Be An Essentialist

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The excellent book "Essentialism" by Greg McKeown describes what an essentialist is. I would like to personalize it in one pithy example. Coffee. I love coffee. Not mocha frappaccinos. Not sweet cream cold brews...coffee. You know? Hot Water over ground up roasted coffee berries?. And I have only too recently discovered how remarkably bad most coffee is, once my taste buds had been exposed to carefully prepared...coffee. The essence of coffee is the flavor that emerges from a long series of successful preparations. Once you experience the essence of coffee - not the sugar added to it, not the hazelnut creamer...but the coffee itself, you may appreciate it the way I do. It starts with coffee that is grown in a particular region of the world. I know very little about is part. Then, there is a process of making sure that the berries are properly roasted (probably a bunch of important stuff in here, I am ignorant to). The roasted beans then need to be ground using a burr grinder, not a blade grinder, so that the ground sizes are consistent. And this needs to be done within the correct time period after the "beans" were roasted. Then, once you have the freshly burr-grinded coffee, measured in the precise quantity, there is a whole process of "the pour over" that I won't go into. The point is that I love sticking to the "essence" of coffee. This seems to be a theme in my life that I have been learning recently - I love the essence of things. I don't like things being dressed up to look like something they are not. Coffee should be coffee, not a "coffee flavored drink". Food should be FOOD. Like...from the ground, or it had a mother. Not "processed food like substance" like go-gurt. I think this is why I like the "go" programming language. It is Simple, but not simplistic. It is focused on the essence of a systems language. It's not trying to be something it's not. Look at the menu of In N Out. It's essence is BURGERS. They don't get flowery with their menu, and this is a forcing function for them to remain committed to their essence. Likewise, I enjoy being with people who also appreciate the essence of things.

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