The Less Is More in Life
Live Life on Your Terms
“Being content with less creates space in the heart for more love.” ― Margo Vader
Dear Brothers and Sisters, Namaste!
I welcome you.
May God bless you and your loved ones with joy ever-lasting!
In this essay, let us take up the profound theme, “The less is more in life.”
Section I: The Conventional Logic Towards Life
The conventional logic of living dictates that “more” is always the best.
In other words, we are always encouraged to do more…to have more…to aim for more…
…the focus is always on more, more and even more!
We, accordingly, embrace ‘more’ in our lives. Evidence is:
- we do ‘more’ repetitions during our workouts (never mind that returns from more repetitions quickly taper off)
- we cram ‘more’ electronic gadgets into our homes (never mind that the existing ones are in perfect working order)
- we design systems to extract more work from our teams at the office (never mind its impact on the mental health of such team members)
- we crave the job that pays ‘more’ (never mind that it will squeeze the last drop of energy out of us)
…the list of such ways of ‘more’-focused living just goes on.
Our society heartily approves of this maximalist approach towards living our lives.
Its evidence can be seen in the disproportionate respect accorded by the society to the tycoon who has the maximum material wealth to his name.
And, we the lesser mortals, just blindly follow these stifling norms.
Thus, we automatically condemn ourselves to lead lives on terms that are anything but our own!
Result?
Let’s see in the next section.
Section II: Is Having More Worth It?
Let us take a step back and introspect deeply: — does having more possessions add value to our lives?
We shall then arrive at the disconcerting conclusion that, no, they do not. On the contrary, an excess of possessions can and do detract from our lives.
Let us take the test case of clothes. We impulsively buy new dresses during our visits to shopping malls.
Then, after wearing them just once or twice, our enthusiasm starts waning. Soon they become just one more piece of clutter in our already overstuffed wardrobe.
But though we hardly wear many of these clothes, we are still burdened with the responsibility of their continuous upkeep.
As we continue to self-reflect, we will realize what an extremely unfortunate scenario this is for our lives…!
Let’s always remember our lives are a collection of just a counted number of hours.
And so even one hour misspent is an hour gone forever...it is permanently subtracted from life
So, an hour we devote to the futile maintenance of excess possessions is an hour gone forever — it is a cruel waste.
Yes, let me not mince words here!
We are wilfully wasting our lives due to our unending desire to own more.
Plus, most of us are guilty of the tendency that we are fast to acquire new things, yet we are slow to discard them.
Consequently, we have to continuously increase the storage space inside our homes and hence, our lives just to keep up with our never-ending greed.
And, in the end, due to our superfluous possessions, everything gets blocked…our space, our energy, our time, our money, our peace of mind…all to no avail.
Is this the way to live our finite life spans?
The next section, which is the crux of this essay, delves into this.
Section III. The Way Out: — ‘The Less Is More’
Yes.
This is the way out.
As the subtitle suggests, the solution is to adopt the elegant philosophy, “The less is more in life.”
This profound concept owes its origin to Ludwig Mies Van der Rohe, the famed architect from Germany.
When we begin embracing this philosophy, it forces us to change the way we approach the business of living our day-to-day lives.
We are then forced to exercise a tremendous amount of care in what we allow into our lives.
Thus, we become massively choosy about what jobs we do, what kind of homes we live in, what books we read, which people we associate with, what clothes we wear…
Slowly, our choosiness slowly starts encompassing the full spectrum of our lives.
No aspect of our lives is left out of our laser focus.
That laser focus stands for an uncompromising stance on doing a thing in life if and only if it aligns with our chosen mission in life.
Then, we do NOT live our lives to please social norms.
If any feather gets ruffled, so be it.
Summing up…
My brothers and sisters, therefore, I urge each of you to embrace the supremely powerful philosophy of ‘less is more’ in your life.
Rest assured this single decision of yours will transform your life in unimaginable ways…!
Because, ultimately, such an intentional way is the only way to lead a life that is meaningful on its own terms.
Thanks for reading the essay.
Bidding you a fond goodbye now.
