Simplicity and Focus
I had a realization yesterday after watching John Maeda’s TED talk on simplicity. As an aside, when I mention realizations, I mean the kind of truisms that are evident to a lot of people before I ever get to them. I write this stuff down just to track my own progress, not to announce a great discovery to the world. There you go.
In one of his slides Maeda showed a picture of a beach at sunset with the sky replaced with a 41% gray. “Wouldn’t that be the perfect sky?” he said. “A simplicity sky.” Then he replaced the gray sky with the actual photographed sky and it was a rich mix of blues, pinks, yellows, and light clouds. It was very complex and it was beautiful and much more interesting than the gray sky. I think the point was to illustrate his first law of simplicity: sometimes the simplest thing you can do is not necessarily the best thing you can do. Specifically he says, “The simplest way to achieve simplicity is through thoughtful reduction.”
And it hit me. Simplicity is not about reduction. It’s about focus. It’s about emphasis. It’s about specificity. By focusing on certain details or areas I am declaring what I think is important. I am simplifying by jumping off the broad road and onto the narrow path. And in doing so I may actually step into more complexity, as was the case with the beach photograph, but the complexity will be beautiful. It will be worth it. It’s worth it because we put more time and energy into the things we really care about, regardless of their complexity. Simplicity and complexity are not opposed to each other but intertwined and interdependent.
Semantics? Swapping a negative for a positive? Maybe.
Now, truthfully, focus may include thoughtful reduction but it doesn’t have to. In focusing I am not necessarily removing the excess because it may have never been there in the first place. Focus may simply mean choice. Reduction, on the other hand, always includes focus. “I have all these things and I must get rid of some of them.” That’s an important distinction, I think, and is the reason why I like my version better.
One of the things he said about simplicity I disagree with. He said, “Simplicity is about living life with more enjoyment and less pain.” Not true. I would use those words to describe hedonism but not simplicity. Instead, a simple life, a life of focus, may actually bring more pain. It may bring more complexity. It may also bring more joy, although not necessarily more enjoyment, which, in this case, I think he’s using as a substitute for pleasure. I’ll leave you to think about why that’s true.
