One thing all pilots feel at some point on any flight is a sense of pressure. On a good-day local flight, it could be something as simple and routine as wanting to make an “are-we-down-yet-smooth” landing to impress someone. At the other extreme might be a boss who absolutely, positively needs to be at a meeting and is depending on you to fly through challenging weather on minimal fuel to get there in time. In the former example, that pressure is self-imposed and of short duration, with the outcome almost totally in your control. The latter example, though perhaps extreme, is more representative of the kinds of pressures under which pilots operate, few of which are in our control. Most often, however, pilots face a series of more subtle pressures, only some of which may be in our control. But all of them contribute to how well or poorly we fly.
Researchers tell us there are two basic kinds of pressure we may experience as pilots: internal and external. Internal pressures, pretty much by definition, are self-imposed. External pressures result from factors outside our control, like no-nonsense bosses and their demands, and bad weather. Something to keep in mind is that pressure, whether self-imposed or resulting from external forces, often results in stress. And stress in turn too often leads to making mistakes as we rush through a procedure or let adverse possible outcomes dominate our thinking and soak up our mental bandwidth.
