Profound Simplicity

Diego Rodriguez of Metacool, my mentor in this blogging madness, had an intriguing post recently about the power of simplicity. Diego described the stunning simplicity with which Associate Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor described the ideas on the U.S. Constitution. Diego’s post reminded me of something that organizational theorist Karl Weick always talks about when he describes the stages that people go through when they make sense of overwhelming events or ideas. To quote Weick, “people often go through at least three stages when they deal with the inexplicable: superficial simplicity, confused complexity and profound simplicity.” Weick explains that our first reactions to events or a body of knowledge is to develop dangerous oversimplification, usually wrong and downright destructive. Then we face the difficult stage of realizing that we are oversimplifying things, which means that we are flooded with confusion and develop excessively complex ideas and solutions. After what can be years of struggle with the complexity, some people develop the ability to identify and explain to others what really matters. 

Sandra Day O’Connor has reached this level of wisdom with the law, as Diego shows, and it is sight to behold when it happens – so long as you realize that there is also danger in listening to such gifted people because they can make things that are very hard to learn look very easy. Weick applies this perspective in his lovely online essay Leadership When Events Don’t Play By The Rules, but this is just one example, it can be applied to almost any problem where there is overwhelming information or emotion.  Or if you want to go to the original source, see William Schutz's book Profound Simplicity – which is out of print, but you can get used copies on Amazon.

Comments

[unsecured business funding]

According to Rules Leadership when Events Don't Play By the Rules, Most of all, in inexplicable times, people have to keep moving. Recovery lies not in thinking then doing, but in thinking while doing and in thinking by doing. No one has the answers.

[Kent Corbell]

The 3 stages of understanding of complex ideas listed here seem to correlate to what Ken Wilber calls the pre/trans fallacy. It's too easy, and can be havoc-wreaking, to confuse the transcendent profound simplicity of mastery with the pre-mastery oversimplification of a first blush. Wilber's work is focused on cognitive understanding of complex ideas like spirituality, sociology, etc... I think the stages of design-mind understanding so simply described here (pun intended) is similar.