Definitions: (1) easy to understand or deal with; (2) sincere; free of deceit or guile; innocent; (3) elegant and plain; not ornate or luxurious; unadorned; not elaborate or complicated; unembellished; (4) modest; unaffected; unassuming; unpretentious
Compatible Qualities: It takes time, teamwork, and tenacity to arrive at simplicity.
Music: “Simple Gifts”
‘Tis the gift to be simple
‘Tis the gift to be free … {1848}
— Elder Joseph Brackett (1797-1882) American Quaker songwriter
Quotes:
• When you bless it, you can own it. Our eye is how God sees the world. Our hand is how God holds the world. Our job is simply to be. — Gerard “Jerry” Vincent Hubert Downs (1949-) and Joe Burull (1947-2019) American photographers
• Everything should be made as simple as possible but not simpler. If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough. — Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German-American physicist
Note: The most complex thing can be boiled down to a simple formula or precept, for instance: E=mc2 or “All You Need Is Love.” As you are creating or investigating a system, its complexity can be overwhelming. But as you begin to grasp it, it begins to collapse back into its simple, unified reality.
Comment: Friar William Ackham, (c.1287-1347) English philosopher & theologian, never said, “The simplest explanation is usually the correct (best) one.” But he did write, “Plurality must never be posited without necessity.”
Question: Although it may not seem obvious for some to ask, “Is there a reality beyond this one?” There are very few who do not succumb to this wonder when Death is breathing down their necks.
Symbol: The number one