Warren Buffett is right again

Really successful people say no to almost everything. How to find your NO-pportunities.

Author

Jen Phillips
October 21, 2025

Hi it's Jen,

I don’t know about you, but for me….everything feels (even) more crazy than usual.

Sure, the future of work is … totally unclear. But so is pretty much everything else.

In talking with clients and partners, I’m seeing a theme. A lot of you are saying yes to everything. Just in case. To stay relevant. To prove you're indispensable.

Every project. Every meeting. Every opportunity. Every ask.

But in the noisiness that comes with YESSING all over the place, it’s easy to lose your footing. Everything feels equally urgent. But nothing feels right.

My take: the answer isn't doing more. It's defining your floor.

In today's issue:

  • Why saying yes to everything is a non-great survival instinct

  • How your "floor" becomes your anchor in chaos

  • The framework to define what you won’t do. Even when it’s scary to say no.

Read time: 7 minutes

Default

Let's name what's actually happening in your body right now.

When everything feels unstable, your brain defaults to hypervigilance. It’s whole job becomes scanning for threats. You try to control what you can. You say yes to everything because saying no feels like closing a door you might need later.

This is survival instinct. Not weakness. Biology.

Research on decision-making under chronic uncertainty shows that when we can't predict what's coming, we try to keep all options open. We hedge. We overcommit. We exhaust ourselves trying to be ready for anything.

Our nervous systems literally can’t tell the difference between "my job might be eliminated" and "there's a hungry werewolf in this room." 

Both trigger fight-or-flight. Both flood you with cortisol.

Both make you flee or behave in ways you’d never consider normal. Just to feel like you're doing SOMETHING.

And what makes it worse for women in the workplace - especially in tech right now: the threat is real. With over 92K Tech layoffs in the U.S. this year, women are 1.6x more likely to get laid off than our male colleagues.

The instability is real.

So we take on more. We say yes faster. We work harder.

But the research shows: Saying YES to everything doesn't make you more valuable. It makes you less effective, less strategic, and (much) more burned out.

‘Everything, all at once’ isn’t a healthy strategy. And when we’re spread too thin, and feeling under threat, we're not able to create the kind of focused impact that actually makes us indispensable.

What really happens? We break.

Ambition

So, if that answer isn’t doing more, why are we doing it? Because we don’t have our floor defined.

(This newsletter, and my thinking, is deeply inspired by psychologist Benjamin Hardy, whose important work on future self and raising your floor has been living rent-free in my brain lately.)

Hardy's insight: Your floor is your new minimum. Once you grow to a new level, you raise your floor so that even on your worst days, you're still operating above your old average.

What I know: You don't have to wait until you're "successful" to have a floor. In fact, having our floor defined helps us MOST when things are chaotic.

Like right now.

Warren Buffett said, "The difference between successful people and really successful people is that really successful people say no to almost everything."

But what does that actually mean when everything feels uncertain? It means: They know their floor. And they don't go below it, even when it's uncomfortable.

For me, one way that shakes out in practice:

Unless it's aligned to my purpose or supporting nonprofits, I don't do unpaid speaking anymore (well, my last one is next month).

I used to say yes to every speaking opportunity because "exposure" and "building platform." But my wealth floor says: if I'm giving my time and expertise for free and it's not paid or clearly moving me toward my outlier goal or mission, it's below my floor now.

Old floor: "Good speakers say yes to build their platform"
New floor: "I only speak when it's paid, strategic to my mission, or serves a cause I believe in"

The decision isn't hard anymore because the floor is clear. And my time? It’s my biggest asset.

Here's what happened when I enforced it: I said no to three speaking requests in the last two months. Requests that would have been "great exposure." But they didn’t meet my floor.

And saying no to those created space to focus on the work that could actually be an outlier. Not just another checkbox on my speaking resume.

It’s not about being privileged enough to be selective. The new ambition is knowing what serves you and what's just noise.

So we can survive the chaos without losing ourselves in it.

Autumn teaches this: trees don't struggle annually to keep every leaf. They don't apologize for what they let go of.

They know what they need to survive winter (trunk, roots, core structure), and everything else has to go.

Because that's how they emerge even stronger come spring.

GO | DO

Estimated time: 20 - 30 minutes | Estimated energy: moderate

This week, get to know what serves you (and what’s just noise)

The filter that helps you survive chaos is simple. But to apply it, you need to know what "serves me" actually means. You have to define your floor.

