When you are in a potentially stressful situation and everyone around you is losing their cool this does not mean you have to join them! You will be able to contribute a lot more if you remain calm and centered.

Staying calm and resourceful is a choice you can make. Unfortunately it is all too easy to be a sheep and simply follow crowd. Nobody says you have to be a sheep!

Instead make a point of keeping yourself in a resourceful state.

3 Step Outside The Situation

Whenever I am in a highly charged situation I will often step outside situation -- in my mind. This helps to defuse event for me.

You can do this too. Simply imagine that you are at other end of room watching interaction between you and other person or people.

It is as if you are a neutral observer with no emotional involvement in discussion at hand.

When you do this you will think of ideas to handle situation better and you will also feel less bothered by stress of other people.

This is one technique you need to play with first in easy everyday conversations. Once you get familiar with it you will find it easy to mentally step outside event while still participating with people in front of you.

Stress or relaxation which do you prefer?

Now...

I also know people who learned same peak performance strategies I learned. Today they are no farther ahead than they were years ago.

How did they pull that off?

By putting it off until another day and by neglecting to use what they had learned. Implementation is crucial.

If you do this your progress is a certainty.

3. Attempting To Be Original

Many years ago I put myself under huge pressure by expecting myself to be original with each person I met.

This is a sure-fire strategy for failure and a great way to get stressed out for no reason.

Guess what I later discovered?

There is no need to be original. You can have same conversation all day long with different people and nobody will suspect a thing!

People are happy to talk about mundane topics because there is no effort involved.

I have lived or worked in several countries including Ireland, England, Germany, Holland, Spain and U.S.

And everywhere I have been people are happy to talk all day about:

- weather - their children - new movie - family pet - boss - traffic

You get idea!