I really believe that less is more. I’ve talked about that on a number of occasions here. This is just one example.
Yesterday I saw a great post on the Zen Habits blog. The post is called “Pare It Down: Cut Away the Extraneous to Leave the Awesome.” I loved these very practical steps to paring it down:
- Spend a few minutes thinking about what is really essential. What is it that you really want above all else? What is it about your product or service that the customer really wants? What is it you are really trying to communicate? If you had to pick one thing about whatever you’re doing, what would it be?
- Be bold. Don’t be afraid to throw stuff out. You can always add stuff back in later — remember that less is better as long as you’re leaving in the essentials.
- What is blocking the essentials? Sometimes the awesome in something is being blocked by other things — can you remove those things to show the awesome and let it shine? Remove the noise to let the music be heard.
- Come back to it. Sometimes you can’t see the extraneous the first time you start paring down. So do your best, and then come back later and try again. You might be able to pare down even more this time. Keep coming back as long as you can — the more you pare, the better in most cases.
Within churches and in my life, I see so many opportunities to embrace simplicity. For example:
- Fewer meetings equal more meaningful relational connections.
- Fewer commitments equal more time with family.
- Fewer words equal a more focused message.
- Fewer ministry programs equal a clearer path for discipleship.
- Fewer rules equal more time to love God and love others.
Where do you see the “less is more” principle playing out in your life and ministry?
This is key to avoiding burn-out too. Sometimes as Christians we take on much more than we can handle because we can not say no. What happens is, we do everything at a lower standard rather than doing a few things with excellence.
[...] principle today from Leo , but instead of margin he used the term ‘pare it down’. Then Tony Morgan responded to this and shared some of things in his life he has marginalized and what that leaves time [...]
Tony have you ever seen an instance where less is not more? I sometimes wonder if this principle is misapplied and becomes an excuse for not striving for excellence, impact and results-all in the name of simplicity, clarity, focus etc. I agree with your previous post regarding the paradox of choice-yet I believe I’ve seen people hide behind “less” is more. I don’t believe your post is saying that…but I struggle when I see Less = Less
I once took a creative writing course and got some very valuable advice. When you finish a first draft, go back and delete every fourth word. Replace only the ones needed to make it logical and grammatical. Repeat as needed.
Editing and refining always takes effort. Bob, with all due respect, creating a concise and focused product is always harder and more time consuming than using the first draft. Of course, there is always the careless and uncaring- I am assuming we are talking about someone who is TRYING to produce a good product.
[...] Tony Morgan’s Post See THIS POST, great stuff from Tony [...]
[...] picture. Hard to beat something that awesome! Speaking of awesome here’s a link to a good post from Tony [...]