Extremely simple and incredibly difficult

Great design is both extremely simple and incredibly difficult to achieve.

Simple, because it requires only a very few activities–observing people and expressing ideas–and those are not very complicated to perform. There are certainly tricks of the trade, and more or less efficient ways of doing these things, but the core actions are not complex.

Difficult, because the energy and dedication required to do these activities broadly, deeply, and thoroughly enough to find the *right* design solutions is hard to achieve. Most people [don’t have the patience](http://kennethto.tumblr.com/post/9359336429/when-you-first-start-off-trying-to-solve-a) to get there; instead, they settle too early to avoid the discomfort of [not “knowing”](http://bob.ryskamp.org/brain/?p=4619).

I still believe the most important thing I do as a designer is [tolerate ambiguity](http://bob.ryskamp.org/brain/?p=4079). And it’s still the hardest part of my job.