What Pressure Teaches That Winning Never Will (with special guest Darren G. James)

Pressure doesn’t make heroes; it reveals habits. We sit down with Darren James— career infantryman since 2003, and avid rugby player since 2001—to unpack what really carries teams when the stakes surge and the plan breaks. From the pitch to the drop zone, Darren shows how “find the next job” becomes more than a slogan; it’s a survival skill and a blueprint for winning.

We dig into the differences that matter—scoreboard versus survival—and how that single shift changes training, leadership, and accountability. Darren breaks down why you fall to your level of training, not rise to the occasion, and how to build a learning culture where mistakes are addressed, options are taught, and trust is earned. He shares a rivalry match decided by bend-don’t-break grit, then maps that mentality to contact scenarios where decisions have to be timely, good-enough, and executed together.

If you’re a coach or human performance pro crossing into tactical work, Darren’s playbook is blunt and generous: immerse yourself, learn the language, show up where it’s hard, and add value without ego. We also talk about decision speed under incomplete information, leading through friction when roles blur, and the quiet cost of ignoring self-care. It’s a fast, honest tour through teamwork, leadership, and the moments that shape both.

Subscribe, share this with a teammate who thrives under pressure, and leave a review with the one lesson you’re taking to your next training session or mission.

Transcript

Meet Darren: Sport And Service

SPEAKER_01 1:02

So you might be taking all taking a command role.

SPEAKER_00 1:07

I will be. It's just where and when.

SPEAKER_01 1:10

Love that for you. Love that for you. Hello, Elise.

SPEAKER_02 1:15

Hello. What do you love?

SPEAKER_01 1:18

This is this is Darren. Darren, this is Elise. This is my my closest colleague now that I'm not really working closely with the military like I once was.

SPEAKER_02 1:29

Yeah. Hey Darren. Nice to meet you. Yeah, you too. Thanks for uh hanging out with us. Sorry, I'm a little late to the table.

SPEAKER_00 1:42

Just having some uh some lunch.

SPEAKER_02 1:47

Perfect.

SPEAKER_00 1:48

It's uh mix of uh Celsius non-carbonated and uh Starburst minis unwrapped for efficiency.

SPEAKER_01 2:01

Weird version of the food pyramid there, but I'm sure if you looked into the ingredients, it hits all the all the right things. Breakfast or lunch of champions.

SPEAKER_02 2:13

Yeah. There you go. Oh man. How's drum treating you?

SPEAKER_00 2:19

It is cold. It is cold. It was about negative 17 out of PT this morning.

SPEAKER_02 2:25

Sure, my husband. Yep. That it be. Tell me and everybody that's gonna be hanging out with us who you are. Or, you know, how do you want all of us to know who you are?

SPEAKER_00 2:41

It's kinda weird considering I tried to generally stay behind the scenes and not be seen, which is kind of hard. I got a real punchable face. But I'm Darren James, originally out of Wilmington, North Carolina, about 90 minutes from the center of the universe, but that's a whole other rant for a whole other day. And yeah, uh been playing rugby for off and on 24 years, been in the the All-American Gun Club, a little over 22. And yeah, I manage things as does that that's kind of what I do at this point in life, and I think today's topic is uh sports and tactical decisions, right?

SPEAKER_03 3:30

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 3:32

The similarities, the differences. Yeah, speak to that a little bit.

SPEAKER_02 3:37

Okay. Sounds like you can.

SPEAKER_01 3:40

Awesome. A lot of experience in that under that belt.

SPEAKER_02 3:44

I think we all think that there's some overlaps. I think it's great to have you maybe share a bit more of a first hand experience to that overlap. Yeah, because you know, you've lived like you just told you said 22 and 24 years, you've literally lived these two worlds of sport and service.

SPEAKER_00 4:03

That's correct.

SPEAKER_02 4:05

Which I'm sorry, you said rugby for 24, so that started first.

Defining Performance Under Pressure

SPEAKER_00 4:10

That started first. That started down at the uh military college of South Carolina.

SPEAKER_02 4:15

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 4:16

And then 9-11 happened, and that's why in the army.

SPEAKER_01 4:19

Classic GWAP vet.

SPEAKER_02 4:22

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 4:23

Classic answer.

SPEAKER_02 4:25

Yeah, no kidding. I don't know. I feel like there's even more questions and answers in your origin story to both of these performance domains. But I guess starting there, like what is, you know, what does performance under pressure mean to you?

SPEAKER_00 4:44

Performance under pressure. It sounds simple being under pressure and still having to perform, but that doesn't really scratch the itch, I think. Regardless of the situation, there's still an instinct that has to be met. There's still responsibilities, whether they be physical exertion, whether it's decision making, whether it's leadership, that there's still expectations that have to happen, and there's still the completion of said task. It always culminates to a completion of a task. It could be in sports, it's a goalpost, it's a scoreboard more realistically, in combat, it's a mission bringing the the true weight of the formation to bear against the enemy without losing losing too much combat power, read people on the friendly side. So there's similarities there, especially in the whole gun club where you you play away games and you do bad things towards people.

SPEAKER_02 5:57

Yeah. Different opponent. Would you say that your like definition of performance under pressure has it changed from when you first started in both of these places? Like over time, would you define it differently?

SPEAKER_00 6:15

I don't think that I would define it differently. I think that when you start something, it's gonna be it's gonna evolve as you go along, and the the responsibilities that you have towards something. And the expectations rather grow as you gain experience or you put more time in. Starting off, whether it be as a new recruit that comes out to the practice pitch or a new private that goes through basic training, that difference, the the expectation uh out of that person is gonna be far minimal than the captain of the team or the in this case, the sergeant major of an organization.

SPEAKER_02 7:05

Tell us a little bit about what did rugby teach you, maybe initially, maybe over time, to be a better leader or operator. You said teamwork?

Rugby’s Lessons: Find The Next Job

SPEAKER_00 7:15

Teamwork. 100% teamwork. Rugby like football in this sense. There are very few team sports out there that are true team sports in terms of you need everybody to be successful. Rugby is one of those sports. Uh, very rarely is somebody, one person out of the 15, just gonna carry the water for everybody else and win the match. You need everybody. The military is no different. You need everybody. Are there gonna be people that bring more to your collective than others? Sure. But you need everybody in that collective to be successful. Knowing where you fit in, knowing what you can contribute, knowing yourself, figuring out yourself. One of the things that I really drove from rugby initially was find the next job. Rugby is the physicality of football, the speed of track, and the continuity of soccer. All of that is happening. The ball doesn't die. So even as you get tackled, you gotta get up and find your next job. Even as you make a tackle, you gotta get up and find your next job. You make a pass, you gotta get up and find your next job. The army's no different. You want soldiers to understand their base job, but then also understand the mission to the degree of two levels above them. That you want the soldier to understand the higher higher intent by two levels. So that in the event that it's just them, they can pick up and find the next job and complete the mission.

SPEAKER_02 9:01

Yeah, I mean, that would make sense. It's interesting how you started off with the analogy about carrying water. I feel like and then illustrate perfectly across like both rugby and the military why it feels like those actually those two things seamlessly fit together. Just maybe looking for different outcomes. One, obviously, like you said, a scoreboard versus a mission. So then what, if anything, did the army force you to learn that that rugby never demanded, if that exists?

SPEAKER_00 9:43

Sure. The worst things, the worst thing that I've seen on a rugby pitch outside of loss, right? The 80 minutes tick off and your score is not higher than your opponent's. I've seen injuries. Seen a couple catastrophic injuries, legs and ankles that aren't supposed to go and point in the direction that they now find themselves.

SPEAKER_03 10:10

Right?

SPEAKER_00 10:12

I've also seen on the Army side the worst things that you can imagine. One tells me that at the end of the day, there is still an end of the day. Maybe you didn't make the pass you needed to make, or you didn't make the tackle that you needed to make, or you dropped the ball and somebody else picked it up, and that's how the game ended. But on the combat side, your decision, your activity or inactivity can have ramifications on the mission or on specific people, and you don't get to you don't get to choose how that pan pans out if you don't do your job.

SPEAKER_02 10:59

I appreciate you sharing.

SPEAKER_01 11:01

As a as a leader, how do you help your teammates, your Joes, privates, junior NCOs, how do you how do you help them work through that? You know, you you make a mistake, you're the reason you lost the game, you know, you we've seen it in combat, uh, you know, a the wrong radio call alone could cause something catastrophic. How do you as a leader help teammates and uh junior soldiers get through that? And what are some of the similarities that you may have used in both scenarios?

unknown 11:51

Sure.

Stakes Diverge: Scoreboard Vs. Survival

SPEAKER_00 11:52

First, it comes back to training. Contrary to public belief, you will not rise to the occasion, you will fall to the level of your training. So you have to you have to have an environment where it is acceptable to be a learner, a lifelong learner. You have to foster and cultivate the mentality of the learning environment, a learning organization. And in that, you have to make it acceptable where possible to have those mistakes so you can learn. You can fail on the way to success. When everything is a no-fail, people are going to play to what the right answer is in the moment to not be considered a failure. And then the real failure comes when really put to the test with an external evaluation. On the practice pitch in rugby, it's real easy to call people out. You drop a ball, that's a turnover. If the ball goes forward, of course. You miss a tackle, somebody else has to reposition themselves and take themselves away from their defensive responsibilities. It's easy to call that out. And the scoreboard is a great way to remind us of the final result. Just like not being in the starting 15 is a great motivator to fix your corrections. On the military side, it comes back to training. You got to take the opportunities to be on the parade field and do the walkthroughs, do the talk-throughs, have the classes, build the critical thinker, and then when the mistakes happen, address the mistakes as they are. Address why they're the mistake, address the potential solutions to those and have the person understand. Maybe not your way of doing things, but in their own, in their own interpretations, other acceptable ways of doing things. And then you retrain it. You gotta trust people. Leadership is built on mutual trust. You have to build the the environment to where people are they feel trusted to make a decision whether it's right or wrong, knowing that if time is available or time allots, that those missteps are going to be retooled and refocused. And then you got to remind people why. The corrections are made, even the most harsh of corrections, so that you get better and you're more apt to preserve other people in the moment.

SPEAKER_02 14:40

I was trying to write down fail to success. Like I like, sorry, I'm like, I really love what you said though, and I feel like it goes back to the under pressure. You don't rise. I may have already botched this because my brain is heading off on a thousand directions, but you don't rise to the task, you fall to your level of training. I just like if that isn't across the board under pressure for you know, mission success, championship game, you know, the performance of a lifetime, like it falls to like that. That's beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 15:17

Yeah, I mean, I th I I think it I we as mental performance consultants, we look at how we can make ourselves known, fit in with the units, fit in with the teams, and I think if we're looking at the training, whether on the pitch or in the training area, the parade, the parade area, uh, if we're not uh adding in layers of stress, are you really prepping yourself for the actual event when it rises? And I know there you can't truly create or recreate combat in that emotional sense, but I feel like you can get pretty damn close in the training areas if it's developed right.

SPEAKER_02 16:12

Yeah, uh Darren, I've I don't know if you can add to but the sport piece, right? Like that if you take your training seriously, right? Because again, agreed, Matt, like you can't fully mimic combat, just like you can't maybe fully mimic the energy of a championship game, but that goes back to what we just talked about, right? Like rising to the task false year training, you have to take that seriously. To maybe have you elaborate a little bit more, Darren, about again, training that. How do you train or can you train somebody to take it seriously?

Training Over Talent: Build The Culture

SPEAKER_00 16:55

You got to build a culture where people want to be there. You got to build a culture where accountability matters. You got to build a culture where you understand what it is that you're doing and why you're doing it. And it starts with the little things. If practice begins at six, that means you're stepping onto the pitch, ready to take instruction at six. That is not just arriving at six or putting your boots on, warming up on your own. You want to do that, you figure out how to get there prior to to allow you to do that. Have structure, you have organization, you have collective buy-in. Your drills are short, succinct, and to the point. Your team on drills are very pointed. Your team sessions with opposition are pointed. And it's not about breaking away and getting a score or standing out in the moment. It's about what is the point of this particular drill? Am I doing what I'm supposed to do for this particular drill? Or if I'm not, what do I need to be doing to get right? On the other side, it's showing up to training, divorcing yourself from yourself, taking your instruction from those that are giving it, and being open to criticism because your cell phone's not going to be there in combat.

SPEAKER_02 18:27

Do you have an example, a story, or you know, something that you could share that kind of a reset needed to happen, or you know, the pressure was building again in a different position of leadership, but like how that that pressure moment came and what happened on the other side?

SPEAKER_00 18:47

Like I think it was my last home match in San Diego. Rugby club, that is uh very near and dear to my heart. The uh the last match we were positioning for top seating, or I think it was we're we're battling it out for second place on the table, and it was the last match at home. We were undefeated on the uh home pitch looking to get ourselves into win and get in for the uh playoffs for nationals. And it just it went back and forth to very it was a rivalry match, the old Mission Beach Athletic Club and Belmont Shores. Belmont Shore, sorry. And the match just went back and forth. It it really was one of those. It came down to the each, it came down to making the plays and stepping up and making your tackles and holding on to the ball. It really could have went, it could have gone the other way if it would have been maybe another three minutes on the match. It was a bend but don't break mentality, and not only did we our undefeated streak at home for the campaign, we made it to the playoff scenario prior to going to nationals, but that's that's where it ended. But that's another story. Real proud of that team.

SPEAKER_02 20:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:21

Real proud of that day. I still talk to the lads to this point, to this day.

SPEAKER_01 20:27

Yeah, I think you said you really said something that I think kind of can can go either way very similarly between the two domains, sport and tactical, and it was out and it was outlast. Outlasting the pressure, outlasting the moment to see the next moment. What is it, whether rugby or the tactical environment, when you get to that moment where it is you're getting physically exhausted, you're mentally getting just dumped on. How do you outlast that?

SPEAKER_00 21:08

It to be cliche, but at the same token, you don't have a choice. When you find yourself in a situation, I mean, we'll keep it simple with training. Like, if you don't get the training right, you're you're gonna end up doing it again. Nobody wants to do it again, even if you probably should. But the more lasting point is if you don't get it right, depending on what you messed up, that somebody's gonna pay for that in blood. And in training, understanding that and working towards your 10-2, your piece of the pie, and making sure you are nested with what your squad, your platoon, your company's trying to do, and what the organization is trying to achieve, you're gonna minimize these things. And ultimately, as you go downrange, you want to make sure you're doing the best that you can do, especially under the most uh adverse of situations, so that everybody has the highest probability of returning while also accomplishing the mission and de-ord disorienting whatever enemy force that you find yourself in in conflict with.

SPEAKER_02 22:28

I I kind of hear, you know, discipline and training and showing up, especially when you don't want to, which kind of goes beyond beyond like motivation, right? Like your why and your purpose are definitely in there. I feel like there are times where it's discipline and choice over motivation, right? Because those can the motivation can grow stagnant, the desire to be there can dissipate, and that's where like discipline and choice show up.

SPEAKER_00 22:58

I agree. But then at that point, you also got to ask yourself. while you're still doing it. But that's a podcast for another day.

SPEAKER_02 23:08

Yeah. Take two. Do you think the tactical performance, the tactical athlete, requires less equal to or more mental discipline than sport? And to expand on that, right? Like differences that you may see that sure.

Rivalry Match And Bend-Don’t-Break

SPEAKER_00 23:30

I think that there are similarities. I think that regardless of whether it's the sport domain, the tactical domain, first responders versus closing with and destroying the enemy, I think that you are processing information at a rapid pace. And you the pressure might not even be physical. The pressure is you are realizing what the situation is giving you. And you have to determine and chew on that and turn very quickly on a decision. And it might not be the perfect decision all the time, but that's where training comes into play. Like you have to train those scenarios to get to build your own confidence in making those decisions because you have to make them and you have to execute them and your team has to execute them and be comfortable with the outcomes. I do think that there's more to it on the tactical side because in the like I said the final determination for the sport domain is the scoreboard. The tactical side even to include the first responder the loss of life is a cost it's it's a consideration that you have to take into account. Whereas in the sport domain if somebody if somebody loses a life on a field that's a whole different set of circumstances that have nothing to not as much to do with the decisional piece in the sport domain. Like something else happened there. But when you find yourself out as a first responder or you find yourself as a squad leader, platoon sergeant, platoon leader leading a combat patrol and getting into a contact situation, the loss of life, the probability is always there. So that pressure always sits there when you go into a situation and you're executing and you're trying to do your best to negotiate the situation.

SPEAKER_02 25:45

I love the answer about reaction time. So if I'm if I am somebody who wants to and I'll just say like if I'm somebody who is any sort of a practitioner and I want to get into the tactical field but I've only come from sport. What is something if I only come from the sport world what will I misunderstand about tactical?

SPEAKER_00 26:15

If you're only coming from the sport world you need to go to the world you need to immerse yourself in the world in which you're trying to enter and receive the the inputs and the information that you are receiving from those in the world in which you're trying to understand listen to learn not listen to communicate initially that is true of any time we enter a new battle space or or if you're in the woods and you stop every once in a while to stop look and figure out the the tactical situation the surroundings listen to see if anybody's also in the wood line with you same difference.

Discipline, Choice, And Endurance

SPEAKER_01 27:05

If you're trying to figure that space out go amongst the uh the population go out and train with them observe training listen to how they communicate so that when you communicate you are speaking the same language the being of the sports realm will translate because again the big real the big difference is the scoreboard versus sure the not I I agree I I I love I love the answer and I think from a consultant standpoint right again the military is growing at a rapid rate when it comes to human performance programming and putting embedded specialists in brigades, units, you know, first responder teams sometimes the consultant that whether military experience or as a veteran or someone that's coming straight from athletics feel like it is not accessible. Can you open that up and kind of explain why it may feel that way but it's actually not if you're coming into anything initially you're just coming in those that are in have built that whether it's through training exercises deployments what have you there there's some some blood sweat and tears there that have been bled that have been shed rather across the collective shared hardships is what I'm getting at.

SPEAKER_00 28:51

Maybe the person coming in they don't have that or maybe the personalities are off initially there's a look there's always a little bit of healthy or even sometimes unhealthy apprehension on both sides. But how you get in there is reminding people why you're there what you bring to the collective and what you're trying to overall add value to. How are you trying to help the overall mission? How are you trying to help the end state? How are you trying to help that organization? How can they help you eventually and then you just gotta be out there with them. You got to be out there in the spaces you got to be out there in the area J's of the world you got to be out there on the Geronimo drop zones of the world sometimes you got to be at green ramp.

SPEAKER_01 29:39

It's easy to be a green ramp it's not so easy being out there at uh Sicily I will say I will say I remember my first time there it was unlike any it was Sicily drop zone is so vast it is huge. And you don't really like I drove past it every day on Montgomery and you truly don't understand how big that area is until you're standing in the middle of it that in itself teaches you so much about the mission. You're just standing there and you're not allowed to freely roam it you're you're next to the the medics you're with you know the the crew there my first time on the drop zone paratrooper has a panic attack after landing and I'm being called over as the CPS because this individual is freaking out after the fact and look luckily I knew the the the medical provider there and she called me right over and was like Matt we have this she's having a panic attack not real sure what's going on I'm like well you just said she's having a panic attack so that's what's going on but they wanted me to help this paratrooper through the panic attack and I certainly was not prepared for that I was literally there to learn the to understand the experience but that is a part of the experience life comes at you fast. How fast does it take you to fall right like that that depends on different people figuratively and literally so I mean so the the moment you exit that aircraft it's less than a minute before you hit the ground and I don't know if it's uh that fast but it I probably probably feels that fast but having the uh the having the panic afterwards is what intrigued me the most because usually it's in the aircraft that the panic is setting in. So I've I I found it very I found it very intriguing that the panic like that was my first experience on the drop zone just observing and I have to go to work. Like actual like I don't they're working but having to help a paratrooper through that experience was I was I certainly wasn't ready for because I wasn't expecting it.

Faster Decisions, Higher Consequences

SPEAKER_02 32:27

So it was it was it was a great experience I had so many stories about Area J and oh man some clear I think you you bring up a point though so something that's I've been thinking about over here is the the template right like we're kind of identifying the similarity of the template across performance domains. I think I'm gonna turn that back over even to the the mental performance or the human performance practitioner that we're talking about coming into this domain. Like there's there's still a a performance that goes on. And so again kind of using the same similar template I want to go back to something earlier about the fail to success right because like Darren you talked about you know you have to get in there you have to get in there you have to get you know become a part of the furniture is is one of the things that I've always been taught you know you have to you have to show up in the uncomfortable and I want to go back like the fail to success because you have to try. And I think that you know you can sit there and have this experience that works somewhere else and understand that it'll somehow work here, but it's only going to start working if you are open to trying and failing in a you know in a in a way that allows you to move forward to a point that makes sense for that environment.

SPEAKER_01 33:52

Maybe a little bit different for for Matt like in an example where you're like hey show up and try no no do but again a a powerful moment though I think Matt you could probably also say in that moment you had to show up and while you went in to try you were able to fall back on your training and do that be fair no yeah absolutely because the success of the mission is landing and joining going to your alpha alpha with your team right that ends that chapter of the mission for this individual I was just a piece of the pie of her quarter and while I wasn't expecting to have to truly intervene in the chapter I had to I had no I had no choice I the peatrooper needed help. So while I may not be an expert in panic attacks I can certainly talk to an individual and go hey how you feeling not so good. Hey let's let's unpack it you don't have to move like let's get let's ground ourselves you're you made it to the ground congratulations do you feel anything broken no no no let's take some long slow breaths so you can calm you can relax we have to re-center the body so yes 100% yeah the pressure to perform even for me as the consultant or the embedded specialist is still there performance goes is multifaceted observation is performance having to intervene with a paratrooper that is panicking is performance so 100% you have to fall back on your training yeah and just do yeah you you you have like like Darren said you have no choice right because again because again it's about trust if if I would have walked over there and asked her one question and been like suck it up every paratrooper around me would have been like he's an asshole I'm not going to talk to him and that one that's not me but it's about trust and I had no choice the medic the medics and the medical officer asked for my help one that's building credibility and trust in that fee that part of the team and then that paratrooper was able to get up and walk off the DZ I wouldn't say she was perfectly fine but she got off the DZ right and and on to the next chapter.

Crossing From Sport To Tactical

SPEAKER_02 36:57

I think a couple of other things though too right like one I think there's a couple of other ways you could have failed that by you know like that's not my lane I don't know that's not my job right I think there's a couple of other ways you could have have damned yourself and I want to say that because I think we've witnessed I think all three of us in a variety of these scenarios have witnessed people lose their credibility with one statement in like a very vulnerable like a very valuable place of like a make or break place like that. But that makes me want to go back to something that I think I don't know how unique it is. You, Darren, you mentioned going back to one of the original like analogies of of the water finding the next job that something I want to point out that I think is a little bit unique in this space where everybody has a job. And so similar to like what you mentioned about rugby, but here we are and everybody is there like Matt you're talking about everybody's there to learn but everybody's there to you know kind of see an overarching mission. And at some point when things don't go the way they were originally planned the best thing you can do is find the next job. Right to kind of and so in that moment you were called in and it wasn't the way it was supposed to go because things took a turn but at that point it was your job to find a way to find the next job to kind of keep everybody you know moving forward.

SPEAKER_00 38:25

Yeah I would agree with that not everything's gonna go as planned even if you have everybody in this the time and space in which they need to be performing the roles they need to Murphy shows up and Murphy throws curveballs and you got to be able to roll with the punches. And he does when things aren't going the way they need to go having the ability to see that and move in the points of move towards the point of friction to overall turn the the tide of the situation you got to be able to do that. And that's anywhere you got to be able to be reflective re reactive and drag people along if need be to do the things that need to be done even if that's not what you were supposed to be doing in the first place. Yeah successful organizations and successful people are successful because they find ways to remain successful they do things to bring about mission success.

SPEAKER_02 39:28

I want to divert a little bit and ask about you know pull back the curtain a little bit and talk and get a few things about you know the person behind the performance here. So Darren so kind of something we want to do right is again talk about who you who are you behind all these incredible things that you do. So I guess maybe going what has pressure taught you that success never did I would say pressure taught me that winning doesn't come by accident.

SPEAKER_00 40:08

Being successful does not come from the mentality of I'm just gonna be victorious. Pressure comes from actually doing and putting yourself out there being under the weight and still being expected to lift it you don't get you don't get to a point to where you can lift a lot of weight or move a lot of weight or run really fast just by saying you want to do it and the having the pressure of your decisions impacting the situation and impacting other people that that'll wake you up that'll wake you up and allow you to see that there's more to this there's levels to this there's a responsibility that comes with this when the clock is ticking the zeros and I'm the one with the ball in my hands people are looking at me to make a play to get the ball across the the uh try line or if we're trying to get to the objective and I'm the one on the radio with the key calls people are expecting me to make the right call and re reallocate assets and divert focus to the points of friction. And that's in sport you earn that whether you're the captain of the the team or you are a solid performer in the tactical sense that primarily is an expectation of leadership but at the same token there are people that rise to the occasion they just have to find a way to do it.

