Book Review: Essentialism

 

Fast Read with Pearls of Wisdom

Grade: B+

 This book helps you develop more options in your life.  Push away all the clutter and figure out what you REALLY care about, and what you need to have a fulfilling life.

 It starts with a rather extreme idea - say NO to everything.  Seriously, when you are asked to do pretty much anything, say no. 

"Do you ever feel busy but not productive?" (p. 4) I do. This is because we do so many things that don't really matter to us.  We do things that we don't care about, that don't move us forward, that aren't part of our value system.  They don't advance our career or improve a relationship - yet we do them anyway.

"Live by design, not by default." (p. 7)  How many of us really choose what we do each day?  How many of us have daily goals, weekly goals, monthly goals, yearly goals?  Even if they are not written down - we know what they are and we know what we are doing each day to get us there.

"If you don’t prioritize your life, someone else will." (p. 10)  Just like your dream.  If you aren't fulfilling your own dream , someone else will pay you to help fulfill theirs.

He then gets into some other great points about our homes, our belongings, our clutter:

"We tend to value things we already own more highly than they are worth." (p. 18)  We've been taught to never throw anything away.  Which increases our number of choices, increasing our stress, decreasing our space and enjoyment.

"This book is not about going back to a simpler time.  It’s not about eschewing e-mail or disconnecting from the web or living like a hermit. " (p. 27)

This book embodies the idea of Good Better Best.  Stop doing so many things that are merely GOOD.  WE can fill out lives with "good" things and miss out on everything that is better, and even the best.

"We aren’t looking for a plethora of good things to do.  We are looking for the one where we can make our absolutely highest point of contribution." (p. 112)

We need to reevaluate the way we look at opportunities: Don’t ask “How will I feel if I miss this opportunity?” but rather, “If I did not have this opportunity, how much would I be willing to sacrifice in order to obtain it?” (p. 149)

This book took me a few days to read because it is well written.  The author gives interesting and understandable examples and it was easily applied to me daily life.  I am glad I read it.

I recommend it

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Here are a few more of my favorite quotes:

Essentialism is not about how to get more things done, it’s about how to get the right things done. – p. 5

The more choices we are forced to make, the more the quality of our decisions deteriorates. – p. 15

We keep doing things we detest to buy things we don't need with money we don't have to impress people we don't like. – p. 26

Drip by drip we allow our power to be taken away until we end up becoming a function of other people’s choices – or even a function of our own past choices. – p. 39

Warren Buffet decided early in his career it would be impossible for him to make hundreds of right investment decisions, so he decided that he would invest only in the businesses that he was absolutely sure of, and then bet heavily on them. – p. 44

You cannot overestimate the unimportance of practically everything – p. 45 (John Maxwell)

There are no solutions.  There are only trade-offs. – p. 55 (Thomas Sowell)

By abolishing any chance of being bored we have also lost the time we used to have to think and process – p. 68

The best journalists do not simply relay information.  Their value is in discovering what really matters to people. – p. 75

Play stimulates the parts of the brain involved in both careful, logical reasoning and carefree, unbound exploration. – p. 87

“If you think you are so tough you can do anything I have a challenge for you.  If you really want to do something hard; say not to an opportunity so you can take a nap.” – p. 94

The best violinist spent more time practicing than the merely good violinists…[AND] the best violinists slept an average of 8.6 hours in every 24 hour period; about an hour longer than the average American. – p. 97

If we could be truly excellent at only one thing, what would it be? – p. 127

When people ask us to do something, we can confuse it with our relationship with them. – p. 137

Sunk Cost Bias – it explains why we’ll continue to sit through a terrible movie because we’ve already paid the price of a ticket. – p. 146

Nearly 40 percent of our choices are deeply unconscious – p. 209

Every habit is made up of a cue, a routine, and a reward – p. 209

On my worst days I have wondered if my tombstone will read “He checked e-mail” – p. 232