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How to Untie a Balloon: A Negotiator's Guide to Avoid Popping Under Pressure
This game-changing book, How to Untie a Balloon, was written by former hostage negotiator and founder of Conflictish, Ryan Dunlap. He guides listeners into the messy world of human interaction and behavior. Listeners will gain practical tips to navigate some of the problematic behaviors they experience with others that contribute to conflict.
Why now? In a world where getting along is basically a survival skill, this book isn't just a good listen—it's an absolute necessity. Packed with real stories and strategies straight from the interrogation room and the field, How to Untie a Balloon is your secret weapon to turn conflict into connection. Whether you're dealing with a grumpy coworker, a stubborn family member, or the ups and downs of modern love, this book is for you. Ready to flip the script on conflict? This book will help you get your 'ish together.
Why now? In a world where getting along is basically a survival skill, this book isn't just a good listen—it's an absolute necessity. Packed with real stories and strategies straight from the interrogation room and the field, How to Untie a Balloon is your secret weapon to turn conflict into connection. Whether you're dealing with a grumpy coworker, a stubborn family member, or the ups and downs of modern love, this book is for you. Ready to flip the script on conflict? This book will help you get your 'ish together.
- GenresAudiobook
218 pages, Paperback
Published May 13, 2025
80 people are currently reading
142 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
August 27, 2025
Excelente
Excelente libro facil de leer y consejos que todos podemos aplicar deseo que pronto se publique en español así nuestro liderazgo latinó podrá tener esta excelente herramienta
Excelente libro facil de leer y consejos que todos podemos aplicar deseo que pronto se publique en español así nuestro liderazgo latinó podrá tener esta excelente herramienta
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June 23, 2025In "How to Untie a Balloon: A Negotiator’s Guide to Avoid Popping Under Pressure", Ryan Dunlap distills lessons from a high-stakes world into a manual for anyone struggling to stay grounded under emotional and psychological stress. Drawing on his career as a SWAT hostage negotiator and detective in the Special Victims Unit, Dunlap shows that when people unravel during tense moments, it isn’t because they lack knowledge or intelligence—it’s because pressure clouds their access to what they already know. The book’s core argument is simple yet powerful: pressure, when unacknowledged or unmanaged, leads to poor decision-making, breakdowns in communication, and unnecessary conflict. The key to staying composed and effective lies in learning how to decompress before reaching a breaking point.
Dunlap uses an exercise involving balloons to illustrate the nature of pressure buildup. In workshops, participants are asked to blow up balloons as large as they can, then told to untie them—an almost impossible task. Most struggle or fail entirely, with some balloons even popping. The metaphor is clear and immediate: pressure accumulates easily and rapidly but is far harder to release. This dynamic plays out in everyday life. A surgeon under continuous stress may snap during a trivial meeting, or a couple might reignite a heated argument because they try to resolve it before their physiological stress response has had time to subside. People often think they’re calm enough to communicate, when in fact their bodies are still surging with cortisol and adrenaline. Without time to truly cool down, even well-intentioned efforts at resolution can backfire.
The balloon exercise also shows how poorly people recognize their own limits. Like a balloon that appears fine until it explodes, many people seem outwardly composed right up until the moment they reach their capacity. Executives, parents, and frontline workers all risk pushing themselves beyond sustainable thresholds, only realizing it after damage has been done. These moments are not always about incompetence or immaturity—they’re about unmanaged pressure and a failure to notice its silent escalation. The lesson: self-awareness and planned decompression are not luxuries but essential safeguards.
From his police background, Dunlap recounts how even experienced officers often lose their composure in tense scenarios. These aren’t green recruits—they’re seasoned professionals who, without adequate communication training for high-pressure moments, fall back on primitive fight-or-flight instincts. In police training, officers are rigorously prepared for firearm malfunctions, but no equivalent system exists for communication failures. That’s a problem. Just like you wouldn’t throw away your gun when it jams, abandoning a conversation after the first misfire is counterproductive. Communication, especially under stress, needs its own rehearsed response protocol.
Signs that your pressure is nearing the limit are clear if you know what to look for. The professional mask starts slipping, performance suffers, rational thinking fades, and emotional responses become more erratic. You might experience irritability, brain fog, or emotional disconnection. These symptoms are not random—they are signals. Paying attention to them allows you to intervene early and avoid catastrophic failure, just like noticing a balloon becoming overly taut prompts you to stop adding air.
To help manage these high-pressure situations, Dunlap introduces the F.I.R.S.T. Steps Framework: Feelings, Interests, Relationships, Situation, and Tolls. This structured method helps individuals break down complex or overwhelming situations into workable parts. For example, a hospital administrator under budget pressure can use this framework to identify not just her anxiety but also what matters most—staffing and morale. By mapping out her relationships with stakeholders and understanding the actual situation (not just her assumptions about it), she can see how the mounting tolls—like sleepless nights and communication strain—signal the need for intervention. The process helps her shift from emotional reactivity to strategic thinking, a core theme throughout the book.
