{"id":30401,"date":"2021-04-02T20:58:40","date_gmt":"2021-04-03T00:58:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=30401"},"modified":"2021-04-02T21:51:11","modified_gmt":"2021-04-03T01:51:11","slug":"essentialism-quotes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/essentialism-quotes\/","title":{"rendered":"3 Essentialism Quotes on How to Do Less But Better"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Looking for <em>Essentialism<\/em> quotes by Greg McKeown? What do they teach about prioritizing and time management?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Essentialism<\/em> is a 2014 book by leadership and business strategist Greg McKeown, in which he walks you through his principles of essential living. The following <em>Essentialism<\/em> quotes capture some of his key ideas about essential living, prioritizing, and time management.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Keep reading for <em>Essentialism<\/em> quotes by Greg McKeown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><em>Essentialism<\/em> Quotes by Greg McKeown<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p><strong>\u201cEssentialism is not about how to get more things done; it\u2019s about how to get the right things done. It doesn\u2019t mean just doing less for the sake of less either. It is about making the wisest possible investment of your time and energy in order to operate at our highest point of contribution by doing only what is essential.\u201d<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>According to McKeown, essentialism is not about being more efficient or doing more with less (or less with less), as many companies demand of employees. It requires stopping regularly to ask yourself whether you\u2019re spending your time and resources on the right things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We have numerous activities and opportunities to choose from, and obviously we can\u2019t invest our time and energy in all of them. Some may be good or excellent opportunities, but most are inconsequential; few are crucial or essential. Essentialism is differentiating among the options and selecting and acting on just a few essential ones while eliminating the rest. It\u2019s doing the right things as opposed to doing more things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Essentialism is investing your time and energy only in what\u2019s essential in order to make your optimum contribution to activities and projects that really matter. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p><strong>\u201cIf it isn\u2019t a clear yes, then it\u2019s a clear no.\u201d<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>One of the most crucial skills for practicing essentialism is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/saying-no\/\">saying no<\/a>. If you can\u2019t say no to the nonessential, you won\u2019t have the time and energy to pursue the truly important things.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Saying no makes us uncomfortable because it\u2019s socially awkward. There seem to be only two options: say no and endure the immediate awkwardness, or say yes and regret it much longer. However, you can learn to say no gracefully and even get people to respect you for it in the process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p><strong>\u201cThe killer question: \u201cIf I didn\u2019t already own this, how much would I spend to buy it?\u201d<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>McKeown is a firm believer in using the extreme criteria for deciding on how to spend your time.&nbsp;The closet-organizing example shows how extreme criteria work. While sorting your clothing, if you base your decisions on a broad standard of whether there\u2019s a chance you\u2019ll wear something at some point in the future, you won\u2019t get rid of much. However, if you ask yourself \u201cIf I didn\u2019t already own this, how much would I spend to buy it?\u201d, you can more easily eliminate the nonessential. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Looking for Essentialism quotes by Greg McKeown? What do they teach about prioritizing and time management? Essentialism is a 2014 book by leadership and business strategist Greg McKeown, in which he walks you through his principles of essential living. The following Essentialism quotes capture some of his key ideas about essential living, prioritizing, and time management. Keep reading for Essentialism quotes by Greg McKeown.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":30414,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[40,7,43],"tags":[248],"class_list":["post-30401","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-books","category-lifestyle","category-self-improvement","tag-essentialism","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v24.3 (Yoast SEO v24.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>3 Essentialism Quotes on How to Do Less But Better - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Looking for Essentialism quotes by Greg McKeown? These quotes capture some of his key ideas about essential living and time management.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/essentialism-quotes\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"3 Essentialism Quotes on How to Do Less But Better\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Looking for Essentialism quotes by Greg McKeown? These quotes capture some of his key ideas about essential living and time management.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/essentialism-quotes\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Shortform Books\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-04-03T00:58:40+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-04-03T01:51:11+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/wordpress.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/time-clock-watch-routine.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1920\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1080\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Darya Sinusoid\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Darya Sinusoid\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/essentialism-quotes\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/essentialism-quotes\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Darya Sinusoid\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/0421cce75bc249b11e2517b3a91f9c46\"},\"headline\":\"3 Essentialism Quotes on How to Do Less But Better\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-04-03T00:58:40+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-04-03T01:51:11+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/essentialism-quotes\/\"},\"wordCount\":489,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/essentialism-quotes\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/time-clock-watch-routine.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Essentialism\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Books\",\"Lifestyle\",\"Self-Improvement\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/essentialism-quotes\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/essentialism-quotes\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/essentialism-quotes\/\",\"name\":\"3 Essentialism Quotes on How to Do Less But Better - Shortform Books\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/essentialism-quotes\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/essentialism-quotes\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/time-clock-watch-routine.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-04-03T00:58:40+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-04-03T01:51:11+00:00\",\"description\":\"Looking for Essentialism quotes by Greg McKeown? 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