What is Success, Anyway (5 minutes)

What does success mean to YOU…right now? Not what it should mean, not what it meant last year. What really matters in THIS season?

✅ To-do: Name your core three success levers.

Typical success levers include:

  • Health (energy, mental wellbeing, physical fitness, sleep quality)

  • Autonomy (control over time, how you work, where you work)

  • Wealth (financial security, income targets, equity, net worth)

  • Impact (meaningful work, transformation you create, legacy you're building)

  • Happiness (joy, fulfillment, what lights you up)

  • Connectedness (relationships, community, belonging)

These are just examples. Yours can absolutely be different.

Why this matters: Your success levers define what "serves me" means. They're your measuring stick for every decision. Without them, we keep just reacting to whatever feels most urgent.

What’s the Floor? (10 minutes)

For each success lever, define:

Floor: The minimum you'll accept, no matter the situation

Stretch: What you're reaching toward. Your aspirational definition of the success lever.

Using Health as an example:

  • Floor: "I don’t skip sleep or meals for work deadlines."

  • Stretch: "I make time for hiking weekly and have reduced my physical age through healthy living by 5 years."

The floor sets the boundary. The stretch pulls us toward what we’ve now defined as success. Both matter.

Why this matters: Research on values alignment and decision satisfaction shows that when our choices match our stated minimums, we experience less regret, more clarity, and greater resilience during uncertainty.

Serve or Noise (10 minutes)

List everything currently demanding your energy:

  • Active projects you're working on

  • Opportunities you're considering

  • Recurring commitments (meetings, obligations - personal and business)

  • Things you said yes to that you're now questioning

All of it. Be ruthlessly honest. For each item on your list, ask:

  • Does this serve my success levers? Is it above your floor? Is it moving you toward your stretch?

  • Or…is it noise? Feels urgent, but doesn't align with your levers? Keeps you busy but not focused?

Why this matters: Knowing is the first step for better navigating chaos toward our definition of success. 

Release Your NOISE (this week)

Look at your NOISE column. Pick 1-3 things to create a plan to release this week.

The ones that, when you release them, create the most breathing room. Return the most energy.

Using Health as an example:

  • Floor: "I block my calendar for lunch every day. And either decline meetings that conflict, or shift my lunch block to another time.”

Why it matters: You are respecting your definition of success. Even though it may be at the floor level.

Protect What SERVES (ongoing)

Look at your SERVE column. These are the things already in your life that are above your floor, moving you toward your stretch.

How can you protect focus for these? What boundaries do you need to hold? What would it look like to double down here instead of spreading yourself thin? What’s missing?

Using Health as an example:

  • Floor: "I know I tend to get stuck working on the weekend, which stops me from hiking. I’ll start to work with my team and my leader to reduce - or stop - the expectation of weekend work.”

Why it matters: You’re now building your life in the direction of your success levers. Once you build that awareness and shift from reaction to strategic focus, you can’t unsee it.

What’s In It For All Of Us

When you know your floor, you end up battling fewer werewolves 🐺 . You stop saying yes to everything and start saying yes to what actually matters.

And bonus points: Your team watches.

When they see you say no to things beneath your floor…even good things, even opportunities…they learn they can too. They see that having standards isn't arrogant. It's sustainable.

That's how workplace culture shifts. Not through policies or workshops. Through leaders who know their floor and hold it, even when it's uncomfortable.

🌈 And that's the version of leadership that builds (real) success that doesn’t cost everything. 

Forward this to a leader who's drowning in everything. Sometimes we need permission to know our floor and hold it. This is it.

Get In There

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Oh, here we are again. Allllll the way down here. So, what's one thing you're still saying yes to that's beneath your floor? What would happen if you said no this week? Reply and let me know. I want to root for you from the Smoky Mountains.

P.S. Today’s Go | Do is a high-level version of the Success Options PlanningTM framework. I hope it gives you a strong start to setting your Floor and Stretch for your Success Levers

If you’re ready to get support to accelerate your clarity and move toward your definition of success, I’d love to partner with you, help you see what you might not see alone, and build a plan you can execute.

Not coaching. Not therapy. Strategic clarity with execution support for leaders ready to filter the noise and focus on signal.