The First Law of Simplicity is...Reduce

“The simplest way to achieve simplicity is through thoughtful reduction"- John Maeda

Years before thinking about simplifying my life, I was lucky to listen to a wonderful speech on design by John Madea -in 2010 at an eBay Leadership conference (*during my time leading StubHub International, a subsidiary of eBay). I started to follow John Maeda from that time and read his blog and eponymous book “The Laws of Simplicity” in design.

Maeda’s first law of simplicity in design is REDUCE. In his words, “the process of reaching an ideal state of simplicity can be truly complex, so allow me to simplify it for you. The simplest way to achieve simplicity is through thoughtful reduction. When in doubt, just remove. But be careful of what you remove”.

I have decided to apply this principle to my life, and my journey to simplify will focus on subtle reductions applied to 3 domains:

-MY THINGS

-MY TIME

-MY MIND

MY THINGS:

This will be simply about reducing the things I own, use and buy. I call that process “Lighten”. This is as much about decluttering my home and life, but also been thoughtful about the impact of the things I use on the environment, and setting the example with my kids, family and friends. On this journey, I will try to understand what drives the attachment to things and the inescapable consumption and accumulation of objects over the years. I will in parallel undertake to progressively declutter my stuff, sharing my successes, failures and learnings along the way.

I do not quite know yet how far this will take me…

MY TIME:

This will entail reducing the pressures on my time. I call that process “Free”. I will carefully evaluate all the things, activities, constraints, commitments which do not bring joy to others or myself, do not help me learn and grow, or do not contribute to support others.  This will be focused on my free time, where I have more control, but this is also an exercise I intend to apply to my work schedule. In fact, I have over the years tried to experiment with a lot of time management techniques to cut meetings, projects and improve returns on time and energy investments. I want to be more radical in those explorations and share my findings.

MY MIND:

This intimate journey is about reducing the wasteful and negative thoughts in my mind. I call that process “purify”. I want to declutter my mind from what is not aligned with my values and priorities. I want to focus my thoughts on what matters.

So in the next few weeks, I will let Maeda’s first law of simplicity be my mantra: “The simplest way to achieve simplicity is through thoughtful reduction”.

Simply yours,

Brigitte