Essentialism

**Author:** Greg McKeown **Estimated Reading Time:** 45 minutes

### What You'll Learn

You will learn why almost everything you spend your time and energy on is noise, and how a systematic approach to eliminating that noise can transform your work, your relationships, and your sense of purpose. You will learn how to distinguish the vital few from the trivial many, how to reclaim your power to choose, and how to build a life around what truly matters instead of what merely clamors for attention.

### Who This Book Is For

This book is for the person who feels stretched too thin but suspects busyness is not the same as productivity. It is for the professional who says yes to too many requests and then regrets it. It is for the parent who wants to be present but feels pulled in every direction. It is for anyone who has ever thought, "I'm doing so much, but I'm not sure any of it really matters."

The problem is not that you are not doing enough. The problem is that you are trying to do too much, and in doing so, you are making almost no meaningful progress on anything that counts. Most of us live in a state of constant overwhelm. Our calendars are full. Our inboxes overflow. Our to-do lists stretch beyond what any human could complete in a week, let alone a day. We respond to this pressure by working harder, staying later, and sleeping less. We treat busyness as a badge of honor, as if exhaustion were proof of contribution. But here is the quiet truth that Greg McKeown wants you to hear: if you do not prioritize your life, someone else will. And they will not choose what matters to you. They will choose what matters to them. Essentialism is not a time management system. It is not about squeezing more tasks into fewer hours or finding clever hacks to clear your inbox. It is a systematic discipline for determining what is absolutely essential and then eliminating everything that is not. It is the art of discerning the vital few from the trivial many and having the courage to act on that distinction. The word "priority" came into the English language in the 1400s. It was singular. It meant the very first or prior thing. For five hundred years, people understood that you could only have one priority. Then, sometime in the twentieth century, we pluralized the term and started talking about "priorities." We convinced ourselves that we could have multiple first things. But we cannot. When everything is a priority, nothing is. McKeown argues that the way of the Essentialist is not about getting more done in…