Yes, I know what I'm asking is basically sacrilege in the 'Soulsborne' community but I've played quite a few Souls games and I am kind of over the whole 'challenging myself' thing. Part of the reason I was originally drawn to the Souls franchise was the difficulty but now I just want to play Fashion Souls with a cool-ass character in a cool-ass world doing cool-ass shit. The game has so much lore and such a beautiful world and just so much creativity in general that the difficulty seems like a distraction from enjoying it.
I've heard using summons is a good way to alleviate some of the difficulty. Are there any other effective ways?
Summons are the way to go. Especially when combined with spells/incantations. You can kill most bosses by just summoning and using Rot Breath and just running away. Some bosses also have weaknesses that you can exploit.
But if all else fails, summoning other players is probably the easiest way.