Less But Better

Less but better. Every time I read that line, my brain plays a trick on me and sees the word butter. Actually, less but butter would work, too.

Less but better is most famously associated with Dieter Rams, a German industrial designer known for his minimalist and functional approach to design. Less but butter is now not-so-famously associated with me, an American stoneworker trying to design his life.

I love butter. I want the rich stuff you don't need too much of to be full. 

The typical way of doing stonework, and most trades, is to work 8 to 10 hours a day, at least five days a week, for as many years as you can take it, until your back and knees give out and they take you out behind the barn to put you out of your misery.

I'm sorry, but that doesn't work for me. Why can’t I set up my work in a way that works for me? It turn out, I can. And so can you. I don't know why I had that realization so late in life. But butter, sorry, better, late than never. 

One way is to take on fewer projects. The blue-collar part of me recoils from the thought. What a lazy son of a bitch. You should be just as miserable as the rest of us. I don't know where that voice even came from. I didn't grow up with it. I guess it came from wanting to fit in on job sites when I first started out, trying to prove that I was something that I wasn't. 

I don't have to listen to that voice. There’s another voice, one that thinks less might lead to more. More of the good stuff. More energy to bring my best work to the right projects. More connection to clients and collaborators. More money. More space between projects for creativity, for the unexpected to arise.

Less but better. 

More butter.