Staying Clear When Everything Is Urgent

Back-to-back meetings.
Shifting priorities.
Decisions arriving faster than you can fully process them.
Nothing is technically wrong, but your thinking feels narrower, your patience thinner, and everything takes more effort than it should.

This is the state many leaders operate in for large parts of the day.

In this episode of It’s Me. Your Brain., Virginia Palm, founder of Augment Mind and advisor to leadership teams operating in high-pressure environments, explores what actually happens in the brain when urgency accumulates, and why even highly capable leaders can temporarily lose access to clarity, perspective, and emotional range.

You’ll learn:

• Why sustained pressure reduces cognitive flexibility and decision quality
• How the nervous system shifts into faster, more automatic modes under urgency
• Why this isn’t a mindset problem, it’s biology
• How to reset your nervous system in real time, even inside a packed day

Virginia shares three simple, practical resets you can use between meetings, during difficult conversations, or when the day feels out of control:

✔ A 90-second breathing reset that directly signals safety to the nervous system
✔ How closing one small “open loop” (yes, including browser tabs) restores mental clarity
✔ How subtle changes in movement and sensory input rapidly shift internal state

This episode is for leaders who want to stay clear, grounded, and effective, not just when things are calm, but when everything feels urgent.

No hacks.
No theatrics.
Just evidence-based tools for modern leadership in a high-velocity world.

Most high-performing leaders don’t wake up unmotivated.
They wake up mentally overbooked.

In this first episode of It’s Me. Your Brain., Virginia explores why mental clarity isn’t about discipline, willpower, or optimizing your morning, it’s about how regulated your nervous system is before the day even begins.

You’ll learn:

• Why your brain goes into “reactive mode” the moment you reach for your phone

• How the amygdala and cortisol influence focus, judgment, and decision quality

• Three simple, realistic morning habits that support clarity (without biohacking theatrics)

• How small shifts in your nervous system state can change how you think, lead, and decide

This episode is for body professionals who want to work with their brain, not constantly push against it, and build sustainable performance in a high-velocity world.