Under Pressure: The Human Behind the Performance
Performance looks polished. Pressure feels human.
Under Pressure is a podcast about what really happens inside the human system when the stakes are high.
Hosted by Dr. Alyse Munoz and Dr. Matt Hood, this show explores the psychology, physiology, and identity behind performance in high-pressure environments — from tactical and first responder roles to esports, athletics, leadership, and everyday life.
Under Pressure: The Human Behind the Performance
Why Pressure Isn’t The Problem
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Ever felt the gap between how strong you look and how scattered you feel? We built “Under Pressure: The Human Behind The Performance” to close that gap with straight talk, smart tools, and a roundtable where practitioners and performers learn side by side. Pressure isn’t going away, so we show how to work with it—without fluff, clichés, or complicated jargon.
We start by redefining high performance as a human experience, not a job title. Parents, founders, artists, athletes, and first responders all carry load; the difference is regulation. We explore clear language—pressure, composure, focus, resilience—that helps you notice signals and act. Then we get practical: how sleep pressure and circadian timing sharpen attention, how nutrition and the gut–brain axis shape mood and stamina, how movement and recovery protect the nervous system from chaos or rigid shutdowns. The goal is sustainable output by aligning mind, body, and environment.
We also tackle the gray space between mental health and performance. Diagnosis can give direction, but capacity grows through skills like attention management and emotional regulation. We talk scope and ethics in plain English: when to refer, how to collaborate, and why siloed care fails real people. Expect “velvet bricks”—truth delivered with care—because honest feedback lowers cognitive load and restores trust in your own signals. With major sporting moments on the horizon, we’ll use timely case studies to show how regulation wins under bright lights, then translate those lessons to tough mornings, big meetings, and daily life.
Pull up a chair, stay curious, and build a system that fits your reality. If you’ve held it together in public and unraveled in private, you belong here. Subscribe, share with someone who’s carrying a lot this week, and leave a review with the one lever you’re adjusting first.
Hey everyone. Thanks for pulling up a chair and welcome to Under Pressure, the human behind the performance. Once again, I am Elise here with my co-host Matt. Say hi, Matt.
SPEAKER_01:Hey everyone. Thanks for thanks for joining us today.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So we're gonna get right into it and tell you guys a little bit about why we're here, what we've got going on, why we why we started this ongoing roundtable. Let's get into it.
SPEAKER_01:I'm very excited to get this, you know, start this journey, get everything started. I think one of the big things that's kind of drawn me to doing this is a lot of what we talk about is the fluff. And it's not just fluff. We got to talk about hard things, what people truly deal with day in and day out. And it's not just athletes and performers, it's everyday people. Everyday people have to deal with pressure. And this is something that I feel like giving back to the community. What wherever you're at, this is your opportunity to learn different ways from two people that share have similarities, but also very different career paths, yeah. And how that merges with, you know, how that merges together into one and truly helping people deal with pressure.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, no, I think you bring up a really great point. Let's let's pull it apart a little bit, right? Like you just said, this is we want everybody to feel like they can pull up a chair here because what is high performance? And I feel like if you are paying attention to anything going on in any corner of your world, personally, professionally, you know, existentially, like I think there's an element of high performance that's required some days, even just to feel like it keep a baseline. So I think that's why we want everybody to feel like they can pull something from this. You know, I think I think, and and we'll get into this, I think, in a little bit more here shortly about some of our origin stories. But, you know, for both of us for different reasons, different lenses, and then also some overlapping ones, we pulled this podcast together because we have so we have so many reasons to be here. We've watched so many capable humans, personally, professionally, you know, publicly that struggle quietly. And and I think we really want to like pull back the the fluff, if you will, and really normalize like the conversation here is that you know, there's there's something all of us can gain for how to maybe perform a little bit better internally, you know, to kind of maintain the well-being of the performance that's happening externally.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, 100%. This this is something that I think when we sat down and started discussing, it was it was a no-brainer. It I think this is going to give the audience, the listeners, a very different perspective of sport and performance psychology, mental health. My I'm more excited about how we are going to be able to show how two professionals that work in that work in different lanes can actually work together as well. Like we hear a lot of people talk about, you know, whether you know, one person should do it all or should if one has to refer here, one has to refer there, you know. How can you truly work together? That is also something I'm very excited to dive into because we have to get rid of the confusion in the field. There's too much confusion in the field, and it's not helpful to the people that we're supposed to be serving. So let's I'm ready to dive in to all different all different layers.
