Like every time I get nervous or anxious, my body locks up. It starts with a mild chill and then a gentle tremble. If it’s a small confrontation I am approaching, it will be generally end there, perhaps my voice will shake slightly, but on this day, it was the biggest news I had ever had to share with anyone, and I knew the outcome would be bleak.

A half hour before the meeting, the first signs of anxiety quickly set in, I was shaking. As each minute ticked by in anticipation it grew much worse. I excused myself from my desk and headed to the bathroom.

As I looked into the bathroom mirror, trying to steady myself, the shaking only became worse; racking my body and sending me into dry heaving so violent my eyes began to water until I could no longer contain myself. As my lunch departed from me, the water in my eyes turned to tears and I realized that everything I had worked for in the last 10 years rested on a single moment 6 minutes in the future based on one action taken by me some 6 months in the past.