What can we remove? Our bias is to always add more. More rules, more procedures, more code, more features, more stuff. Interdependencies proliferate, and gradually strangle us. Systems want to grow and grow, but without pruning, they collapse. Slowly, then spectacularly. When a piece of... See more

Simplicity is difficult because most of us are overcompensating for uncertainty. Adding something is easy. But removing something is hard, because it requires conviction. It’s easier to hedge against uncertainty, entertain multiple paths, and dilute your focus than to develop a strong opinion about what to exclude.

Nietzsche burned early drafts. Michelangelo destroyed sketches. Leonardo left thousands of pages unfinished. The act of deletion is not a failure of recordkeeping. It is a reassertion of agency.

In design, we speak of subtraction as refinement. A sculptor chips away everything that is not the figure. A musician cuts a line that clutters the melody.... See more