The Stress Spectrum

I am currently in Bangalore, India on a business trip.  I just arrived two days ago and have been pretty jet-lagged.  I'm not sure how much time I'll have here, so blog posts will probably be a little less frequent than usual.

On the flight I read the book Dune, by Frank Herbert.  I'm not a huge science fiction reader, but I enjoy reading the good ones, and this one is definitely a great book.  And much to my surprise, it even has a few good quotes.  Here's a Bene Gesserit axiom that stood out to me:

"The mind can go either direction under stress--toward positive or toward negative: on or off.  Think of it as a spectrum whose extremes are unconsciousness at the negative end and hyperconsciousness at the positive end.  The way the mind will lean under stress is strongly influenced by training."

If you look at any team, don't you see this spectrum he describes?  The athletes who are most fit, most diligent in their training, most focused in their preparation tend to also be more aware of what's going on when the level of stress increases.