17 Dec 2025 · 0 min
Brian Johnson on Phil Stutts' insight that how you react to small, everyday moments matters more than how you handle dramatic events. Your response to tiny things is what builds greatness, not your response to the big ones.
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Hi, this is Brian. Welcome back to another Optimize plus one. In our last couple ones, we flipped through my notes from session number 150something with Myota spiritual godfather Phil Stutts. On page one, we had success. Doesn't matter in this world, commitment does. On the middle of page three, we had real enthusiasm is passing through the worst and realizing it's the best. Now, looking at the bottom of page three, we see how you react to dramatic things is good. How you react to small things is great. That's Phil says Where the Power Is now as I reread my messy writing, I actually remember asking Phil to hold on a second so I could write that down. I repeat, how you react to dramatic things is good, but how you react to small things is great. That's where the power is. As we've discussed, Phil and all great teachers really is all about the small things. He calls our moment to moment experiences with ourselves and others microtransactions. Although we tend to ignore them and think only the big stuff is really important, he flips that around and says it's the tiny things that matter the most. Of course, by practicing with the small things, we're well trained to handle the big things when they inevitably arrived. So one more time. How you react to dramatic things is good. How you react to small things is great. That's where the power is. And David Allen comes to mind. As we've discussed in our interview years ago, he said that the sublime comes through the mundane and that's today's plus one. Let's bring our best to the small things today. Little P.S. fun family fact here. Midway through writing this plus one, I heard a ferocious banging on my office door. Not the tap, tap, tap, but like jumbo, crazy loud. My initial reaction was what the not fantastic. Then I ran my if then algorithm and got ready to welcome my little man. And what did I see? I see Emerson in his brand new bright neon green helmet standing next to his sister in her bike helmet. Daddy, look at my new bike. Yep, his new bike we got the night before was downstairs. He cruised down, hopped on it and rode it around the house. To think that I almost ruined that tiny moment by getting upset in the middle of writing this +1 made me laugh. Here's to moving from theory a lot easier than practice to practice with the little things and the little ones today.
We hope you enjoyed this episode of Optymyze with Brian Johnson to find out more go to Optimize Me.
Hey guys, this is Brian with a quick little P.S. i. I'm really excited to let you know about an event we're working on. Plan is to make it the premier self optimizing event of 2020. We're calling it Optimize 2020. You the modern hero. Basic idea. Five days, 101 world class luminaries. One million people. You can learn more and get your tickets to the online and offline event at optimize me. Twitter2020. Again, that's optimize me 2020. Hope to see you there.
