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compromise their own abilities to attend to relevant things. Of interest, as we will see later, are the many positive ways in which we can affect ACC functioning to impact the amygdala.
    Thus, for Jack B., all the fears—both conscious and unconscious—activate the amygdala and keep this “unconscious fear wheel” spinning. The impact of this is that it eats up thinking resources in Jack B.’s brain because this amygdala activation disrupts Jack B.’s thinking brain in the frontal lobe. One of the important parts of the frontal lobe—the prefrontal cortex (PFC)—is especially important because a part of it acts as short-term memory and another part as the accountant in the brain. (The accountant calculates risks and benefits of decisions.) So now we have a brilliant entrepreneur who in his baseline state is able to be very creative, but with all these fears impacting his brain, his capacity to remember and make the right decisions about risk are quite compromised.
     
    Concept 5
     
    If you remember clearly, the amygdala detects the significance of emotions in the order of their importance. Usually, because fear is such a strong emotion, it is at the front of the line. However, other emotions may also register first if they are strong or relevant. Studies have shown that the amygdala is an emotional relevance detector rather than just a fear detector. 15
    The question that this creates in the case of Jack B. is, what can he do to displace fear as the primary emotion being processed? That is, he can’t exactly ignore TV entirely, or his wife’s anger for that matter, but he can deliberately also expose himself to optimistic andpositive influences on any given day so that his brain has a chance to be relieved and so that his thinking brain can coordinate plans without the “earthquake of the amygdala.” Fear creates amygdala earthquakes; positive emotions calm down the tremors and allow for decisions to be made more effectively.
     
    Summary of the Concepts as They Are Relevant to Coaches, Managers, and Leaders
     
    Fear activates the amygdala: both consciously and outside of consciousness. We need to be aware of this “silent” impact of fear. Here are some specific examples of overt threat that overactivate the amygdala and disrupt decision-making:
• The CEO or senior manager is a bully. Forcing people to do things under stress may get the job done, but significant thinking resources that take in the whole picture may be missing.
• An employee is having trouble at home or just had a fight with a spouse. The anxiety will not allow for optimal decision-making.
• There are unreasonable time pressures. This creates anxiety and is better handled with preventive measures such as time management rather than having to do a task under extreme pressure.
• The employee does not know how to do a task and is afraid of asking someone or being dependent on them. This can be avoided by encouraging a culture of asking and rewarding this over extreme independence. Interdependence can help productivity.
    Because the amygdala is connected to various parts of the brain, impacting the amygdala impacts the entire brain. And when the amygdala is impacted, this in turn impacts memory centers, reward centers, decision-making centers, and attentional and motivation centers in the brain.
    Working backward, then, if leaders find themselves “stuck,” even when they are not consciously experiencing fear and anxiety,they should ask themselves whether unconscious anxiety is blocking their path to success. Here are some specific examples of unconscious threats that overactivate the amygdala and disrupt leaders’ productivity:
• “Am I ever going to be able to sustain my profit margins? What if I lose everything?”
• “I don’t know how I got here.”
• “My business is going to cave under the recession.”
• “The government is not supportive of small business and is giving my money to the poor.”
• “What if I get