The benefits of keeping things simple

When I worked in IT back in the 80s, I remember vividly being taught the KISS principle. KISS means ‘Keep it simple, stupid!’ In the context of computer systems, it means avoiding over-complicating the design.

I’ve just Googled the saying and it was used as a design principle by the US Navy as far back as 1960. The more complicated a system, the more likely it is to go wrong. And complicated systems need specialist engineers to fix them. So, keeping things nicely simple future-proofs the system and makes it easier to maintain.

We can use the same approach in life. If we overcomplicate things we’re adding a layer of stress that could be avoided.

As an example, if you have two friends who don’t get on, inviting them both to lunch at the same time is going to complicate what could otherwise be an enjoyable event. Keeping it simple means nurturing your relationship with person A, then separately nurturing your relationship with person B, and not worrying about the relationship between A and B. Their relationship is not your concern.

Often, things start out simple and become more complicated as new factors come into play. This happens with IT systems as they become more mature. They were originally designed to, say, track income vs expenditure. Then someone asks to include a function to forecast future spending based on historic performance. Then someone else asks to have the ability to flag up when surplus income dips below a certain threshold. Then three other people ask for three other fancy features.

The system is now being asked to do something it wasn’t originally designed to do and has become overly complicated. It ends up being held together with sticking plaster. The best option then is to take a step back and build a new simplified system specifically designed to incorporate all the new requirements.

Again, we can see this playing out in real life. Suppose you like certain brands of products and your local supermarket stocks all of them. As time goes by, the supermarket replaces your favourite brand with a different one that you don’t like. So, now you have to find a shop that sells your favourite brand of that item. This could happen several times and you find you have to go to multiple shops each week to source all your favourite brands. Things are becoming more complicated and your shopping trip is taking longer and longer.

The best option when this happens is to take a step back and look for a way of reducing the number of shops you have to visit each week. Perhaps by investigating a supermarket further away that stocks more of your favourite brands, or buying in bulk each time, so you only have to visit each shop once every month.

So, if things are feeling like they’re getting out of hand, take a deep breath and see if there’s a simpler solution.

Which reminds me of another principle I learned from my IT days: Occam’s razor. In essence, it means ‘The simplest explanation is usually the best one’. American medical researcher Theodore Woodward summed it up like this: ‘When you hear hoofbeats, think of horses not zebras.’

This can play out in various ways and is important in managing anxiety. I’ll give you an example. Some years ago, before I became a Hypnotherapist and learned how to overcome my own anxiety, I signed up at a recruitment agency to look for a new job. I was working at a fairly senior level and established a good rapport with the consultant who was helping me with my job search. She lined up an interview with a company who were very interested in meeting me.

In the meantime, completely out of the blue, a former colleague contacted me with an opportunity and made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. Rather than waste everyone’s time by going to an interview for a job I knew I wasn’t going to take, I came clean with the consultant and said I’d been offered a fantastic job and no longer needed to attend. She wasn’t available to speak to directly, so I had to email her instead. And I never heard another word from her.

My anxious mind imagined all sorts of unpleasant things. I’d let her down badly. She’d gone out of her way to help me find a new job and I’d just walked away. She may have been banking on the recruitment fee and I’d cost her dearly. She must think I was really rude and ungrateful. I fretted about it for years.

Some time later I bumped into her at a meeting and we got talking. She was perfectly fine, as if nothing happened. I mentioned that I’d felt bad about letting her down over the job and she said something like, ‘Oh don’t worry, it happens all the time. All part and parcel of recruitment. Sorry if I didn’t get back to you, I was just focused on finding another candidate for the vacancy.’

If I’d stopped for a moment, I would have realised the reality of the situation. In the meantime I’d made a simple scenario unnecessarily complicated by imagining all sorts of far-fetched explanations.

So, if you’re fretting about someone’s reaction to you and imagining it’s something you’ve said or done, remember that there could be a million reasons why they’re behaving like they are.

And the simplest explanation is most likely the correct one.