
git clean -fd

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☁️ Step 5 (Optional but Recommended): Push the backup

git push origin backup-changes-apr20

Because GitHub doesn’t crash when your laptop does 😉

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💡 What I Learned

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🛑 Why You Should Never Work Directly on main

Working directly on main led to:

• Confusion about which changes mattered
• No clear safety net if something went wrong
• Stress when I needed to clean things up

🔁 Lesson: Main is your production branch. Treat it that way.

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✅ A Better Git Workflow (That I Now Follow)

From now on, I always:

git checkout -b feature-[name]

• Work in a dedicated feature or experiment branch
• Commit frequently (even WIP)
• Merge to main only when clean, tested, and intentional

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🧠 Git is More Than a Version Control Tool

This experience reminded me:

Git is not just about saving code — it’s about organizing your thinking, your risk, and your recovery plan.

Resetting doesn’t mean losing. With a little care, it becomes part of a thoughtful development rhythm.

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🌱 What I Learned (DevSecOps Mindset)

This wasn’t just about Git commands — it was about building a mental safety net:

• Working clean doesn’t mean working recklessly
• Backups are not weakness — they’re wisdom
• Even in version control, governance and rollback matter

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🧠 Final Reflection

Git is not just for version control. It’s for version confidence.

By backing up before resetting, I avoided loss, confusion, and panic — and I gained a cleaner project and clearer mind.

This is DevSecOps in practice: backup, rollback, safety, and governance — even at the developer level.

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🧹 Git Cleanup Checklist

• ✅ Created backup branch: backup-changes-apr20
• ✅ Committed all changes with context
• ✅ Reset main to clean state
• ✅ Cleaned untracked files
• ✅ Pushed backup branch to GitHub for extra safety

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Thanks for reading. May your commits be clean, your merges be conflict-free, and your backups always be one step ahead!

🔗 Explore my other blogs at opsbygandal.dev
📁 Check out the GitHub repo [https://github.com/gandalops/portfolio-chirpy]
🔄 Let’s connect on LinkedIn

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