Response to Malcolm Gladwell's "The Tipping Point"

In "The Tipping Point", Malcolm Galdwell says that small events and changes can spark a much larger change than we had expected. In this piece, he provides so many relatable examples that capture the reader's attention, and pull them into the story. As I was reading, I connected with every example that he gave. One example in particular made me feel like I was part of the story. He explained how yawning sparks a whole revolution of yawning. If you think about it, when someone yawns, anyone around them who saw them yawn will yawn too. Even as I'm writing the word yawn, I am yawning. It is such a small act, just a simple yawn, but it creates a long trail of yawn after yawn after yawn, until the whole building has yawned. What he was trying to say by giving this example, is that we often don't know what the outcome is going to be from our decisions, and it is out of our control as to how much of an impact we will have. I want to challenge this, because I feel like there are some situations where we do have control over the outcome. He says that everything is pretty much left up to chance, but I believe that there are also some events that we have total control over. His purpose for writing this piece is good though. He wants the reader to look back on their actions and their lives, and see how their small daily activities created something bigger than they ever imagined. As I was reading "The Tipping Point", I had so many memories flash back in my mind, and many of them, I would say, turned out unexpectedly. Gladwell made a valid point when he said "little changes [have] big effects" (page 678). Now, every choice I make stops me and makes me think about the impact that it will have on my life. Gladwell made a powerful statement.