SPEAKER_00:I think I again, right? Like there's I hope that there's something for everybody, you know, because I think on one level we are the practitioners, so we want to talk to the practitioner, we want to talk to the the professional, but then on the other, I think we would also claim existence as the end user. And so we really want to be able to talk to them as well. And so and I don't think that there is a lane we don't want to invite here to continue to talk about it and normalize it. I, as the professional, want to know how to build a system to best serve my clients. I, as the end user, want to know how to navigate the system to best serve myself and my performance. And so I hope that that gets reflected here. So to that, I want to I want to kind of you know point this back, Matt. Like we were naming it right under pressure. Tell us a little bit about right pressure. I know pressure is a big conversation we have. Pressure, you know, what does pressure do? And and why are we why are we talking about it here?
SPEAKER_01:Pressure, pressure is everywhere. You start your day with some form of pressure. I mean, we sleep, right? We wake up and we automatically start building more sleep pressure. So, even from a sleeping standpoint, pressure is building to put us back to sleep. When we look at the stresses of our day in and day out, right? Like we both are parents, our day could absolutely start with a ton of pressure, a ton of stress, depending on how our children wake up.
SPEAKER_02:That's very true.
SPEAKER_01:So pre and and that builds. If we have a stressful morning, if we don't find a way to regulate, it's only going to start compounding throughout the day. And from a philosophical framework, theoretical, whatever the hell we want to call it, we have to stay in alignment because what stress and pressure does is it rips our nervous system to shreds. Yeah, it causes so much chaos or rigidity that we're literally getting pulled apart from the inside out. And we have to do certain things to reconnect the system, reconnect the body, reconnect the mind. So we can't ignore pressure, but we also have to use language that helps the practitioner, but also is not too much for the end user. And pressure is one of those words. Composure is one of those words, focus is one of those words, resiliency is one of those words. Like these are the this is the language we want people to understand because we're really good at getting in our own way as practitioners to make this shit way more complicated than it truly has to be.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, we're here to keep it simple for sure. I I mean, I love that you just said, right? Like the pressure, we aren't gonna get away from it. You know, so again, talking about the human behind the performance, and that's like a big thing. It's not that we're sitting here to talk about how to get away from pressure or how to, you know, get away or stop or reduce even what we're exposed to every day, because the reality is, I mean, truly the reality is that we're not. And so I think for us it's about normalizing the conversation at the micro level about what you know, what the world is doing to us, which we don't have control over, but what we ourselves as the professional, as the as the performer, as you know, who wherever you identify within that space can do, you know, to to best manage what comes at us every day and to be best armed for it or resilient to it or engage with it, you know, I think so to kind of elaborate on your point, Matt, like I have been, I've been a clinician in the I've been in the mental health space, but interestingly enough, because most of that mental health has been in the tactical space, I have been, you know, put in positions where it's been a hybrid. And the way that I usually articulate to a lot of people is I have done a lot of mental health work through a performance lens, oftentimes, because that was usually the only way that most of the individuals were willing to listen to what I had to say. I want to talk about why that works, and I want to talk about, you know, where my clinical lens and the mental health lens does serve a purpose.
SPEAKER_01:No, I think what you're saying is is completely valid. I I get it, right? Because again, also an end user of mental health treatment. Like even as a veteran, valid, I I get it, right? Because again, also an end user of mental health. This the stigma's there. There is no shying away from there. Are people out there that strive for the diagnosis? They want to know what is wrong with them.
unknown:Sure.
SPEAKER_00:And then there's value there.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, absolutely, because then it gives them an idea of where they're going. What can help me with this? Right. I I think that is, I think, be honest, that's a podcast episode in itself.