In addition to F.I.R.S.T., Dunlap offers the 3R Iterative Progression Framework for situations requiring urgent action: Realize, Respond, and Realign. In an emergency, like a product failure before launch or a hostage situation, doing nothing is not an option—but neither is rushing in blindly. The 3R approach teaches that any action should start with a deliberate assessment of available options. Once a step is chosen and taken, it should be followed by honest evaluation and adjustment. Like the negotiator who learns more about a suspect with each interaction, or a business leader who tests and adjusts strategy in real-time, this cyclical method helps navigate high-pressure situations with responsiveness rather than rigidity.
To manage pressure in everyday interactions, Dunlap also shares the S.T.O.P. protocol: Space, Time, and Opportunity. The first step is physical or mental space—stepping away from the pressure source, even briefly, to gain clarity. Then comes time: allow your body to metabolize stress before attempting resolution. Without this phase, your brain is still wired for conflict, not collaboration. Finally, opportunity refers to re-engaging in a more thoughtful, deliberate way, with a clearer mind and a renewed sense of purpose. This framework doesn’t just prevent explosions—it allows for more constructive and lasting solutions to emerge.
The book’s insights are deeply pragmatic, rooted not in theory but in the messy, high-stakes reality of crisis negotiation. Dunlap’s tone is calm and instructional, like a veteran coach training you not just to win but to avoid losing your cool when the heat rises. His frameworks are not meant just for corporate boardrooms or first responders—they apply to anyone navigating stress: parents, managers, teachers, and couples alike. Whether dealing with a minor disagreement or a full-blown crisis, Dunlap’s message is that you don’t need superhuman emotional control; you need better systems for recognizing and releasing pressure before it takes control of you.
In the end, "How to Untie a Balloon" doesn’t promise a life without pressure, nor does it suggest you can avoid conflict entirely. Instead, it equips you with mental models and actionable tools to stay grounded when the stakes are high. It challenges the notion that strong leadership or emotional intelligence is about remaining unaffected. Instead, it reframes composure as a discipline—something you practice through awareness, strategy, and iteration. When you learn how to monitor your internal 'balloon,' to detect the signs of dangerous inflation, and to untie the knot with patience and care, you build resilience. And in a world that constantly challenges your composure, that kind of resilience becomes not just helpful, but vital.
Dunlap uses an exercise involving balloons to illustrate the nature of pressure buildup. In workshops, participants are asked to blow up balloons as large as they can, then told to untie them—an almost impossible task. Most struggle or fail entirely, with some balloons even popping. The metaphor is clear and immediate: pressure accumulates easily and rapidly but is far harder to release. This dynamic plays out in everyday life. A surgeon under continuous stress may snap during a trivial meeting, or a couple might reignite a heated argument because they try to resolve it before their physiological stress response has had time to subside. People often think they’re calm enough to communicate, when in fact their bodies are still surging with cortisol and adrenaline. Without time to truly cool down, even well-intentioned efforts at resolution can backfire.
The balloon exercise also shows how poorly people recognize their own limits. Like a balloon that appears fine until it explodes, many people seem outwardly composed right up until the moment they reach their capacity. Executives, parents, and frontline workers all risk pushing themselves beyond sustainable thresholds, only realizing it after damage has been done. These moments are not always about incompetence or immaturity—they’re about unmanaged pressure and a failure to notice its silent escalation. The lesson: self-awareness and planned decompression are not luxuries but essential safeguards.
From his police background, Dunlap recounts how even experienced officers often lose their composure in tense scenarios. These aren’t green recruits—they’re seasoned professionals who, without adequate communication training for high-pressure moments, fall back on primitive fight-or-flight instincts. In police training, officers are rigorously prepared for firearm malfunctions, but no equivalent system exists for communication failures. That’s a problem. Just like you wouldn’t throw away your gun when it jams, abandoning a conversation after the first misfire is counterproductive. Communication, especially under stress, needs its own rehearsed response protocol.
Signs that your pressure is nearing the limit are clear if you know what to look for. The professional mask starts slipping, performance suffers, rational thinking fades, and emotional responses become more erratic. You might experience irritability, brain fog, or emotional disconnection. These symptoms are not random—they are signals. Paying attention to them allows you to intervene early and avoid catastrophic failure, just like noticing a balloon becoming overly taut prompts you to stop adding air.
To help manage these high-pressure situations, Dunlap introduces the F.I.R.S.T. Steps Framework: Feelings, Interests, Relationships, Situation, and Tolls. This structured method helps individuals break down complex or overwhelming situations into workable parts. For example, a hospital administrator under budget pressure can use this framework to identify not just her anxiety but also what matters most—staffing and morale. By mapping out her relationships with stakeholders and understanding the actual situation (not just her assumptions about it), she can see how the mounting tolls—like sleepless nights and communication strain—signal the need for intervention. The process helps her shift from emotional reactivity to strategic thinking, a core theme throughout the book.
