Pressure is the psychological and physiological weight created by high expectations, limited time, and significant consequences.
There is no actual definition of pressure. Pressure causes conscious action instead of relying on muscle memory which causes mistakes in big moments.
I watched a video recently on pressure which rationalized mistakes in large moments to “the lights being too bright”, a way to describe succumbing to pressure. It also described others rising to the occasion, and performing under great pressure which is a differentiator between high achievers and others. However, when it comes to pressure, it is not one’s ability to perform under pressure, but rather the absence of pressure at all due to repetition.
Under pressure you don’t rise to the occasion, you sink to the level of your training.
Alex Honnold is a climber famous for free-soloing el-cap and most recently, Taipei 101. In the documentary “Free Solo”, his amygdala was shown to have a damped response to images that caused a control group “stress”. This wasn’t a result of a mutation, or defect in Alex’s brain, but rather due to his repetitions in scary situations as a professional climber, to the point where things that most people would consider “scary” are routine and normal to him, allowing himself to fade the fight or flight response of pressure.
The same thing goes for things like test anxiety, or interviewing. Putting in the reps to make yourself comfortable in situations where you normally would not be is the differentiator between crumbling under pressure and thriving. When you feel the pressure, put in the reps.
Engineering
This was meant to be a note on metaphysical pressure but pressure is also . This is a big deal in fluid mechanics (MTE352).