Simple is better than complex.

It's the new year! Coffee is in hand, IDE open. Your first programming task? Understanding what you wrote last year.

There's a joke that goes:
“When I wrote this code, only God and I understood it. Now, only God does.”

That joke exists for a reason.

We don’t keep code simple because we lack skill. We keep it simple because we understand how humans work. Context fades. Memory lies. And future-you will not remember why that clever solution made sense at the time.

Simple code makes intent obvious. It doesn’t require archaeology. It lets someone make changes without fear. In corporate speak, this means changes can be shipped faster and by more team members.

When writing code, don’t be clever, be obvious.

We like to think of simplicity as a form of optimization, but instead of optimizing for performance, you are optimizing for understanding.

The Zen of Python says (among other things):
✅ Explicit is better than implicit
✅ Simple is better than complex
✅ Readability counts

We don’t believe this is Python-specific; it’s good programming advice.

Adding complexity is easy.
Keeping simplicity takes discipline.

And that discipline is the best gift you can give yourself at the start of a new work year.