SPEAKER_00:I was writing that down right now.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, no, yeah, I'll be honest, like we could probably do a podcast episode on that alone. I think on the flip side is where you have the mental performance people, mental performance coach. I won't say people, gotta be professional, the mental performance consultant, the mental performance coach, right? The people that thrive in the environment of performing at an elite level, performing at a high level, and the individuals that may only work in that environment, like myself and my my you know, my colleagues around the United States, you have the flip side. And while we specialize in the flourishing, thriving side, the high performing side, the folk enhancing focus, managing attention, emotional regulation, and awareness, all of these things. You also have to understand we also have to understand the gray area. Being able to work through that gray area without crossing the line, like crossing this the the line with our scope, right? And that that is that's something that we have to talk about as well, right? Ask just had a dang webinar about it, right? So like that it's something that needs to be talked about more because as mental performance consultants, coaches, we have to understand where we can and can't go, right?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, but I I think I think the the human system is gray. You know, the human experience is gray, and and I think that you know the system the system fails people, and I think it it fails people when we forget that it's gray, that we can't treat people. I think that there are there are rights and there are lefts, and it's our it's our responsibility ethically, professionally, academically, to understand the rights and the lefts and to continue to understand, you know, the development that might shift those. And but it's it's our job to professionally hold that space well for the client. And as you've mentioned, there's a way where we can talk about this, you know, like we can talk about this as the person who has needed or benefited from mental performance coaching. And there is, and we can also sit here and talk about how we have benefited from mental health treatment. And, you know, and we understand pressure as a high performer, as as a as a parent, as you know, a career person, like a lot of different levels. And I think, and again, to kind of bring it back, that's that's why we're here to talk about the gray and to talk about, you know, the the system and and why the system can work. And my hope is that we create a conversation here where you walk away from these episodes, understanding how to make the system work better for you, whether that's through advocacy or education awareness. Because I have watched, I've watched the system and the system being the system that we have to work within, but I would even say like our own nervous systems, you know, like the very same nervous system that all of us are educated about that has a very similar template, play out wildly different in people from all different walks of life. Um, I think that's for me one of the things you'll hear a lot if you've worked with me or if you know you guys tune in with us. I I work from this same template, different details. Like I think that there's a template that we're operating under as performers, as people, as systems, and it's the different details that we uniquely bring that, you know, create maybe the different outcomes. And so again, I wanna I wanna talk about that. I want to, you know, illustrate it for everybody here. And yeah, I I think that we bring some good experience to the table to talk about it with. Matt, let's tell everybody a little bit about, you know, performance culture rewards output, right? Not regulation. But I think we want to expand the idea of regulation beyond just our traditional lanes, which maybe feels like mindfulness and and emotional, which we will definitely be doing here, but let's talk a little bit more about who else we want to bring into this space to talk about how to regulate these different parts of our system.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think really when you look at when you look at the human, the mental side is just a sliver of the pie. There's so much, there's so much that makes the human a human, and you can't we can't ignore it, right? And I think what we're seeing across the field of human performance is uh the interdisciplinary work. You can't ignore the physical piece, you can't ignore recovering from a potential injury, an illness, you can't ignore the nutrition piece, the dietetics, the ins and outs of you know, one of the I think one of the biggest things that we can talk about with a dietitian or a nutritionist is the the the gut-brain connection. And it it and we can't ignore that piece because that is a part of pressure in the system, and it's not just nervous system, the the whole system needs to be talked about, and that is what also excites me about where we're going because pressure truly does hit us everywhere, yeah. Well, I mean having those guests, you know, not just hearing our voice, our lovely voices for you know, 30, 40 minutes, but like having people come in and chat with us, like bring a pull up a chair, let's go.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, well, and I I think, you know, listen, I think all of us to touch back to you know elementary school days, maybe middle school, I'm not sure when this I've I've been a part of you know science for a long, long time, but a very, very early on lesson, even though it wasn't further explained the how, right? But homeostasis, I think, you know, to kind of sum up homeostasis, we learned at some point was a lot of different things having to come together, you know, and and regulate themselves. And to kind of build off of that illustration, it's exactly what you said, right? We need to talk about how food and nutrition fuel for our system plays a role in regulation, how movement plays a role in regulation, how sleep plays a role in regulation, you know, how what you know, what do we in our brains and and actually have control over and how to regulate it? And so, yeah, I I think we want to create a platform for people to come here and have that conversation with us. So, you know, thought leaders, performance experts, performers themselves, you know, we're we want to talk about hard things here. We want to develop and push the line on the ways we're thinking. We want to evolve these areas. We're definitely not gonna shame anybody here for struggling. You know, this is a space where I don't know, this this is a space where again, I'm gonna go back to the the tagline, right? The human behind the performance. Being a human isn't the problem, it's not a liability, it's act it's the starting point, and we want us to get connected with that on a real deep level.
SPEAKER_01:Because it is it's it's about the connection and it's something that we have to talk about, and it's not it's not soft, it's hard. And I'll say it, I think we also do a lot of babying with people.
SPEAKER_00:You're coming in hot.
