Part of the Book Review series

Book Review: Essentialism by Greg Mckeown

Essentialism walks you through the mindset of an Essentialist and discusses how we can develop a systematic approach for determining what are the important things in our lives and how we can focus our energy in contributing to those essentials when making a decision. It is not about getting more things done, it is about getting the right things done.

An essentialist is one who knows how to live a life true to oneself and how to discern what is important and eliminate what is not.

Rating: 5/5

Essentialism Cover

Recommended If:

you constantly feel busy, but also feel like you aren’t being productive or getting things done
you want to make the best investment of your time and energy in contributing to only what is essential to you
feel obligated to live the life others have set for you
you are looking for an interesting read to expand your horizons
you reflect on your life and regret on the decision you made in the past as it wasn’t contributing to what you value

Highlights

“Essentialism is a disciplined, systematic approach for determining where our highest point of contribution lies, then making execution of those things almost effortless”
“Living by design, not by default”
“If you don’t prioritize your life, someone else will”
“If the answer isn’t a definite yes, then is should be no”
“Essential Intent - makes one decision that eliminates 1,000 later decisions”
“Remember, forcing these people to solve their own problems is equally beneficial for you and for them”
“Every day do something that will inch you closer to a better tomorrow”
“Done is better than perfect”
“Learning essential new skills is never easy. But once we master them and make them automatic … the skill remains with us for the rest of our lives”
“Life is available only in the present moment, if you abandon the present moment you cannot live the moments of your daily life deeply”
“In work, do what you enjoy. In family life, be completely present.”

Going Forward

This book help me realize that we should enjoy the journey and not just focus on the destination. We are also in control of our own choices, so we should spend time on the few essentials as opposed to spreading yourself thin. After reading the different steps, I aim to incorporate the following into my life:

Schedule one hour of blank space every day to think and escape from the busy life
Keep a journal to identify patterns or trends as small, incremental changes are hard to see in the moment, but can have a huge cumulative effect
Have consistent sleep
Apply selective criteria to opportunities before I make a decision
Create my essential intent
Learn the slow “yes”, and quick “no”
Build in buffers to reduce the friction cause by the unexpected
Focus on small wins vs setting big goals

This is my second time reading the book and I enjoyed it as much as the first as I am someone who feels constantly busy and always says “yes” to all opportunities that comes to me. After the first read, I realize that I am better now in saying “no” and not taking on opportunities that are not essential. However, I am constantly applying this systematic approach and still working on focusing on living in the present and appreciating the journey.

Summary

The book was broken into four sections: essence, explore, eliminate, and execute.

Part I: Essence

What is the core mind-set of an Essentialist?

This section discusses what an Essentialist is and how they choose, discern and view trade-offs. The way of the Essentialist is to practice the idea of less but better. This is achieved in a disciplined way by saying “no” more and to pause to think if you are investing in the right activities. As there are many more opportunities now, especially with technology around, an Essentialist learns to filter through all the different options to select what is truly essential to them. This way we make significant progress in the things that matter.

Nonessentialism is everywhere as we have too many choices, too much social pressure, and the constant idea of ‘you can have it all’. The core mind-set of an essentialist contains the following:

We can choose how to spend our energy and time vs. I have to do it
Only a few thing really matter vs. It’s all important
The reality of trade-offs (we can’t have it all or do it all) vs. I can do both

The next parts of the book describe the system that we can go through to obtain the mindset of an essentialist, which can be broken up to three components: explore, eliminate and execute. This process can be applied when making a decision.

Part II: Explore

How can we discern the trivial many from the vital few?

To explore is the beginning stage where we want to evaluate our professional and personal lives and understand what activities or efforts we want to focus on. In this stage, ask yourself three questions:

What do you feel inspired by?
What are you particularly talened at?
What meets a significant need in the world?

The book breaks this section into escape, look, play, sleep and select.

Escape: it is critical to set time to think, breadth and observe; this allows us to have clarity and space to explore different possibilities and options
Look: be a journalist of your own life to avoid focusing on the details and see the bigger picture; hear what is not being said and find the essential information
Play: do simply for joy rather than a means to an end; play sparks exploration and expand our minds
Sleep: sleep enables the highest level of contribution and is a priority
Select: be selective, explicit and right by saying yes only to top 10% of the opportunities

Part III: Eliminate

How can we cut out the trivial many?

To eliminate is to actively get rid of those that do not make the highest possible contribution. By eliminating, we earn the time necessary to achieve what is essential. In this stage, ask yourself these questions:

What out of my priorities, will I say no to?
If I didn’t already own this, how much will I spend to buy it?
If we could be truly excellent at one thing, what would it be?

The book breaks this section into clarify, dare, uncommit, edit and limit.

Clarify: be clear about your purpose as motivation and cooperation can deteriorate when there is none
Dare: a clear “no” can be more graceful than a vague or noncommital “yes”
Uncommit: sunk-cost bias to continue to invest time and energy into something because we already incurred a cost that cannot be recouped; tendency is to undervalue things that aren’t ours and overvalue things because we already own them
Edit: cutting, condensing and correcting enable us to check ourselves
Limit: know your boundaries and set rules for a direct “no”

Part IV: Execute

How can we make doing the vital few things almost effortless?

To execute is to create a process that makes getting the essential things done as effortless as possible. After understanding what efforts to keep in our life, we want a system that is routine to execute the essential things as easy as possible.

The book breaks this section into buffer, subtract, progress, flow, focus, and be.

Buffer: be prepared and build a buffer for unexpected events, planning fallacy is a phenonmenon that people tend to underestimate how long a task will take (even when they done it before)
Subtract: understand what obstacle is keeping you back from achieving what really matters and how to remove them
Progress: start small and get big results, don’t go for the flashiest wins as small and concrete wins create momentum and affirms further success; there is power in steadiness and repetition
Flow: expend a small amount of initial energy to reate the routine and then executing the essentials will be autopilot
Focus: every second spent worrying about a past or future moment distracts us from what is important in the here and now, so focus on the now and be present
Be: the life of an Essentialist is a life of meaning and a life that really matters; live a life without regret