Dear courageous leaders,
Lately, I’ve been noticing how often leaders describe feeling stuck not because they lack options, but because everything feels urgent, heavy, and on repeat.
The same conversations.
The same patterns.
The same internal monologue running on repeat.
This is happening at the same time technology is accelerating everything around us. AI promises speed, efficiency, and answers; the promises are delivered before we’ve even finished asking the question. And while these tools can be powerful, they also amplify a quieter pressure many leaders feel: keep up, decide faster, don’t slow down.
What often gets lost in that push is judgment and humanity.
Susan David, psychologist and author of Emotional Agility, has a word for what happens in these moments. She calls it being hooked – when a thought, emotion, role, or story starts writing us.
When we’re hooked, what we think or feel quietly starts to stand in for what is. The view narrows. Options shrink. Behavior becomes scripted. We find ourselves reacting in ways that feel automatic and strangely inevitable: There’s no point. This is just how it works. They’ll never listen anyway.
Teams and cultures feel this too through rigid rules, unexamined norms, familiar explanations that crowd out adaptability. Under time pressure and amid growing complexity, emotional rigidity takes hold. And as David says, “Rigidity in the face of complexity is toxic.”
Being hooked isn’t a failure. It’s human. Especially in uncertain, fast-moving environments.
The work begins not by fixing ourselves, but by noticing when the story has taken over.
A Clearing Practice: Noticing Your Hooks
This short practice is an invitation to gently observe where you may have been hooked recently without judgment and without trying to change anything yet.
Step 1: Identify your hook
Hooks often arise in ordinary leadership moments: a tense meeting, a difficult conversation, a decision under pressure.
Choose a recent experience that felt challenging but is safe to revisit.
It might look like:
- Losing your patience with a colleague because you didn’t feel heard
- Avoiding a hard feedback conversation
- Saying yes when every part of you wanted to say no
What situation comes to mind?
As you recall it, notice:
- What emotions or thoughts were present?
- What was your autopilot reaction?
Step 2: What did the hook feel like?
Hooks show up not just in our thoughts, but in our bodies and behaviors.
You might notice:
- A tightness in your chest, like you can’t take a full breath
- Your voice becoming sharp or clipped
- Over-explaining to prove you’re right
- Withdrawing or going silent
You might complete these sentences:
- In my body, it felt like…
- Others could see it because I…
There’s no need to analyze or solve anything here. This practice is simply about restoring perspective: seeing the hook, rather than being written by it.
When leaders begin to recognize their hooks, something important happens. Choice returns. Curiosity has room to stand. And we can start responding to what’s actually needed—not just replaying the same scene again and again.
In a world racing to automate decisions, this kind of human awareness isn’t a “soft skill.” It’s a leadership capacity.
In the next Dispatch, we’ll explore what it means to meet these moments with presence by showing up without brooding, bottling, or forcing positivity.
For now, if this resonates, I’d love to hear what you noticed. And if you’re seeing these patterns play out on your team, know that you’re not alone and that there is a different way to meet them.
I read your responses so please do reply.
Clear eyes. Full hearts.
Paula
Inspired by Susan David, PhD, author of Emotional Agility: Get Unstuck, Embrace Change, and Thrive in Work and Life.
P.S. If you’re feeling caught in a familiar loop right now or carrying a decision, conversation, or leadership challenge that feels heavier than it should, I have a few complimentary Clarity & Alignment Consultations remaining in February. It’s a chance to slow things down, widen perspective, and identify a values-aligned next step.
