The heart of Essentialist thinking: know your goal, weigh the priorities and trade-offs, and nail down what’s worth going big on. What will you go big on?
How often do you wake up in the morning, already ticking off the list of everything you need to accomplish that day? Before your day even gets started, the list can be overwhelming, and you wonder, “How am I going to accomplish it all?” I know that happens to me quite often, especially on Monday mornings after my brain has had a weekend to refresh.
Recently, I read a terrific article related to my own belief around tackling items “one thing at a time” – the go slow to go fast mentality. This article and book review of Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown, set off another similar set of lightbulbs for me. It centered around Essentialist thinking, which was a new term for me.
At its core, the Essentialist thinker has taught themselves to discern what is truly important and…“everything else.” An Essentialist thinker will look at my overwhelming to-do list and ask:
“What can I go big on”
A Non-Essentialist thinker will look at my same list, and ask, much like I currently do:
“How can I do it all?”
It sounds so simple, so basic. But SO powerful. Why? Because Essentialism isn’t about getting things done – it’s about getting the right things done. It’s about making the wisest, most informed use of your valuable time and energy. That root question of “What can I go big on” allows your brain to identify and focus on your biggest opportunities for the week, rather than ticking off, item by item, the overwhelming list.
This isn’t about doing less for the sake of taking items off your plate, and it does require some trade-offs. Often there could be competing priorities that meet the “go big” criteria. So, what to do? Trade. Weigh the options and ask which is worth going big on, and will provide the most significant outcomes towards achieving my goal(s)?
I’ll give you an example. Today I wanted to clean out my Inbox and strategically unsubscribe to a number of retailer newsletters. I also planned to write this article for my weekly newsletter and website blog. Taking a moment to weigh the two options, rather than scrambling to squeeze both into my busy schedule, the answer became clear. This article will achieve my larger business goal, while the e-mail clean-out is a nice-to-do when time allows.
This is the heart of Essentialist thinking; know your goal, weigh the priorities and trade-offs, and nail down what’s worth going big on. Because let’s face it – we can’t do everything.
My challenge to you is this: What will you go big on?