SPEAKER_01:I I am, I am yes, we want to help them, and sometimes we have to be we have to also give it to them straight.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I don't know anybody out there, like I will be honest, right? Does it does it hurt to get punched in the face? Yes. Do I tell my clients to expect what we call velvet bricks in my sessions? Also, yes. Do you want to know why though, too? Because like what you just said, our nervous systems know that we're that somebody's not being real with us, right? Like we get the information and then our our nervous systems, because all of us a lot of us, our nervous systems have been trained to also pick up on this. We look at a situation, we're like you're not giving me the whole picture, right? Yeah, so even though we sit here and we we don't like being told hard things, we also need them.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Like I'm not gonna tell a client what they have to do, but I will be direct if I need to be direct, right? I grew up in the tactical field. There's no there are very few people in this world that don't want bullshit, and they want to know something immediate that is gonna help them.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, well, we are not gonna be able to do that.
SPEAKER_01:They don't want the fluff. So, me as a consultant, a coach, they need to be told direct from time to time that, hey, you do you really think that works for you? There's nothing wrong with that question. Did that did that work for you today? How did that how did that help?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I think we want I tell clients this a lot too, right? But we can feel really we can feel really bad about a good decision. I don't think that the I think the truth can be refreshing after, you know, after it maybe hurts a little bit. And so I I agree with you. And and again, I I also I also think that we have control of the delivery. I think there's a thousand ways to deliver a message. And so, you know, that's I think that there's a lot of you know, truth bombs and velvet bricks that we plan on dropping here. And you know, and and I hope in, you know, with with the best delivery, again, through our own experiences and our own lens on things, but also again, we want to open that back up to you guys and and to you know, the people we have come on here like us and not like us, and you know, same opinions and different opinions. We we really want to be able to again, like I said, have this really amazing round table conversation where you feel like you pull up a chair with us every week and feel a part of that conversation and and walk away, you know, to kind of further the thoughts on that conversation, you know, week to week.
SPEAKER_01:No, absolutely. I'm super, super pumped to get this to. To continue this journey because episode zero just about to drop. Like this, the journey starts now. And the table always has a chair for somebody to pull up. And I'm excited to start this journey. So, you know, let's as the military often says, let's send it. Because you never know what's going to be said at the table. So let's go.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Trying to think of it.
SPEAKER_01:No, I'm super excited. But we also are starting the inaugural season right before. Are we allowed to say the special two words, or are we going to get sued? The world championship of football. I don't want to say it because I don't want to get in trouble. But like everybody knows what I'm about, everybody knows what I'm about to say. I want to say, but I don't know if I can say it.
SPEAKER_00:I mean that's happening.
SPEAKER_01:And there's always something that happens in that game that can be that can be talked about from a mental standpoint. The Olympics are about to start. And if we know from history, there is absolutely athletes or Olympians that crack under the pressure. And it it I can't ask for a better time to start this journey because you know we're we're we're gonna give it to you straight, and it's gonna be great. We're here for you know everyone because that's truly what our field is about. That's truly what human performance is about, you know, you know, here to here to serve. So let's let's start serving it up.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, you know, again, and I I think we'll probably share this wherever we can, right? But like if you've ever held it together publicly and fallen apart privately, you belong here. I mean publicly, and then you look back and find out you weren't you belong here. Yeah, you know, get curious with us. I know we just talked about like the crazy performances coming up just in in February, and that's just on the sport side of the house. What you know, what do we we want to give anybody an idea of what they can come back for, even just in in our next episode?
SPEAKER_01:Who knows? Beyond who knows? I and I and I say that out of out of curiosity, because the next the ep the next episode could be on anything, like because that's what pressure is. So all all I'm asking is, like you said, the curio the curious individual that is looking to learn something different, a different way, a different viewpoint from two very similar but different people. Like, let's go. I gotta I can't be more excited about this this journey is like uh we'll have structure, don't get me wrong. Like you can't structure. You you can't you can't be a bag in the win. Quote from my wife You can't be a bag in the win. But you so yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I mean, whatever you might be carrying, because man, I don't know about you, but you know, this this soon into the next year, I think our bags already feel pretty full. And so, you know, you don't you don't need to be elite, you don't need to be fixed, you don't have to have all the answers. You just need to be willing to pull up a chair, stay curious and buckle up.
SPEAKER_01:Pull up a chair and buckle up. Let's go. Until next time.
