On Ease

"The French Art of Not Trying Too Hard" by Ollivier Pourriol is a serious book with a silly title that I picked up at Messy Nessy's Cabinet in Paris last week. Pourriol is a philosopher with some interesting observations to make, chief of which is that you are never starting anything, only continuing it.

We might think we are starting to write a book or an essay, or beginning some kind of project but, because the inspiration has hit previously, because the ideas are already in our heads, we are not really starting anything - it's already in progress.

This is a useful way to think: everything is already in motion, we just need to try to steer.

(A similar effect is achieved by Warren Ellis, who writes a pitch and then turns that same document into a synopsis, then an outline, then a piece of work, so that he only faces a blank page once, at the beginning of the process.)

Pourriol talks about ease a lot, the idea that when you're doing something that you're good at or that you enjoy, less effort is required. Conversely, if you find yourself putting a lot of unpleasant effort in, you may not be doing what you should be doing. Obviously effort is a subjective idea, because even things we love doing don't always feel easy, so we need to be conscious of the difference between being challenged and essentially wasting energy.

And there are things that we may not have a choice over. Most of us probably don't enjoy filing taxes, but not everything is optional. In that instance, though, Cal Newport's "So Good They Can't Ignore You" comes in handy; Newport would advise that you attempt to file those taxes better than they have ever been filed before - the idea being that devoting yourself to the high-level execution of a task can make it much more interesting and rewarding. I'm sure he's right, but I still send my receipts to an accountant.

Pourriol sums up his theory in two steps, that work almost like a Zen koan:

1. Continue
2. Start

Like the best ideas, this is irritatingly simple but incredibly effective.

Enjoy Wednesday's flow.