The Way of Emacs

March 4, 2025

Modern life is too loud: overloaded, overcomplicated, and packed with distractions that pull us away from what matters. Digital absorption drains time, energy, and focus — until it starts chipping away at your income, relationships, and well-being.

Beneath the noise, there’s something quieter and far more powerful: a way of working and thinking that is adaptable, intentional, and completely under your control.

Don't worry, this isn’t about learning Emacs (a very powerful text editor). It’s about what Emacs represents: a unique system for cutting through static and shaping life on your own terms. Emacs embodies this philosophy, but you don’t need to use it. Let’s treat it as a metaphor for a composable, modular, intentional life.

You might want to discover what’s possible when you stop accepting defaults and start designing your own way forward.

Core principles

• Life as a modular system – Everything is a building block. Skills, habits, workflows — each should be composable, extensible, and replaceable.
• The pursuit of signal – Cut the cruft. Remove distractions. Optimize for clarity, efficiency, and deep focus.
• Thoughtful control – Mastery isn’t about following rules; it’s about understanding how to shape your own system.
• Customization over convention – The best solutions are the ones that fit you. Build, tweak, refine — never settle for defaults.
• Plain text thinking – The world overcomplicates things. Keep it simple, readable, and future-proof.

Digital sufficiency at its finest means taking control, living deliberately, dropping what doesn't work for you, and hacking the rest so it does.

This is The Way of Emacs: Lead when called; follow when right; but always own your path.