Coaching practices for Simpler Choice Taoist

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Simpler Choice Taoist, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• Faced with a choice I instinctively reach for the elaborate option
• My systems and routines have grown so elaborate and tangled that just maintaining them drains me, and I can’t even tell anymore which parts actually matter and which I’ve bolted on out of habit
• Everything’s screaming for my attention at once and the sheer pile of it has me frozen
• Every time I try to fix my life I pile more on
• I keep reaching for the tidy simple answer even though the evidence in front of me clearly points to something messier

Practices that may help

1. Making the simpler choice deliberately
   When facing a decision with many options, default to the simpler one unless there is a specific reason to choose complexity.
   Pu: Taoist Simplicity and the Uncarved Block
2. Pu: Taoist Simplicity and the Uncarved Block
   Pu (朴, "uncarved block") is a central image in Laozi’s Tao Te Ching representing a state of original simplicity — potential uncluttered by excess conditioning, opinion, and accumulated complexity. As a practice, pu means deliberately returning to essentials: stripping away unnecessary complexity in decisions, possessions, commitments, and inner speech to restore natural responsiveness.
3. Return to simplicity
   Strip unnecessary complexity from your life and actions — the uncarved block has all possibilities open.
   Wu Wei — the Practice of Effortless Action
4. Returning to essentials when overwhelmed
   When complexity or pressure spikes, ask what the one or two things that genuinely matter are — and do only those.
   Pu: Taoist Simplicity and the Uncarved Block
5. The subtraction practice
   Identify one thing to remove from your life today rather than one thing to add.
   Pu: Taoist Simplicity and the Uncarved Block
6. The Tao Te Ching, Made Practical
   The Tao Te Ching is a 2,500-year-old Chinese classic attributed to Lao Tzu that teaches the art of effortless action (wu wei), simplicity, and yielding — meeting life with less force and more receptivity. Its wisdom is philosophical and contemplative rather than empirically studied; its practices overlap with mindfulness and acceptance-based psychology, which have a more developed research base.
7. Know when not to apply the razor
   Occam’s Razor is a tiebreaker, not a rule: when evidence clearly supports complexity, go there.
   Occam’s Razor: Prefer the Simpler Explanation
8. Occam’s Razor: Prefer the Simpler Explanation
   Occam’s Razor is the heuristic that, all else being equal, the explanation with fewer unnecessary assumptions is preferable. It does not guarantee correctness — the world is sometimes genuinely complex — but it guards against over-fitting, conspiracy thinking, and the cognitive overhead of maintaining elaborate theories.
9. Pu — simplicity and the uncarved block
   Return regularly to an unconditioned, open state before adding complexity or opinion.
   The Tao Te Ching, Made Practical
10. Find and follow the grain of the situation
    Before acting, read the natural structure of the situation and find the line of least friction.
    Wu Wei — the Practice of Effortless Action

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