Can Simplicity Lead You To Authenticity?

What is the self? Most of us are too busy chasing money, hoping to have a better 'status', a better 'identity'. Through this process, we tend to forget our 'authentic self'. Kent Thune, a financial blogger I follow, talked about this in his blog here.

He talked about rediscovering ourselves by doing the direct opposite, which is: simplifying. Instead of searching for new things to adapt, learn and become, we should find things to remove and simplify. Instead of working hard to increase our income, we should think of reducing our expenses. He said one can only find him/herself by removing things and that removal is the foundation of simplicity. Quite an interesting concept but strikingly different from my worldview.

I am veered more towards John Locke's tabula rasa(clean slate) view which argues that all of us are born with a mind identical to a blank slate, on which experiences are written. Hence we do not have innate ideas, but rather ideas that are fed into us by experiences. I find it difficult to understand Kent's meaning of 'self'. I see the self as an ever changing persona that becomes more and more complex over time. More of a self authorship of ourselves than his version of an innate pristine self that can be found through simplicity. Interesting nonetheless.