My 4 Favorite Life Lessons From Greg McKeown

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Hey Reader,

I remember the first time ever I heard about minimalism. It made me want to go into my closet, organize my clothes by colors and functionality, and get rid of things that were old, that I didn’t wear, or weren’t part of my core style.

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It was freeing, and simpler this way, and enjoyed this entry into a more minimal lifestyle. I started looking for ways to reduce, and simplify my life.

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I was a minimalist for a while, that is until I came across this new concept, ‘Essentialism.’ It was a new term from a book by Greg Mckeown, and I was curious.

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I wondered what possibilities this concept would have when stacked against minimalism, and it didn’t disappoint. So here are my 4 favorite life lessons from Greg Mckeown.

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Lesson 1: Less is more.

There's this idea that he reiterates throughout his book, Essentialism, eliminate, eliminate, eliminate, get rid of those things that you don't really need. There's so much excess, so many things that we kind of need, but kind of don't need.

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Lesson 2: Focus on the why before the how.

When there's a great enough why, you can bear almost any how. You can figure out almost any how. And this goes back to an idea of Friedrich Nietzsche, where he talks about how important the why is. When it matters to you, when you have skin in the game and there's a personal stake, the progression of this thing will make you better in the future because of it. You're going to feel better, you're going to look better, you're going to have better relationships. Whatever the outcome is that you want, you start to think of why you're doing that thing.

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Lesson 3: Batch tasks.

Put similar tasks into one bracket of time and get those things done. And so it's funny, I'll give you a story. When I was starting to do more of the podcast and doing the videos, I wanted to just kind of record when I got an idea and it would come to me.

So sometimes I would record like a Monday, then I would record that Wednesday, then I'd record Saturday, then I'd record Sunday. And at the time, I didn't just have a stable podcast set up because I was living in a college dorm room. It was my freshman year of college. And so every time that I went to record, I would go to the wardrobe and I'd grab out the two lights, then I'd grab the iPhone tripod because I was recording with the iPhone at the time. I was wasting so much time setting up and putting everything away, that when I batched recording to one day, I saved more than 1 hour of setup time per week.

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​Lesson 4: Everything requires trade-offs and trade-offs aren't a bad thing.

So what's great about Greg is he stresses the importance of trade-offs. An essentialist see trade-offs as a necessary inherent part of life. Not as something to bemoan, but as something to be grateful for. Instead of asking, what do I have to give up? They ask, what do I want to go big on? It's noting that trade offs are required in life, not a luxury, not a want, not a desire, not a sacrifice even. They're just required. They're a necessary part of life.
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This Week’s Content

Tuesday (10/8):

4 Psychological Biases That Are Clouding Your Judgement | EP312 | Isaac Velez Show

Wednesday (10/9):

How The Lone Wolf Mentality Is KILLING Your Love Life - Sir Aimezing

Thursday (10/10):

You'll Never Have It Fully FIGURED Out | EP313 | Isaac Velez Show

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Until next time, keep optimizing the human experience,

Isaac