Reactive Rhythms explores how urgency becomes identity and how leaders can restore coherence through awareness, design, and presence.
Key Takeaways
Some days, leadership feels like music — balanced, flowing, alive. Other days, it feels like noise — unpredictable, dissonant, overwhelming. We start each morning with purpose and finish wondering where it went. We move faster, answer more, give more, and somehow feel further behind. The rhythm of our day speeds up until it drowns out the very clarity we need to lead.
This episode is about reclaiming that rhythm — not by stepping away from the work, but by working in a way that creates space, awareness, and alignment.
I’m Lee Crockett — welcome to the Culture of Excellence podcast.
Every leader knows this rhythm: the early email, the question in the doorway, the meeting that overruns. By nine o’clock, you’ve solved twenty small problems but created none of the future you meant to shape. The day moves quickly, but meaning moves slowly. Tasks multiply, but satisfaction diminishes. We respond, reassure, decide — yet we end the day asking, What did I actually lead?
This is not failure; it’s feedback. It’s a signal that the tempo of leadership has drifted from purpose to pressure.
Psychologist Daniel Kahneman, in Thinking, Fast and Slow (2011), describes two mental systems. System 1 reacts quickly and instinctively; System 2 thinks slowly and strategically. When we operate entirely in System 1, leadership becomes reaction instead of reflection. And in that state, we confuse movement with progress.
The highest-performing leaders don’t work faster — they think deeper. They lead with rhythm instead of rush. They know that calm doesn’t compete with action; it amplifies it.
Schools often equate speed with dedication. But true influence is measured not by how much we do, but by how intentionally we do it. Leadership that flows with rhythm inspires clarity.
Urgency feels noble because it looks like care. We equate responsiveness with responsibility. But beneath that intention, our biology is in overdrive.
Neuroscientist Stephen Porges, in The Polyvagal Theory (2011), shows that when the body perceives constant demand, the sympathetic system stays activated. We breathe shallowly, focus narrowly, and begin scanning for problems instead of possibilities. The mind shifts from creative to defensive.
David Rock and Ann Ringleb, in their Neuroscience of Leadership Journal (2013), found that prolonged reactivity reduces prefrontal activity — the part of the brain responsible for empathy, creativity, and strategic foresight.
When that happens, our decision-making contracts. We become efficient at solving the immediate, but blind to the important. Each ping, each interruption triggers dopamine — a brief hit of reward.
We feel productive, but the brain is learning dependency. The calendar fills with proof of activity, not achievement.
Michael Fullan, in The Principal (2014), called this the coherence collapse: when complexity fragments attention, and leaders become technicians of the immediate.
Awareness is the turning point. When you notice the pull of urgency, it’s an invitation to shift tempo — to move from reflex to rhythm, from reaction to creation. Leadership begins where biology meets awareness.
Every time we pause to breathe, to centre, to notice, we rewrite the chemistry of our leadership.
Fatigue is not just tiredness; it’s erosion. It wears away presence, empathy, and purpose. One principal told me, “I spend my days putting out fires and my nights wondering if I’ve actually led.” That single line captures a universal truth — effort without rhythm becomes emptiness.
Christina Maslach, in Burnout: The Cost of Caring (2016), defines burnout as the depletion of emotional energy faster than it can be restored. When that depletion becomes chronic, it shapes identity.
Exhaustion starts to feel like evidence of worth. At six p.m., the corridor tells the story: half-lit rooms, papers stacked, voices quiet. The day isn’t just long; it’s heavy.
Fatigue narrows vision. We start leading through tasks instead of relationships. Trust fades. Culture stiffens. But noticing the fatigue is the first act of restoration.
When you recognise that you’re running on reaction, you reclaim the power to choose differently. Energy follows attention. Where you place awareness, recovery begins.
When leaders honour their own capacity, they create permission for everyone else to do the same.
Leadership is pattern recognition. Every culture runs on rhythms — some intentional, some accidental. The most effective leaders don’t just work inside these rhythms; they design them.
Dan Siegel, in The Developing Mind (2012), describes mindsight — the ability to observe our own mental state as it happens. Mindsight is the leader’s superpower. It transforms instinct into insight.
