The Courage to Cut (2 Min Read) | Vol. 210

July 3, 2026

“I have made this longer than usual because I have not had time to make it shorter.” – Blaise Pascal

The Courage to Cut

In the summer of 1776, Thomas Jefferson sat in a hot Philadelphia room and watched his work get torn apart. He’d drafted the Declaration of Independence and poured himself into it. Then he gave it to a committee. Then Congress got its hands on it.

Over July 3rd and into the 4th, they cut and cut. By the end, about a quarter of his words were gone, including a passage he’d fought to keep.

Jefferson was crushed. As a writer who’s endured many a writer’s workshop, I feel his pain. He later recalled sitting beside Benjamin Franklin, who was “not insensible to these mutilations.” Franklin leaned over to comfort him. He told him a story.

A young hatter was opening his first shop and wanted a sign. He wrote out: “John Thompson, Hatter, makes and sells hats for ready money,”  with a picture of a hat at the end. He showed it around. One friend said “Hatter” and “makes hats” say the same thing. Cut it. Another said no one cares that you sell for cash. Cut it. One by one, the words fell away.

When done, the sign read “John Thompson” with a picture of a hat. That’s it. Every cut made it better. 

Here’s the thing. The Declaration we celebrate isn’t Jefferson’s original draft. Only some of that work remains. The founders didn’t add their way to greatness. They subtracted.

We’re wired to do the opposite. A 2021 study in Nature found that when people try to improve something, they almost always add. They shovel on more even when reminded that less is an option, they still reach for more. 

Researchers handed people a wobbly Lego structure to fix. Most added blocks to prop it up. Far fewer simply pulled out the single block, causing the wobble. It actually seems obvious when you’re not the one tasked with fixing the wobble. 

More feels like progress. Less feels like loss. Yet, the best edits are deletions.

It takes courage to cut. This is the heart of The ONE Thing. Extraordinary results don’t come from doing more. They come from doing less, better. 

Two hundred and fifty years ago, a handful of patriots changed the world with a single document. But the lesson isn’t only in what they wrote. It’s in what they were brave enough to cross out.

Franklin’s hatter ended up with a sign that said exactly what mattered and nothing more. So did America.

One question to ponder in your thinking time: What would my life look like if I had the courage to cut a quarter of what I’m doing?

Make an Impact!
Jay Papasan
Author I CEO I Coach