I betrayed my own advice and wrote a check

I recently wrote a check to a family member who didn’t deserve it.

The moment I signed it, I knew I’d betrayed my own advice.

As I drove away from the mailbox, I couldn’t stop thinking about something I’d written a few weeks earlier: “Healthy + Smart = Intelligence.”

An intelligent person gets what they want from life. An intelligent organization achieves its vision.

For the first time, I wasn’t sure I understood the equation anymore.

This family member has spent years learning exactly how to get what they want from me. Guilt. Shame. Even scripture quoted to bend me to their will.

They got what they wanted.

By my own definition, weren’t they intelligent?

I kept coming back to that question. A few days later, I came across something Shane Parrish wrote: “Wisdom is wanting what’s worth getting in the first place.”

My family member wasn’t lacking intelligence. The problem wasn’t that they got what they wanted. The problem was what they wanted and how they chose to get it.

Every manipulation costs trust. Every guilt trip drains the emotional bank account. You might win the transaction, but over time, you lose something much bigger.

That’s when I realized I’d been giving “Healthy” too little credit.

Healthy isn’t just about clarity, a united leadership team, and no politics. It’s about wanting what’s worth wanting and leaving the people around you better because of it.

I’d like to tell myself I was outsmarted.

The truth is, I paid to escape discomfort.

I spend my career helping leaders enter the danger. But when that same danger showed up in my own life, I signed the check.

Businesses write checks like this every day.

Every time we avoid what needs to be addressed because it’s easier in the moment, we’re paying to escape discomfort.

The bill always comes due.

When I build an Accountability Chart with a leadership team, we spend a lot of time asking whether someone GWC’s their seat and lives the Core Values.

Does this person make our organization more intelligent?

There are people who make every team they join better. They build trust, make the people around them better, and want the same things the company wants.

Others are incredibly smart, yet every win comes at someone else’s expense. They get what they want, but everyone around them pays for it.

They’re smart. But they aren’t healthy.

Which means they aren’t making your organization more intelligent.

Then I realized I’d been applying that standard to everyone but myself.

Who in my life am I continuing to write checks for?

Where am I choosing temporary comfort over long-term health?

And maybe the hardest question of all…

Where am I paying to escape discomfort?

I still believe the equation is right: Healthy + Smart = Intelligence.

I’ve just realized that the “Healthy” side of the equation is much easier to teach than it is to live.