Peak Pressure Reveals Real Leadership

When Pressure Becomes Your Teacher

During my first year on the job, I went on a call for a woman around my age having an allergic reaction. She was critical and dying right in front of me. I was the lead paramedic on that call. I remember it as if it were yesterday.

I froze.

Thankfully, one of the other paramedics on the scene stepped in and started directing the call, and me. Our patient was stabilized and transported to the hospital, where she made a full recovery. That was a wake-up call. In the years that followed, I would respond to many situations just as serious, some far worse, and I never froze again.

Why?

Training doesn’t eliminate stress. It changes your relationship to it. Much like in professional sports, paramedics train constantly. Some of it is rote memorization—drug doses, algorithms, protocols. But much of it is scenario-based. We go over situation after situation, practicing how to pivot in the moment and modify our training to fit the real world. And the real world is a sort of training all by itself. Repeated exposure to high-stakes events reshapes the nervous system. You learn to track what’s essential. You move without panic. The nervous system adjusts to the weight. Over time, what used to flood you barely moves the needle.

The outside world sees calm under pressure. That’s the difference with professionals. We’re not suppressing fear. We’re oriented in it.

Where Real Leadership Shows Up

I have an assessment based on my experience. When someone reaches their threshold, the outer edge of what they can manage, you see who they really are. The mask drops. It doesn’t matter how they usually lead, how they talk in meetings, or what their resume says. When the pressure hits, that’s when the truth shows up.

This is where emergent leadership happens. Some people hit their threshold and still hold it together. Others scream or lose their cool and mess up. They lose others around them, and usually themselves. That’s where the opportunity for someone else to step in and bring order to the chaos without needing to be asked. That person doesn’t need to scream or bully their way into a leadership role. Something about their presence just holds the moment long enough for it to stabilize. Not because they have the title, but because they have the presence.

A Moment from Crimson Tide

There’s a great moment in the film Crimson Tide that captures this perfectly. I will let the clip speak for itself, but it’s safe to say you’ll get what I mean about leaders who scream. It’s an attempt to control.

We’re living in a time where pressure is all around us. The ‘normal’ (whatever that means anymore) way things used to be is gone. And it’s not coming back. People are on edge and pushed to their threshold of stress. The truth is, most were never trained for this kind of sustained intensity. They’re doing the best they can, but the old ways of coping aren’t working. I’ve seen this before, in a different way, and my experience can help. I know what it takes.

I’m building this community around a shared clarity. No cheerleading or kumbaya bullshit. I’m sharing real-world tested ways to increase the threshold of your nervous system to accommodate the changing times.

Many of my brother and sister first responders were people who didn’t shrink or freeze when it got real, not because they were fearless, but because they had adapted to the weight.

I’m talking about building the capacity to handle more pressure. Because we have to assume it’s going to get more difficult, that way we will be prepared.

I’m offering an opportunity to build composure. With a group of like-minded people. You don’t need more information or knowledge to lead in the times we are in today. You steady yourself so others can orient. And you don’t do it alone.