Take two breaths. I’m going to show you where one of them comes from.

It all starts (and ends) with phytoplankton. Phytoplankton are single-cell organisms that float throughout our planet’s oceans. Billions of them. And they have a nemesis: viruses.

Here’s what happens. Viruses try to batter their way through the outer shells of the phytoplankton. If a given virus succeeds, it hijacks the phytoplankton’s machinery for the purpose of creating more viruses. Then multiple viruses are created within the poor phytoplankton, and the phytoplankton gives up the ghost.

The outer shell of the phytoplankton sloughs off, and you can actually see this from space. No joke. Check this out:

The milky blue-green substance you see, often called a “phytoplankton bloom,” is millions and millions of phytoplankton shells, having rained off upon their erstwhile owners’ death.

Interesting, right? Maybe a little gruesome? When I told this story to my boss, he grimaced in sincere disgust at the devilish deeds of those vile viruses.

Except, as it turns out, the story has a happy ending. You see, when those phytoplankton die off, space is created for new phytoplankton to build up.

And every time a new phytoplankton is born, a little puff of oxygen is released into our atmosphere.

Half the oxygen we breathe comes from this process. Every other breath you take comes from phytoplankton.

Thanks again to those masters of scientific wonder, Jad and Robert, at RadioLab, for their story.

The whole thing got me thinking.

It got me thinking about the tension between phytoplankton and viruses, and how the result of this tension is oxygen.

It got me thinking about the tension between cooks and servers, and how the result of healthy tension between them is a tasty meal served in timely fashion.

It got me thinking about the tension between editorial and marketing, and how the ideal result is incredible content with a title and cover that capture the world’s attention.

It made me think about the tension between editors and authors. Authors write stuff, editors push back at various points, and the result of this tension is often (not always, but often) a much better book.

I see a distinction between tension and stress. Tension comes from two free-standing bodies that push against one another. Stress is pressure a body feels within itself. Big difference.

But it does make me wonder: Can we transform stress into tension? Can we externalize internal pressure that we’re feeling so that it becomes more productive?

Notice too that sometimes (and I think this is probably more often the case than not) something has to die before the oxygen is released. You might ask yourself, what needs to die for you to move forward?

A few more questions. Do you have some tension in your life right now? Are you struggling with a creative project? Are you anxious about what’s going to happen, what to do next, who’s going to win, where you’re going to go?

Remember the phytoplankton and the viruses. Remember: oxygen.

Tension is the precursor to something better. Tension can lead you to life.

When has tension resulted in life for you? How can you “embrace the tension” right now on the way to something better?