What is simple and complex thinking?

Simple and Complex Thinking aren’t just alternative choices of thinking — they also define neurotypes and professional cultures.

Simple and complex thinking are both caricatured as feeble by their opposite camps. Simple thinking is sometimes viewed as superficial and reductionist — but this is far from the truth when done properly. Great simple thinking is the ability to distill complex things down to a succinct and valid essence. It’s really hard to do well.

On the other hand, complex thinkers are sometimes misunderstood as getting lost in details and subtleties, when in fact the best complex thinkers use those details to arrive at extraordinary applied insights.

And yet, it’s not a matter of one or the other. You can have both.

The most successful thinkers in all fields master both styles. It’s a rare trait that sets them apart.

In business, titans such as Ray Dalio show heroic levels of both simple and complex thinking. In physics, Richard Feynman was a Nobel laureate in the complex field of quantum theory, and was also famous for his elegantly simple and entertaining lectures and popular writing.

Both skills can be learned, and in combination they’re a superpower.

Learn to see the simplicity in apparently complex things, and the complexity in apparently simple things. It’s one of the best-kept secrets of creative thinking.

Learn to see the simplicity in apparently complex things, and the complexity in apparently simple things.

(Reference: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/simple-vs-complex-thinking-daniel-engelberg/)