Welcome to Radhika's newsletter INTENT: a bi-weekly guide for high achievers who want an extraordinary life. Each issue brings you real stories, practical strategies, and the intention behind how we work, lead, grow, and live.
Hi friends 🙂
Quick tea update: I picked up peppermint tea this past week for the first time in what feels like years, and I cannot believe I forgot how good this stuff is. The freshness. The mint. The way it relaxes my throat before I even take the first sip. Caffeine-free, delicious, calming.
Today I want to talk about pressure
You’ve probably heard someone say “no pressure!” at least three times this week. Someone asks you for a favor and immediately softens it with “no pressure, no worries.” A friend invites you to a thing, “no pressure to come!” A manager assigns a project, “no pressure, take your time!”
I get why we do it. We don’t want to seem demanding. We want to be nice. We want to give people an out.
But I want to make a case for the exact opposite.
Pressure is good. Pressure is great. Pressure is one of the most underrated feelings you can have as a human being.
Pressure is what makes us prep harder, focus longer, care more. Pressure is what drives us toward the version of the work we’re actually proud of. Pressure is you, on some level, admitting that this thing matters to you.
Pressure means you care.
Story 1: Getting My Leadership Role
When I was going for my manager role, I was stressed TF out. And I mean that.
I could not stop thinking about it. At work. At night in bed. Actively dreaming about it while I slept (yes, really). When I was hanging out with my friends, half of me was still running the same loop in the background: how do I become the leader they need me to be? How do I prove I can actually do this? What am I missing?
That pressure is what forced me to get my sh*t together.
It’s what got me to enroll in leadership training programs. It’s what made me study the best people I had access to and pay attention to how they operated in a room. It’s what made me show up every single day asking myself: how can I be a better leader right now, without the title yet? What can I do differently, today, that would make me the perfect hire?
If I had felt “no pressure” about that role, I honestly don’t think I would have gotten it. The pressure is what got me the role and helps me stay on my toes about continuing to be better now.
That was the first time I realized: this thing I keep trying to make go away might actually be the thing that’s helping me the most.
Story 2: The Workshop That Almost Broke Me
I’m shakinggg in this photo but luckily no one in the audience could tell :)
Last year I hosted a workshop in NYC called Own The Room, around 30 women, all packed into one space, all trusting me to actually teach them something useful about speaking and showing up. I’ve written about the workshop itself before. What I haven’t really talked about is the weeks leading up to it.
And here’s the thing. I really didn’t need to feel pressure for it. I wasn’t getting paid. I hadn’t met any of these women before. It was in a city I no longer even lived in. I could have easily just winged it and nobody would have known the difference.
But that’s not what happened. I couldn’t sleep the night before. I over-prepped. I re-wrote my opening line probably 40 times. I had this constant, low-grade pressure sitting in my chest for days.
That pressure is exactly what made the workshop good.
It’s what pushed me to practice out loud four times the night before. It’s what made me care about every single word. It’s what made me show up early, walk the room, adjust the chairs, notice the lighting. If someone had genuinely convinced me there was “no pressure” to make it great, I would have shown up mediocre. Guaranteed.
The pressure made me good.
Why “no pressure” is a lie we tell ourselves
Think about the last time you had ZERO pressure to do something. What happened? Probably nothing. You put it off. You did the bare minimum. You forgot about it entirely.
Pressure means you care enough to feel it. It’s the sensation of stakes being real. And stakes being real is what unlocks:
Effort you wouldn’t otherwise put in
Focus you wouldn’t otherwise find
Prep you wouldn’t otherwise do
Standards you wouldn’t otherwise hold yourself to
The version of you that only shows up when it counts
The most driven, high-performing people I know don’t run from pressure. They run toward it. They deliberately put themselves in situations where they have to deliver, because they know that’s when their best work actually happens.
The rest of us spend way too much energy trying to feel less of something that is actually helping us.
A quick disclaimer, because I know how this can be read:
I am not talking about chronic stress, burnout, or the kind of anxiety that eats you from the inside. That’s not pressure; that’s damage. And it’s important to be honest about the difference:
Pressure that sharpens you → healthy, temporary, tied to something you actually care about, resolves when the thing is done.
Pressure that drains you → chronic, unresolved, no clear outlet, follows you into your sleep.
Places pressure has been useful in my life this year
Just so we’re grounded in real things:
Wedding planning at T-minus-not-many-months. Pressure everywhere. Vendors, timelines, decisions I keep having to make (see: my last newsletter 😅). Every ounce of that pressure is translating into a wedding I care about being beautiful.
Speaking at events. Every time I say yes to one, I feel the pressure hit within the hour. Every single time, that pressure is what makes me actually prepare.
Hiring someone new. The pressure of choosing well made me ask better questions, take more references, and be more intentional than I would have been without stakes.
Writing this newsletter after 2 months off. The pressure to come back with something good is what has me actually thinking harder.
How to actually enjoy pressure:
Me enjoying the pressure during T-30 days until the biggest moment in my life!!
Three shifts that have genuinely changed this for me.
1. Rename it. The physical feeling of pressure and the physical feeling of excitement are almost identical. Racing heart. Shallow breath. Hyper-focus. Your body doesn’t actually know the difference. Your brain does. Try labeling it “I’m excited” instead of “I’m nervous” the next time it shows up. Sounds silly. Works shockingly well.
2. Follow it. Pressure is a really good filter. If you feel absolutely nothing before a meeting, a launch, a conversation, you probably don’t care about it that much, and that’s information. If you feel a LOT of pressure about something? That’s a signal it matters to you. Let that guide where your energy goes.
3. Talk to it. Okay, this one is going to sound hellla cheesy and if I read it two years ago I would have rolled my eyes. But I do it anyway, because it works. Right before something big, I take a beat and literally say in my head: I love the pressure, thanks for showing up, we’ve done this before and we got it now.
One last thing… try eating pressure for breakfast :)
The next time you feel that quiet weight in your chest before something that matters, don’t try to make it go away.
Recognize it. And then learn to enjoy it.
That pressure is you, caring. And caring is not something we should be trying to feel less of.
Eat it for breakfast 😁
From Brooklyn 99 - One of my favorite shows :)
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Thank you so much for being a part of the INTENT community. I rely on word-of-mouth for growth. If you enjoyed this newsletter, I’d love for you to share it with a friend.Your commitment to living with purpose is exactly why this space exists. Can’t wait to share more in the next edition!
Until next time,
Radhika
Creating a life of purpose, wealth, and growth
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