Simple n’ Smart
Holla! This post was written originally as a Tip of the Week for the Challenge:Future Community. I write here about the usefulness of simplicity. Please feel at ease and share your thoughts in the comments section when you’re done reading.
When faced with a problem, a challenge, a daunting math question, whatever! I am sure that you, like me, often get the feeling that it cannot possibly be resolved too easily. The solution or the answer must be quite complex, even intricately so. Right?
Well, maybe not so much. This week’s TOW highlights the need to keep solutions simple and smart, so that it doesn’t only look attractive but it is easy to implement. A similar philosophy is the KISS: Keep It Simple, Stupid or Keep it Simple Stupid (I actually like the latter better).
The thing is that when we think about it, the most elegant solutions are the really simple ones. I learnt the truth of this a while ago when a friend asked me to explain a concept to him. Then I started on this long, convoluted explanation and he just stared back with a blank look. He then said, “please explain to me like I’m a four year old”. That got me! It really did.
The theme of simplicity occurs over and over again in science (Einstein famously said, “everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler”), in philosophy (Occam’s razor suggests that we should tend towards simpler theories whenever possible) and in art when Leonardo da Vinci tells us that “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication”. I suggest a two-step process to fixing things, a. Organise b. Activate. This actually works. The text that you’re reading right now is proof that it does. (I wrote this in 10 minutes)
Are you wondering how issues like the environment, world peace etc. can possibly be solved very simply? I know I am. I have an answer, though. My answer is, “drink water”. I’m serious. If everybody drinks water, then we will have world peace and a beautiful planet.
My reasons: If we all drank just water, there would be a lot more money to help eradicate hunger. See What social and economic problems are linked to alcohol use? for some of the effects of drinking beverages. Imagine the billions that go to producing and consuming wines, beer, spirits etc. every year and the effect that money would have in the right hands doing the right things. The environment would be cleaner and people will be happier.
Sigh. So that’s my TOW for you. Drink Water. You’ll be happier and healthier and saving the world while you’re at it. Do you have any simple solutions of your own? Please share in the comments box.
PS- If these two pictures don’t convince you about the value of keeping it simple, then You’re on your own o!
