Simplicity is often cited as a contemplative value. As the Shakers sang, "tis a gift to be simple, tis a gift to be free”.
In making things simpler, our days, weeks, or lives overall we can for some period of time withdraw, psychologically, socially, and/or physically in order to experience self and other more openly without the usual demands of daily life.
In so doing a simpler mode of being brackets the usual demands on our time and energy while allowing us to experience the unseen, unheard, and even unimagined. In other words, it aids in awakening to the potential richness of lived experience.
Retreats are one such traditional and common way to this end as are time spent in nature and meditation. Less well known is focusing on a single sense like seeing or hearing. For example, with the sense of seeing as described at The Miksang Institute for Contemplative Photography ("True Perception True Expression") or with sounds from the BBC's Slow Radio ("An antidote to today’s frenzied world. Step back, let go, immerse yourself: it’s time to go slow.")