Hyper-stress…

We began with the feet in the TRX and sawed on our elbows. Sixty seconds later we took thrity and then we rinsed and repeated. This time we sawed from the push up position. Thirty seconds later we were back sawing from our elbows after crawling out from the anchor point to as far as we could stretch the TRX. This felt as if somebody was trying to pull your little intensines out of your belly button.

Next we held a 5 pound weight between our feet while lifting them and our shoulders off the ground. This was followed by three rinses and then a 4 minute Tabata pushup fest. I laughed inside when I saw Chad actually getting air on the first set. Next we hit a low TRX tricep plank that had Chambers crying and Nate buckeling. In a crazy kinda way I smiled through my own shrieks. And then, suddenly, something changed my whole perspective. This was some kinda magic learning for me.

My body was hyper-stressed to say the least. I was breathing hard, sweating like a banchee, and could no longer feel my arms. That’s the normal part. I was leading today so the stopwatch on my ipad was the timer for each exercise. Suddenly, it was as if the battery was on the blink. I couldn’t make out the numbers and had to take a second look and then a third. The numbers were blurred, or so it seemed.

I was also responsible for moving us from exercise to exercise and keeping track of how many sets we had done. I couldn’t remember how many we had done and found myself double and triple checking with Chad to make sure we were on the right set. I couldn’t think straight.

My body was experiencing what all bodies go through when they are out of their comfort zone, in the challenge zone, and right on the edge of the panic zone. My body was shutting down some of it’s senses to send more blood to the areas that were taxing it the most. I guess my system didn’t think my sight was a big deal when it sensed that sight was overrated compared to figuring out how to perform one more chin, one more saw, one more leg up, and one more tricep plank.

Remember this when you communicate with your hyper stressed high performer or, even moreso, when you try to connect with a hyper stressed poor one. When your teammates are pushing themselves to their maximum, their brain is going to go tunnel and conserve its energy. They will NOT hear what you’re saying, they will NOT see what you think is obviously clear, they will NOT remember what just happened and why it went so horribly wrong, and they will think that they have.

Hyper-stressed humans lose sight, sound, taste, touch, and all kinda senses. Your job, as their leader, is to see what they’re missing, and help them destress enough so they can too. All while pushing for performance and not falling victim to the same.

You gotta know your comfort zone, your challenge zone, and touch on the edge of panic if you’re to lead a team to do the same. This will produce something called hyper-stress. You cannot live long in this state. You can’t grow without tasting it. Your job is to figure out how to manage it for Y.O.U. and for them.

Welcome, my friend, to leadership…