The day my brain froze

December 2019.

“When did you get married?” the examiner asks.

Another officer sits beside her, watching. Pen in hand.

I’m in a drab government office, sitting in an uncomfortable chair. Fluorescent lights are flickering.

“I… I… huh…”

My wedding date?

Why don’t I remember this?

This isn’t one of the official questions. I know my wedding anniversary. But at this moment, the date is gone.

I wasn’t nervous walking in. I had studied all 100 official questions and answers. I knew them cold.

Now something strange is happening to me. Something I don’t remember ever happening during a test.

I’m choking.

The examiner looks to be in her mid-40s. Hair pulled back. Government badge clipped neatly to her jacket. She has the controlled patience of someone who has done this interview a thousand times. The second officer says almost nothing. She watches the process carefully.

After a couple of tries, I narrow the date close enough. The examiner gives me another chance. I get it right. She wants me to pass.

I’m about to test the outer boundary of her patience.

What I didn’t understand is that everyone who takes this test brings their application. The examiner reviews it line by line. This part confirms identity and accuracy. It’s supposed to be a formality.

Then I can’t answer the next few questions either.

I forget my children’s birthdays.

Panic takes over.

What is happening?

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The examiner remains patient. She lets me try a few answers. She clearly knows I’m the person in the application. I’m Sébastien Page.

The problem is that Sébastien Page has temporarily lost access to basic facts about his own life.

For the first time in my life, I’m choking during a test. What’s happening to my brain?

I’ve taken hundreds of tests: university exams, a master’s in finance, the brutal CFA exams. I know how to study. I know how to perform under pressure.

So why this test? Maybe because this one means more to me than any other test I’ve ever taken.

Choking under pressure and forgetting things you otherwise would know cold is common. Pressure consumes working memory, the mental scratchpad that holds facts and rules long enough to use them. That helps explain why a person can blank on a basic test question. The brain is busy worrying about the stakes.

And it’s not about your capacity or level of preparation. In fact, it’s often the opposite – those with high mental capacity are at higher risk of choking. In one study, researchers gave students unfamiliar math problems, then increased the pressure: money was on the line, another participant’s bonus depended on their performance, and their work would be videotaped for math teachers and professors.

The students with the highest working-memory capacity—the ones best equipped to solve the problems—were the ones who choked under pressure, especially on the hardest questions. The researchers titled their paper, aptly, “When High-Powered People Fail.”

Back in the testing room, the examiner finally moves to the official questions.

I’m relieved.

I know these.

“What is freedom of religion?” she asks.

What?

I freeze again.

This is one of the easiest questions in the entire set. So easy that I barely studied it. Now it feels like the whole test has narrowed to one sentence.

Freedom of religion.

Freedom of religion.

Come on.

Finally, my brain unlocks.

“You can practice any religion,” I say, “or not practice a religion.”

The officer nods.

The next few questions are easy.

I pass.

A ceremony follows.

I raise my right hand and take the Oath of Allegiance. The words are formal, but the moment feels deeply personal.

I cry.

After years of work visas and about ten years as a permanent resident, I am now a U.S. citizen. I will get a passport. I will vote. I will belong in a new way.

Someone hands me a small U.S. flag. I will keep it on my office desk.

It has been a long journey. Work visas. Permanent residency. Moves. Paperwork. Challenging work. Opportunity. Kids. Gratitude.

This country gave me room to build a life I could barely have imagined as a kid in Québec.

I’m proud of my Canadian heritage. I always will be.

And I love the United States of America with all my heart.

Happy Fourth of July.

(Buy my book The Psychology of Leadership here.)

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Beilock, S. L., & Carr, T. H. (2005). “When High-Powered People Fail: Working Memory and ‘Choking Under Pressure’ in Math.” Psychological Science, 16(2), 101–105. This experiment shows that high pressure can consume working memory and impair performance, especially for people who normally rely on strong working-memory capacity.