In addition to F.I.R.S.T., Dunlap offers the 3R Iterative Progression Framework for situations requiring urgent action: Realize, Respond, and Realign. In an emergency, like a product failure before launch or a hostage situation, doing nothing is not an option—but neither is rushing in blindly. The 3R approach teaches that any action should start with a deliberate assessment of available options. Once a step is chosen and taken, it should be followed by honest evaluation and adjustment. Like the negotiator who learns more about a suspect with each interaction, or a business leader who tests and adjusts strategy in real-time, this cyclical method helps navigate high-pressure situations with responsiveness rather than rigidity.
To manage pressure in everyday interactions, Dunlap also shares the S.T.O.P. protocol: Space, Time, and Opportunity. The first step is physical or mental space—stepping away from the pressure source, even briefly, to gain clarity. Then comes time: allow your body to metabolize stress before attempting resolution. Without this phase, your brain is still wired for conflict, not collaboration. Finally, opportunity refers to re-engaging in a more thoughtful, deliberate way, with a clearer mind and a renewed sense of purpose. This framework doesn’t just prevent explosions—it allows for more constructive and lasting solutions to emerge.
The book’s insights are deeply pragmatic, rooted not in theory but in the messy, high-stakes reality of crisis negotiation. Dunlap’s tone is calm and instructional, like a veteran coach training you not just to win but to avoid losing your cool when the heat rises. His frameworks are not meant just for corporate boardrooms or first responders—they apply to anyone navigating stress: parents, managers, teachers, and couples alike. Whether dealing with a minor disagreement or a full-blown crisis, Dunlap’s message is that you don’t need superhuman emotional control; you need better systems for recognizing and releasing pressure before it takes control of you.
In the end, "How to Untie a Balloon" doesn’t promise a life without pressure, nor does it suggest you can avoid conflict entirely. Instead, it equips you with mental models and actionable tools to stay grounded when the stakes are high. It challenges the notion that strong leadership or emotional intelligence is about remaining unaffected. Instead, it reframes composure as a discipline—something you practice through awareness, strategy, and iteration. When you learn how to monitor your internal 'balloon,' to detect the signs of dangerous inflation, and to untie the knot with patience and care, you build resilience. And in a world that constantly challenges your composure, that kind of resilience becomes not just helpful, but vital.
May 24, 2025
We’ve been watching Conflictish videos at the start of our staff meetings at work as a way to stimulate conversation. I enjoy the nuggets of wisdom.
You can tell Dunlap is a speaker and I always suspected he was a type of preacher. Reading about his involvement with faith-based organizations made total sense. The cadence and structure of this almost felt like one long homily.
I did find the book useful and interesting. But most of the knowledge inside I’ve garnered from videos of his or other self-help speakers.
Overall, I think it’s worth it if you’re not familiar with Dunlap’s thoughts and process. If you are, expect more a summary of previous videos and talks he’s given rather than anything new.
You can tell Dunlap is a speaker and I always suspected he was a type of preacher. Reading about his involvement with faith-based organizations made total sense. The cadence and structure of this almost felt like one long homily.
I did find the book useful and interesting. But most of the knowledge inside I’ve garnered from videos of his or other self-help speakers.
Overall, I think it’s worth it if you’re not familiar with Dunlap’s thoughts and process. If you are, expect more a summary of previous videos and talks he’s given rather than anything new.
June 10, 2025
There is a lot of learning and great memorable experiences shared in this book to help anyone grow in managing pressure/emotions/personal reactions in conflict. While the author has a huge social media platform that does a lot of teaching, which is great for auditory learners, having a book like this: to highlight, flip through, and study is fantastic for people who learn better through reading and note-taking.
After reading this book, I will definitely need to re-read and have a notebook/journal on hand to get through the exercises and questions provided so that I can better apply the different frameworks and strategies.
Highly recommend. I am also requiring my high schoolers to read this over the summer to help them prepare for adulting in a healthy way.
After reading this book, I will definitely need to re-read and have a notebook/journal on hand to get through the exercises and questions provided so that I can better apply the different frameworks and strategies.
Highly recommend. I am also requiring my high schoolers to read this over the summer to help them prepare for adulting in a healthy way.
July 11, 2025
2.5 This read like a book written by a public speaker who wanted to have something to sell to the audience after a presentation. I did enjoy some of the anecdotes from Dunlap's career (and, in fact, it made me think that more law enforcement officers should write memoirs), but the how-to portion never stretched beyond the obvious.
July 13, 2025
Good tips for recognizing pressure points in yourself and how to address them before loosing control
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews