the world is a delicate balancing act. It is always in
need of retiming, further inquiry, attention. But I find
the notion of voluntary simplicity keeps me mindful of
what is important, of an ecology of mind and body
and world in which everything is interconnected and
every choice has far-reaching consequences. You
don't get to control it all. But choosing simplicity
whenever possible adds to life an element of deepest
freedom which so easily eludes us, and many
opportunities to discover that less may actually be
more.
Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity! I say let your affairs
be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand;
instead of a million count half a dozen. ...
In the midst of this chopping sea of civilized life,
such are the clouds and storms and quicksands
and the thousand-and-one items to be allowed for,
that a man has to live,
if he would not founder
and go to the bottom
and not make his port at all, by dead reckoning,
and he must be a great calculator
indeed who succeeds.
Simplify, Simplify.
Thoreau, Walden