GREG. MCKEOWN

The Disciplined Pursuit of Less

Essentialism

Piet Terheyden

Pola Schwöbel

Dhrumil Patel

Claudine

The way of the Essentialist involves learning to tell the difference-learning to filter through all those options and selecting only those that are truly essential. Essentialism is not about how to get get more things done; it's about how to get the right things done. It doesn't mean just doing less for the sake of less either. It is about making the wisest possible investment of your time and energy in order to operate at our highest point of contribution by doing only what is essential.

The way of the Essentialist rejects the idea that we can fit it all in. Instead it requires us to grapple with real trade-offs and make tough decisions. In many cases we can learn to make one-time decisions that make a thousand future decisions so we don't exhaust ourselves asking the same questions again and again.

Essentialists see trade-offs as an inherent part of life, not as an inherently negative part of life. Instead of asking, What do I have to give up?" they ask, "What do I want to go big on?" The cumnulative impact of this small change in thinking can be profound.

Nonessentialists get excited by virtually everything and thus react to everything. But because they are so busy pursuing every opportunity and idea they actually explore less. 

Being a journalist of your own life will force you to stop hyper-focusing on all the minor details and see the bigger picture. You can apply the skills of a journalist no matter what field you are inyou can even apply them to your personal life. By training yourself to look for "the lead,' you will suddenly find yourself able to see what you have missed. You'll be able to do more than simply see the dots of each day: you'll also connect them to see the trends. Instead of just reacting to the facts, you'll be able to focus on the larger issues that really matter.

Nonessentialists listen too. But they listen while preparing to say something. They get distracted by extraneous noise. They hyperfocus on inconsequential details. 

As you evaluate an option, think about the single most inmportant criterion for that decision, and then simply give the optiona score between 0 and 100. If you rate it any lower than 90 percent, then automatically change the rating to 0 and simply reject it. This way you avoid getting caught up in indecision, or worse, getting stuck with the 60s or 70s. Think about how you'd feel if you scored a 65 on some test. Why would you deliberately choose to feel that way about an important choice in your life?

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