An important goal of ecology is to predict how natural populations respond to perturbations. Natural populations are nonlinear and exhibit substantial variability. In this talk, I will present a theoretical framework showing how transient responses to one-time perturbations accumulate over time, providing a unified framework for pulse-press perturbations. I will draw conceptual links across systems, from traditional farming landscapes in the Indian Himalaya to natural populations of Trinidadian guppies. Together, these examples illustrate how stochasticity and disturbance structure shape resilience, predictability, and vulnerability across ecological and socio-ecological systems.