She didn't ask "What's wrong?" She put a fresh coffee down. And a post-it note. She whispered: "Don't write the paper. Just write the first sentence. I'll come back in 5 minutes to check." It was a dare. A game. My brain woke up. "I can do one sentence," I thought. "I'll show her." I wrote it. She came back. Smiled. "Good. Now write three crappy bullet points. I'll be back in 5." She "gamified" my panic attack. She broke the paralysis by becoming an external timer. I finished the draft in 45 min