Zen calls this awareness kenshō (見性) — “seeing one’s true nature.” It means perceiving clearly before acting decisively. It’s clarity without hesitation.
Viktor Frankl, in Man’s Search for Meaning (1959), reminds us that between stimulus and response lies our freedom to choose. That space is where leadership lives. It’s where foresight replaces reaction.
Awareness turns pressure into perspective. It allows us to lead from consciousness rather than compulsion. Deliberate is decisive. And the leader who masters rhythm masters presence.
Once awareness becomes design, rhythm becomes sustainable.
These next three practices — presence rituals, strategic blockouts, and calendar anchors — are the architecture of that design. They transform awareness into action and make rhythm tangible.
Before we influence others, we regulate ourselves.
Stephen Porges, in The Polyvagal Theory (2011), explains that safety activates connection. Slow, intentional breathing signals calm to the nervous system, and calm communicates safety to those around us.
One principal in Melbourne began each meeting with a full minute of silence. The first week felt awkward; the third felt natural. Staff later said it was their favourite moment — “the only time in the week we breathe, and we all breathe together.”
That pause wasn’t wasted time; it was connection restored. Dan Siegel (2012) calls this integration — the linking of body, emotion, and mind into coherence. Zen calls it mu-shin (無心), or “no-mind” — not emptiness, but total presence. When you arrive fully, others follow willingly.
Presence rituals re-centre both leader and team. They remind everyone that clarity begins before action. When the body calms, the mind opens. When the mind opens, relationships strengthen.
The calendar is a reflection of priorities.
Stephen Covey, in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (1989), described Quadrant II — the realm of what is important but not yet urgent — as the true space of leadership. Time set aside there is where innovation, empathy, and foresight live.
Leslie Perlow’s Predictable Time Off (2012) showed that teams who protect focus hours see higher productivity and emotional well-being. They communicate better because their minds have room to think.
One superintendent I coach calls her block “clarity time.” Friday mornings, two hours, uninterrupted. She says, “I make better decisions in those two hours than in the rest of the week combined.”
Cal Newport’s Deep Work (2016) confirms that depth demands protection. Distraction fractures cognitive flow, and recovery takes time. When leaders protect their focus, they teach others that thoughtfulness is productive.
Strategic blockouts honour thinking as real work. They transform isolation into incubation. They allow reflection to shape direction.
When you protect time for thought, you protect the future of your culture.
Amy Edmondson and Zhike Lei, in their Harvard Business Review article on psychological safety (2014), found that predictability nurtures trust. When people know when connection will happen, they relax into contribution.
Great leaders choreograph time with intention. They use recurring structures that make values visible:
These are not meetings; they are cultural rhythms. They turn consistency into care.
Andy Hargreaves, in Moving (2020), calls this deep accountability — where responsibility grows through relationship, not surveillance.
One principal told me, “When I made my availability predictable, people stopped chasing me down. They trusted they’d be seen.”
Predictability builds peace. And peace creates progress. Efficiency is alignment — when your time matches your intention.
Calendar anchors turn leadership from performance into presence.
These three practices are simple but profound.
Together, they form a rhythm that transforms fatigue into focus.
Ron Heifetz and Marty Linsky, in Leadership on the Line (2017), describe adaptive leadership as the capacity to thrive in complexity by regulating distress.
Regulation is rhythm in action — knowing when to move forward and when to pause.
Calm is clarity revealed through rhythm. It doesn’t remove pressure; it reorders it. When leaders build rhythms of reflection and renewal, they don’t just manage culture — they shape it.
Every pause becomes a pulse that redefines what productivity feels like. This is how awareness scales. Calm leaders calm systems. Systems built on calm create sustainable excellence.
Leadership begins in the pause before the action — the breath before the decision. Viktor Frankl, in Man’s Search for Meaning (1959), wrote that between stimulus and response lies our power to choose. That space is rhythm — the living moment between impulse and intention.
Listen to your day.
Notice its tempo.
Where are you rushing?
Where are you breathing?
And where, with a single deliberate pause, could you change the tone of everything that follows?
Cultures don’t transform through speed. They transform through rhythm — the deliberate, human cadence of leaders who move with awareness, clarity, and purpose.
Leadership, at its best, is music made visible. And when you lead with rhythm, the noise of the day becomes harmony again.