To Simplify Complications is the First Essential of Success - George E. E. H. Moore

The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less. — Socrates

Socrates

At its heart, this saying turns ordinary ambition upside down. Rather than locating happiness in constant acquisition, it suggests that peace comes from training the mind to take genuine pleasure in what is already prese...

It is not that I'm so smart, it's just that I stay with problems longer. — Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein

At first glance, Einstein’s remark sounds like modesty, yet it does more than downplay genius. By saying he simply ‘stays with problems longer,’ he shifts attention from innate talent to sustained effort, suggesting that...

If you can’t solve a problem, then there is an easier problem you can solve: find it. — George Pólya

George Pólya

George Pólya’s remark distills a central habit of good thinking: when a problem resists direct attack, progress often begins by reframing it. Rather than treating difficulty as a dead end, he invites us to see it as a si...

Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful. — William Morris

William Morris

William Morris compresses an entire philosophy of domestic life into one memorable sentence: keep only what serves a purpose or stirs genuine aesthetic delight. At first glance, the advice sounds like simple housekeeping...

Simple things should be simple; complex things should be possible. - Alan Kay

Alan Kay

Alan Kay’s line captures an ideal that good systems repeatedly strive for: everyday actions shouldn’t require extraordinary effort, yet ambitious goals shouldn’t be blocked by rigid limitations. In other words, the commo...

The meaning of life is just to be alive. It is so plain and so obvious and so simple. — Alan Watts

Alan Watts

Alan Watts’s line cuts against the habit of treating life as a riddle to be solved. Instead of offering a grand theory, he points to something embarrassingly direct: the fact of being alive is already the “answer.” In th...