It seems that perfection would be attained not when there is no longer anything to add, but when there is no longer anything to take away. —Antoine de St. Exupery, Terre des Hommes, 1939
I keep coming back to this one. Not because it is particularly deep — we have all heard the version about a masterpiece being complete when there is nothing left to add — but because it got me thinking about the opposite direction, which is the one I actually find harder.
It is easy to add things. Features, habits, opinions, commitments, apps on your phone, people into your life. Adding is the default direction of almost everything. You build a thing and then you add to it because that is what building means. You meet someone and you want to know more, so you ask another question. You are worried about something so you read another article about it.
Taking away is the bit nobody talks about. It is easier to say yes than no. Easier to keep the tab open than close it. Easier to hold on than let go. And yet St. Exupery is saying that the real work, the actual path to something good, runs in the opposite direction. Not accumulation but subtraction. Not adding more but removing what does not belong.
I think about this when I look at my own life and notice how much of it is just stuff I accumulated without deciding. Obligations that started as opportunities and never got declined. Relationships that stopped being useful or joyful but continued out of inertia. Beliefs I picked up because they were convenient rather than because I had actually checked them.
I do not know how to be better at this. I suspect the answer is just to pay attention and be willing to be uncomfortable with the things you are holding onto for no good reason. But I suspect that is easier said than done.
Either way it is a useful thing to carry around.