Chronic stress can look like commitment—until performance quietly breaks down.
Many high performers are in survival mode, but appear “on it” from the outside.
**Stress shows up as behavior—**not complaints. And the cost is quiet, compounding, and hard to track until it’s too late.
Stress isn’t always loud.
In most work cultures, we’re trained to recognize absence as a red flag—missing meetings, missed deadlines, missed KPIs.
But stress doesn’t always cause people to withdraw.
It often does the opposite:
staying late
over-preparing
multitasking constantly
saying yes to everything
answering Slack after hours
These behaviors can look like loyalty.
In reality, they’re often symptoms of a nervous system stuck in fight-or-flight.
When under chronic stress, the brain reduces function in the prefrontal cortex (logic, planning, empathy).
The amygdala—our threat detection system—becomes dominant.
The result? People become reactive, disorganized, or emotionally numb... without realizing why.
🔎 Quote this:
“Stress doesn’t just change how we feel. It changes how we think—and how we lead.”
Here are some real-world signs that your team may be stressed—not underperforming:
Constant urgency—even when deadlines aren’t tight
Frequent “miscommunications” or confusion
Mood swings mistaken for attitude problems
Chronic multitasking, but declining output
Delayed decisions or overthinking simple tasks
Increased emotional labor to “keep things positive”
And here’s the hard part:
👏 Many of these behaviors are praised.
👏 Many of these team members are promoted.
👏 Many of these patterns are rewarded—until they break.
Depleted focus
Lower trust between team members
Decreased collaboration
Decision fatigue
Rising resignation risk
Reduced capacity for creative thinking
Stress doesn’t just hurt people—it compounds into operational drag.
Instead of assuming performance = wellness, consider asking:
Who’s showing signs of stress without saying it out loud?
Who’s over-responding, over-preparing, or isolating?
How can we make space for calm—not just speed?
Because the truth is:
✅ High performance is sustainable.
🚫 High-pressure coping isn’t.
When stress wears the mask of hustle, leadership becomes guesswork.
But when you understand how stress hides—and what it hijacks—you start seeing your team through a clearer lens.
Want to dive in even deeper watch this week's episode of the Movement, Mind, & Meaning podcast here
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