Ever made a decision under pressure that didn't reflect who you actually are as a leader? You've done the reading. You know what good leadership looks like. And still, in the moment that matters most, you react before you can catch yourself.

In this episode of Get Unstuck & On Target, host Mike O'Neill sits down with Billy Mullins, author of Salt Your Thoughts and a lifelong student of the neuroscience behind human behavior. Billy has mapped a five-step sequence he calls the chain, a process that runs in just seven seconds and takes leaders from information overload straight to reactive behavior. Understanding why willpower alone can't stop it changes how you think about leadership development entirely.

Billy and Mike trace each step of the chain from the information overload that starts it to the reactive behavior that ends it and then get into the practical tools Billy built specifically to interrupt it. Billy shares the story behind the reset button, a tactile tool born out of his own darkest personal and professional season, and introduces SALT seeds, a daily positive programming practice designed to point your reticular activating system toward what you actually want to see.

Three key topics to look out for:

- Why willpower fails under pressure and what the neuroscience says actually happens inside your brain in those seven seconds

- The five-step chain from information overload to reactive behavior, and how each step feeds the next

- The reset button and SALT seeds, two practical tools you can use to interrupt the chain before the wrong decision comes out

Find all the show notes and links here: https://www.unstuck.show/241