The more experience a person has, the more simplicity is profound.
       - Keith Jarrett, improvisational jazz pianist.

To find the universal elements enough; to find the air and the water exhilarating; to be refreshed by a morning walk or an evening saunter; to be thrilled by the stars at night; to be elated over a bird's nest or a wildflower in spring — these are some of the rewards of the simple life.
      - John Burroughs

Thoreau admonished us to simplify, simplify, simplify
Reduce the number of moving parts
Still complexity creeps in through the back door.
Simplify in order to pay attention to the little things, the quiet things
The little things of beauty
The bird’s nest, the wildflower, the stars at night.

Our life is frittered away by detail.  An honest man has hardly need to count more than his ten fingers, or in extreme cases he may add his ten toes, and lump the rest.  Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity!  I say, let your affairs be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand; instead of a million count half a dozen, and keep your accounts on the thumb nail.  In the midst of this chopping sea of civilized life, such are the clouds and storms and quicksands and thousand-and-one items to be allowed for, that a man has to live, if he would not founder and go to the bottom and not make his port at all, by dead reckoning, and he must be a great calculator indeed who succeeds.  Simplify, simplify.  Instead of three meals a day, if it be necessary eat but one; instead of a hundred dishes, five; and reduce other things in proportion. 
- Thoreau, in his journal. Thoreau And The Art Of Life.

The tendency is to trade our time, our lives, for unnecessary possessions and comfort. 

Simplicity contributes to financial independence -- allows us the freedom to say no to activities and projects taken on to merely cover overhead. Unnecessary overhead. Simplicity contributes to independence from the dominant culture and its preoccupation with selling you stuff you don't need, with the trivial. Simplicity enhances our ability to create work of beauty, to be independent, to deal in truth.  In that way, simplicity contributes to courage of conviction. 

The spiritual life has always been the simple life, the reflective life. Simplicity enhances your relationship with yourself. The fewer the distractions in your life, the more profound your relationship with your inner world. Focusing on the essential is an important aspect of slowing down.

The soul doesn’t relate to complicated. It needs simple pleasures. Wisdom asks for the elimination of unnecessary distraction, detail. Art asks for that too: What is the essence here? What about this creative work resonates on a deeper level? What can be removed without detracting from the whole? Where’s the juice? 

What can you cut out that you wouldn’t miss? What can you give away without impacting the quality of your life?  Where’s the juice of your life? What can be removed to allow you to focus on that?

. . .

What can you cut out that you wouldn’t miss? What can you give away without impacting the quality of your life? Where’s the juice of your life? What can be removed to allow you to focus on that?

. . .

The thoughts offered above were originally written to myself in my journal.

. . .