What is... PRESSURE?

Do you watch SAS Australia and think, "I wish I could do that"? Each week DS Ollie Ollerton applies a theme from the show to YOUR life. This episode is all about PRESSURE. Watch SAS Australia on Channel 7 and 7Plus.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hello, I'm Oliolitan.

Speaker 2 (00:03):
Every human will experience pressure at some point in their life,
but it's how you respond to pressure that really counts.
Everyone can relate to pressure, usually as a single event.
Pressure in the Special Forces is something very different, and
every Special Forces operator is trained to get into flow

(00:25):
when the crisis really starts to flare, and that is
different layers of pressure, so many things happening at one
certain point in time. I want to go to a
story that really typifies that pressure, and that was when
I was in Iraq. I was driving a car. There
was one other person in the back who was my

(00:46):
number two.

Speaker 1 (00:46):
We were both.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
Armed and we were in soft skin vehicles, which means
the bullets come through, and we were protecting a convoy
going to Baghdad. And it was at that point between
Rimadi and Fallujah we got attacked by the militia. I
was driving the car one hundred and thirty kilometers an hour.
I had a small MP five Kurtz on my lap,

(01:09):
and all of a sudden, the militia who were chasing
us started to open fire. Anyone that's heard in AK
forty seven will understand it's a very intimidating sound. But
when you hear four AK forty sevens cracking off at
the same time when they're pointed at you, it's like
a crescendo from hell. I had that responsibility of the

(01:36):
people in front of me, twelve people who had invested
in me, to keep them safe. I had the pressure
of driving a car at one hundred and thirty kilometers
an hour, and I had the pressure of having to
deal with that threat. In pressure situations, what happens physiologically

(01:57):
you start to breathe radically. When you do that, that
increases courtersol, and that puts you into fight flight or freeze.
And in that moment when the bullets started flying, that
pressure was immense. I took a breath like I hadn't
breathed in the last ten minutes, and straight away that
gave me the clarity of thought. See, as soon as

(02:20):
you breathe, it lowers the courtersole. It allows you to
have a mindset of clarity and not confusion.

Speaker 1 (02:27):
And it's only in that mindset you should make.

Speaker 2 (02:30):
Those life changing decisions, and without it you will take
a step in the wrong direction. So in that moment,
so much going on. It was about triarge. In that situation,
making sure I took that breath before taking action, giving
myself that clarity of thought, looking at what was.

Speaker 1 (02:47):
The immediate threat, and dealing with that threat.

Speaker 2 (02:50):
Luckily we escaped with no casualties our side. When you
feel pressure, when you put yourself into a pressured situation,
the situation wants to grab you around the neck and
rag you around and make you make decisions, force you
into making decisions. When you learn to control that pressure,

(03:14):
and simply that's by breathing against some clarity of thought,
it allows you to be in the driving seat in
that situation when I was in that car. When you're
in a confined space like that, being shut at it
is extremely stressful, extremely stressful. You have very limited options.
So really being able to deal with that pressure through

(03:35):
your breathing, being able to control your mindset is so
so important and you should not make any kind of
rash decisions when you're forced into it under extreme pressure.
Some people crumble under pressure because they're not used to
pressured situations. They allow the pressure to dominate, and in

(03:56):
that moment, the mind will look for the easiest way out,
the path of least resistance.

Speaker 1 (04:03):
If you allow it to. Nine times out of ten.

Speaker 2 (04:05):
That takes you a step in the wrong direction, and
it may be a short win, but long term it
will have negative outcomes.

Speaker 1 (04:15):
In a highly.

Speaker 2 (04:16):
Pressured situation, a Special Forces soldier is trained to triage
that situation.

Speaker 1 (04:21):
Don't try and control things that you can't control.

Speaker 2 (04:23):
Focus on the things that are the immediate threat and
deal with them.

Speaker 1 (04:27):
One after the other.

Speaker 2 (04:28):
Our minds can handle five to nine bits of information
at any one time. When we stress, that goes down
to one to two. It's really important in any stressful
situation that you focus on only one to two things
in that moment. Generally, when you don't how to handle pressure,
that is because you're allowing so many different factors, so
many different layers of pressure to affect your mindset, and

(04:52):
in that moment, the easiest way out is to take
the shortcut, and shortcuts don't win. Thanks for listening to
the show. We will see you next time.