There’s a counterintuitive truth about speed that most people miss: the fastest way forward isn’t always the most direct route. Sometimes, the quickest path to your destination requires stripping away everything that looks like progress but isn’t.

This is the velocity of simplicity—the exponential acceleration that happens when you remove rather than add, when you subtract rather than multiply, when you choose elegance over complexity.

Most people approach problems like they’re packing for a trip. They add more tools, more features, more steps, more safeguards. They believe that comprehensive preparation leads to better outcomes. But they’re optimizing for the wrong variable.

The masters of any craft understand a different principle: speed comes from reduction, not accumulation.

Consider the sculptor who sees the statue trapped inside the marble. Their genius isn’t in what they add—it’s in what they remove. Every strike of the chisel is an act of subtraction, revealing the essential form that was always there.

Or think about the entrepreneur who builds a product with one feature that solves one problem perfectly, while their competitors build Swiss Army knives that solve everything poorly. The simple solution wins not because it does more, but because it does less, better.

This principle scales across every domain of work and life.

In writing, clarity comes from cutting words, not adding them. The most powerful sentences are the ones stripped of everything unnecessary, where every word carries weight and nothing is wasted.

In design, elegance emerges from constraint. The best interfaces feel effortless because someone fought a thousand small battles against complexity, winning each one by choosing what not to include.

In strategy, focus multiplies force. The companies that dominate markets aren’t the ones that serve everyone—they’re the ones that serve someone so well that everyone else becomes irrelevant.

But simplicity isn’t simple. It’s the most sophisticated choice you can make because it requires you to understand what truly matters.

Complexity is easy. You can always add more. More features, more options, more contingencies. Complexity feels productive because it looks like work. But it’s often just procrastination in disguise—a way to avoid the harder choice of deciding what’s essential.

Simplicity is hard. It demands that you know your core purpose so clearly that you can sacrifice everything else for it. It requires the confidence to say no to good opportunities so you can say yes to great ones.

The velocity of simplicity isn’t just about moving faster—it’s about moving with purpose. When you strip away the non-essential, what remains isn’t just cleaner. It’s more powerful.

Think about your current projects, your daily routines, your decision-making processes. How much of what you’re doing is actually moving you toward your goal? How much is just motion without direction?

Every complexity you remove is energy you can redirect toward what matters. Every unnecessary step you eliminate is time you can invest in excellence. Every distraction you cut is focus you can apply to impact.

The question isn’t how much you can handle. The question is how little you need to achieve what you want.

Start subtracting. Start simplifying. Start choosing.

The fastest route to where you want to go might be through fewer steps, not more.