Brian Johnson walks through an 11-second presence exercise inspired by Christopher Reeve's Clark Kent to Superman transformation. The routine uses posture and breathing to flip into your more confident self, drawing on Amy Cuddy's research and Richard Wiseman's "as if" principle.
You're listening to Optymyze with Brian Johnson. More wisdom in less time.
Hi, this is Brian. Welcome back to another Optimize plus one. In our last plus one, we talked about our inaugural Optimize Coach program. And there's still a little more time to sign up and join hundreds of other passionate optimizers and making this the greatest year of our lives, while helping others in our lives do the same. By the way, check out the link Optimize Me Coach now. Specifically in that plus one, we discussed the very first email we send out with the very first micro exercise to invite Optimus us to the party. It goes like this. Stand up, expand, relax. Pull the thread through your head. Take a deep breath in through the nose, down into the belly. Chest up, chin down. Relax a little more. Expand a little more and smile. Hi, Optimus. That is the optimist you. And we're gonna start and end every single one of our 43 weekly sessions together with that exercise. Constantly remembering to physically flip the switch from the not quite optimist version of ourselves to the let's do this optimist version of us. Now, as I wrap my brain around the importance of this little exercise and how to integrate it into our lives, I was thinking that it's kinda like our present Amy Cuddy style phone booth. The one Clark Kent pops into to change from his meek self into his heroic Superman identity. Which led me to Google. Google, I'd like some love on Clark Kent to Superman transformation, please. I literally typed almost exactly that. Enter this epic old school one minute Superman video clip. Check out the plus one link on the site or in the app for more and actually watch it. It's incredibly cool. And note, pay special attention to seconds 23 to 35. It's a minute long, 23 to 35. As Christopher Reeves transforms himself from Clara Kent to Superman, you'll notice that he goes from a hunched over, apologetic, squeaky voiced, suboptimist version of himself to, well, Superman. It's almost as if the script said, stand up, expand, relax. Pull the thread through your head. He literally gets inches taller. Take a deep breath in through the nose, down into the belly. Chest up, chin down. Relax a little more. Expand a little more. And smile. A little side here. At 45 seconds into that clip, you may notice some room for coaching with some mouth breathing that Clark to Superman does. We could say this. Love it, Clark. Well done on standing up nice and tall. Expanding while relaxing and smiling, knowing you've got it going on. Tiny little thing. Let's Keep that breath coming in and out through the nose. Nice light deep into the diaphragm. Slightly longer. Exhale with a smile. Yep, that's it. Superman's in the house. All of which leads us to today's plus one. Let's remember Amy Cuddy's wisdom on the Power of Presence and Richard Wiseman's wisdom on the as if principle, as we practice flipping and reflipping duct taping. The superhero identity switch. Living as the new version of you. 24 7, 365. Sending the old you on permanent vacation. One more time. Stand up. Expand. Relax. Pull the thread through your head. Take a deep breath in through the nose, down into the belly. Chest up, chin down. Relax a little more. Expand a little more. Smile. Hi, Optimus.
We hope you enjoyed this episode of Optimize with Brian Johnson. To find out more, go to Optimize Me.
