Doing any job in a vacuum is easy. Any job. Brain surgery is easy in a vacuum where no life can be lost and nobody can be affected. Rocket science is easy when millions of dollars aren’t on the line and humans aren’t being blasted toward outer space. Standing still on the edge of your driveway is easy, but standing still on the edge of the Empire State Building would be terrifying (for most of us, at least.)
The stakes determine how difficult it will be to utilize our skills.
So why do we spend so much time thinking about how badly things could turn out? It only makes the job harder and the likelihood of failure more sure.
The baseball closer who doesn’t care if he gets the save will blow away the competition with precise pitch placement and devastating power. The closer who is worried about how badly things could go will hang a curveball and watch the batter crush his team with a walk-off homer.
Ignore the stakes, you must to be more effective.