You will feel less and less a function of other people’s to-do lists andagendas. As a result, the execution of those essentialsbecomes more and more effortless.MORE CONTROLYou will gain confidence in your ability to pause, push back, or not rushin.

Every day it becomes more clear than the day before how theessential things are so much more important than the next mostimportant thing in line. Life will become less about efficientlycrossing off what was on your to-do list or rushing through everythingon your schedule and more about changing what you put on there in thefirst place. And I most certainly would never have writtenthe words that you are now reading, absorbing, and hopefully thinkinghard about how to integrate into your own life.Becoming an Essentialist is a long process, but the benefits are endless.Here are some of the ways the disciplined pursuit of less can changeyour life for the better.MORE CLARITYRemember the metaphorical closet we discussed in chapter 1? As youcontinue to clear out the closet of your life, you will experience areordering of what really matters.

I might never have written forHarvard Business Review. It was the quiet, personal confirmation of the way of theEssentialist.Had I not chosen the path of the Essentialist, I might never havepursued the “Stanford or bust” strategy. When I finally received myoffer the second time around it couldn’t have been more clear to me thatthis was the most vital thing for me to be doing. Instead, I felt calm, focused, and in control.I applied only to Stanford-both times. But despite the uncertainty of notyet knowing whether I had been accepted, I didn’t feel anxious ornervous.

Pursuit of less