SPEAKER_02 41:56

There are movies and books and stories and medals citations that capture these situations throughout the annals of our history yes there are lots of those stories since yours is ours today can you tell us what like what is something that you may say to yourself or like you know in a moment where you mentioned like divorcing yourself from your cell phone but in performance we know that we have to compartmentalize sometimes a lot of things a lot all at once and rapidly make decisions is there something that you say to yourself a mantra a sentence to help you come back to the priorities when things get heavy or when that pressure hits either you know you don't mind sharing?

SPEAKER_00 42:49

Yeah I guess it goes back to I don't have a choice um when you talk about regardless of the domain there are people that depend on you and when you have things to do you have objectives to meet people are looking at you to do it. Nobody cares that you don't have all the resources available nobody cares that a couple of the starters are out and you're working with some of the impact players nobody cares that the person you wanted on your saws aren't there or you don't have a full weapon squad nobody cares.

Earning Trust In The Arena

SPEAKER_01 43:25

You have to do the most with the least you have to find ways to endure hardship respond and react to pressure make timely and accurate decisions and execute them with violence have no choice so what do you do when you're not under pressure not sure what that looks like whether it be whether it'd be providing feedback to soldiers in general discussion boards with my peers superiors don't know what it there's always some form of pressure somewhere there's always somebody looking to take your spot yeah and you're looking to take somebody else's eventually on the way to retirement that's life I always say the military is the biggest competition there is the biggest competition there is I mean like you're literally replaceable you're you're replaceable you're you're fighting for promotion just like your buddy next to you and there may be only one spot yeah and one of you are going to get it it is it is what it is I mean that's the the the the the grandstand of the E4 mafia is the E4 threes that finally get promoted to you know specialist or corporal and it's like oh man you're you're we can't be friends anymore you know like you're constantly competing the military is a giant competition I think that while that is ultimately true but I think dialing it back to the Red Devil days I think what made the Red Devils what they were was that group of first sergeants were not in competition with each other the mentality was the star of the show is Randy and the Red Devil Mafia.

SPEAKER_00 45:46

The star of the show is division the star of the show is the Devil Brigade the star of the show was the Red Devil Battalion and once we all understood that we all actively worked together to do right by paratroopers and their families selflessly and I 100% believe that is true because come the end of class 77 all of those Red Devil first sergeants will have graduated and become sergeant's major all of them and that comes from an organization that has standards allows people to fail on the way to success and puts people first and it's that's one of those things that it's just a red double world.

SPEAKER_01 46:39

Yeah it was it was such a great time I was I'm so proud I got to be I got to experience that like for like it was out of the the 10 years I've been doing sports psychology like that that year and a half I spent truly embedded into the Red Devil world was amazing. But also what it took to truly be a team because when you when you dial all that back right while you may have gotten picked up for sergeant major before the rest there was no you're absolutely right there was no it all that mattered was mission success and how you could help the the battalion as a whole how could it affect the outcome of the FTX the JRTC rotation it was all about how you come together as a team for for the mission.

SPEAKER_00 47:56

And to clarify I didn't go ahead of the rest I was lucky enough to be a classmate with Luke Bradshaw Brendan Doherty I then got to see Bobania and Tim Ranker and James Miller go on to be in class right now and then Erica Martinez is heading off the class thereafter like this wasn't uh I did it on my own or I did it ahead of anybody not at all I served with rock stars.

SPEAKER_01 48:28

Yeah I wholehearted how do you take care of the human behind the performance how do you take care of you I don't have an answer for that um that's probably the the worst part that's probably my biggest critique I don't take care of me probably figure it out at some point maybe when I'm a Walmart door greeter one day we know some people before you're a door greeter what next well my gov phone has been pinging at me so I know there are emails and my outlook um I know we've got training next week to shape conditions for future operations I know that gotta continue to build the team um that all having been said there's there is a lot to go around on the next episode of Climbing the Glory to the top to the top Darren so nice to see you again I I truly appreciate the time you spent with us.

Pressure’s Lesson: Winning Isn’t An Accident

SPEAKER_02 49:44

Yeah it was a real pleasure you're definitely a man of service and it shows in all ways so we really appreciate you hanging out at the table with us pulling up a chair and talking about who you are and and all things under pressure so with that we'll say see you next time thanks for having me I'll take it easy thanks Aaron