Today’s Strategic Alignment Journal post in two sentences:

A positive mindset and physical stamina are often treated as soft priorities, even though both directly influence the quality of our decisions, our resilience and our ability to keep going. When we repeatedly postpone movement, rest and proper care because we are too busy working, we compromise the very capacity on which our work and our lives depend.

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It is easy to say that health supports success.

The harder truth is that many of us compromise our health while working towards the success we believe will eventually allow us to live well. We eat for comfort because the work is stressful. We skip the stretches and the walks because we are busy. We remain seated for hours, sleep badly and keep promising ourselves that we will take better care of our bodies once things settle down.

I know this because I have spent so much time trying to get started again. In 2015, after mastering the habit of a once-a-day Kit Kat at night, along with several other terrible food choices, I decided to start walking. I got one of the early Fitbit options and committed to 10,000 steps a day. It went well until 2016, when a family health crisis took me away from life as I knew it, and the 25 pounds I had successfully lost came right back.

In hindsight, I realized that I had moved from being intrinsically motivated—I needed to lose the weight because I needed to—to being motivated exclusively by all the admiring eyes and applause I received for my walking consistency.

So keep in mind that whatever you do has to be motivated exclusively by you.

This matters because the pressure to make progress can make everything that does not appear to contribute directly to earning feel “postponable.” Yet the things we postpone—movement, nourishment, rest and emotional steadiness—determine whether we have the physical and mental capacity to continue.

Recently I’ve watched a family member’s entire life become compromised by the cumulative effect of choices made over time. Being ringside, seeing these consequences up front and personal has made me uber aware of how fragile our lives are if we choose to not heed the early warnings, continuing to make choices that will eventually become detrimental. I recognize that health is no longer a lifestyle preference or something to address when there is more time. It is an asset we are either protecting or gradually getting rid of – literally.

This brings me back to the first name I had for these posts: Well-Paid Professional

Being Well-Paid remains important with the emphasis on WELL. If earning requires us to repeatedly compromise the body and mind upon which our life depends, we may eventually discover that we have been financing our progress with the very thing we were hoping the progress would allow us to enjoy.

A positive mindset and physical stamina are hard assets.

They determine what we can carry, how clearly we can think, how well we recover and whether we remain physically and mentally able to enjoy the life we are building.

Strategic Reflection Prompt

What aspects of your physical and mental wellbeing have you been postponing because work feels more urgent, and what could that postponement eventually cost you?

About Giselle

Most costly decisions begin with a wrong read of the situation.

I’m Giselle Hudson — The Pre-Fixer. I help leaders see the real problem before they act, in my writing and in my work. I don’t fix; I pre-fix. Most advisers jump to solutions before they’ve found the real problem. I find it first — the part that isn’t fully visible yet. Once we see that clearly, everything else falls into place, and confident, right action can follow.

Through my daily Strategic Alignment Journal, I explore leadership, decision-making, and the patterns that shape organizations — helping leaders make sense of complexity before they commit significant time and money to the wrong thing.

What’s the one thing about your business that frustrates you most — the thing that, despite your best efforts, you can’t seem to resolve?