How to change clearsSelectionOnViewWillAppear when not using UITableViewController?

Simply by calling

[myTableView deselectRowAtIndexPath:[myTableView indexPathForSelectedRow] animated:YES];

in your viewWillAppear: method.

Here the Swift code:

override func viewWillAppear(animated: Bool) {
    super.viewWillAppear(animated)
    if let indexPath = tableView.indexPathForSelectedRow() {
        tableView.deselectRowAtIndexPath(indexPath, animated: true)
    }
}

You are most likely overriding the viewWillAppear:animated method and missing the [super viewWillAppear:animated] call.