Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less

by Greg McKeown

Play expands our minds in ways that allow us to explore: to germinate new ideas or see old ideas in a new light.

Play stimulates the parts of the brain involved in both careful, logical reasoning and carefree, unbound exploration.

Play doesn’t just help us to explore what is essential. It is essential in and of itself.

The best asset we have for making a contribution to the world is ourselves. If we underinvest in ourselves, and by that I mean our minds, our bodies, and our spirits, we damage the very tool we need to make our highest contribution.

One of the most common ways people—especially ambitious, successful people—damage this asset is through a lack of sleep.

In the many hours Geoff spent resting he came to see an interesting paradox in his addiction to achievement: for a type A personality, it is not hard to push oneself hard. Pushing oneself to the limit is easy!

The real challenge for the person who thrives on challenges is not to work hard.

By the time I was twenty-one I too thought of sleep as something to be avoided. To me, it was a necessary evil: a waste of time that could otherwise be spent productively, something for the weak, or the weak-willed.

The way of the Nonessentialist is to see sleep as yet another burden on one’s already overextended, overcommitted, busy-but-not-always-productive life. Essentialists instead see sleep as necessary for operating at high levels of contribution more of the time.

the Nonessentialist mind-set of “I have to do it all,” the pernicious myth that can lead people to justify spending longer and longer hours working, with diminishing returns.

Sleep, the authors of the study concluded, allowed these top performers to regenerate so that they could practice with greater concentration. So yes, while they practiced more, they also got more out of those hours of practice because they were better rested.

While sleep is often associated with giving rest to the body, recent research shows that sleep is really more about the brain.

Our highest priority is to protect our ability to prioritize.

Sleep will enhance your ability to explore, make connections, and do less but better throughout your waking hours.

“If the answer isn’t a definite yes then it should be a no.”

when our selection criteria are too broad, we will find ourselves committing to too many options.

In other words, it’s not enough to simply determine which activities and efforts don’t make the best possible contribution; you still have to actively eliminate those that do not.

The first type of nonessential you’re going to learn how to eliminate is simply any activity that is misaligned with what you are intending to achieve. It sounds straightforward enough, but to be able to do that you need to be really clear about what your purpose is in the first place—which

The fact is, motivation and cooperation deteriorate when there is a lack of purpose.

When there is a serious lack of clarity about what the team stands for and what their goals and roles are, people experience confusion, stress, and frustration. When there is a high level of clarity, on the other hand, people thrive.

when individuals are involved in too many disparate activities—even good activities—they can fail to achieve their essential mission.

Without clarity and purpose, pursuing something because it is good is not good enough to make a high level of contribution.

When teams are really clear about their purpose and their individual roles, on the other hand, it is amazing what happens to team dynamics.

Instead, ask the more essential question that will inform every future decision you will ever make: “If we could be truly excellent at only one thing, what would it be?”

A powerful essential intent inspires people partially because it is concrete enough to answer the question, “How will we know when we have succeeded?”

Yet it is worth the effort because only with real clarity of purpose can people, teams, and organizations fully mobilize and achieve something truly excellent.

Have you ever felt a tension between what you felt was right and what someone was pressuring you to do?

Navigating these moments with courage and grace is one of the most important skills to master in becoming an Essentialist—and one of the hardest.

Stephen R. Covey, one of the most respected and widely read business thinkers of his generation, was an Essentialist. Not only did he routinely teach Essentialist principles—like “The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing”—to important leaders and heads of state around the world, he lived them.6

So why is it so hard in the moment to dare to choose what is essential over what is nonessential? One simple answer is we are unclear about what is essential.

On the other hand, when we have strong internal clarity it is almost as if we have a force field protecting us from the nonessentials coming at us from all directions.

In virtually every instance, clarity about what is essential fuels us with the strength to say no to the nonessentials.

We are worried about damaging the relationship. But these emotions muddle our clarity. They distract us from the reality of the fact that either we can say no and regret it for a few minutes, or we can say yes and regret it for days, weeks, months, or even years.

The only way out of this trap is to learn to say no firmly, resolutely, and yet gracefully.

A true Essentialist, Peter Drucker believed that “people are effective because they say no.”

The potential upside, however, is less obvious: when the initial annoyance or disappointment or anger wears off, the respect kicks in.

When we push back effectively, it shows people that our time is highly valuable. It distinguishes the professional from the amateur.

Essentialists accept they cannot be popular with everyone all of the time.

Saying no is its own leadership capability. It is not just a peripheral skill.

“We need to learn the slow ‘yes’ and the quick ‘no.’ ”

“By editorial I mean there are a thousand things we could be doing. But there [are] only one or two that are important.

When making decisions, deciding to cut options can be terrifying—but the truth is, it is the very essence of decision making.

As Alan D. Williams observed in the essay “What Is an Editor?” there are “two basic questions the editor should be addressing to the author: Are you saying what you want to say? and, Are you saying it as clearly and concisely as possible?”

Doing less is not just a powerful Essentialist strategy, it’s a powerful editorial one as well.

Boundaries are a little like the walls of a sandcastle. The second we let one fall over, the rest of them come crashing down.

It’s true that boundaries can come at a high price. However, not pushing back costs more: our ability to choose what is most essential in life.

After all, if you don’t set boundaries—there won’t be any. Or even worse, there will be boundaries, but they’ll be set by default—or by another person—instead of by design.

I am not saying we should never help people. We should serve, and love, and make a difference in the lives of others, of course. But when people make their problem our problem, we aren’t helping them; we’re enabling them. Once we take their problem for them, all we’re doing is taking away their ability to solve it.

Whoever it is that’s trying to siphon off your time and energies for their own purpose, the only solution is to put up fences.

Remember, forcing these people to solve their own problems is equally beneficial for you and for them.