Today I Choose to be Sensible – How to be Sensible

August 13, 2025

I stayed ten years too long.

Not in a marriage or a house or a city. In a job. With a CEO who could charm investors and motivate crowds but couldn’t see the cliff we were all walking toward. For ten years, I watched him make decisions that felt wrong in my bones, decisions I knew would eventually bring everything tumbling down.

And for ten years, I tried to warn him. Gently at first. Then more directly. Finally, desperately.

He wouldn’t listen. And I stayed anyway, because loyalty felt more important than logic, because I’d invested so much already, because walking away felt like admitting failure.

Until the day I realized that being sensible wasn’t about staying. It was about leaving.

The Weight of Seeing What Others Can’t

There’s a particular kind of exhaustion that comes from being right about the wrong things. From watching train wrecks in slow motion while everyone around you insists the train is running perfectly on schedule.

By year seven, I’d developed what I privately called “meeting stomach” -that churning, anxious feeling that came with every strategic planning session where I’d watch us make choices that felt like lighting money on fire. The numbers didn’t add up. The market signals were clear. Our competitors were eating our lunch.

But he was charismatic. Convincing. He could make anyone believe that this time would be different, that his latest brilliant idea would turn everything around. And I kept getting promoted for my “loyalty” and “team spirit.”

What they called loyalty, I was beginning to recognize as cowardice.

Being sensible doesn’t always feel sensible in the moment. Sometimes it feels like betrayal -of the people who believe in you, of the relationships you’ve built, of the story you’ve been telling yourself about who you are and what you owe.

The Day I Finally Listened to Myself

It was a business meeting in a Grillsmith. I remember it clearly. Paul D, the latest of the hangers on was pitching an idea that was pure folly and probably illegal. I remember the car ride back from the meeting, my CEO, we will call him JB to protect his privacy, was with me. I was explaining, sensibly, everything wrong with the situation.

He listened with that patient, condescending smile I’d come to know too well, the one that said he was humoring me but had already made up his mind. When I finished, he thanked me for my “input” and moved on as if I hadn’t spoken.

But this time, something in me snapped. Or maybe something finally aligned. The part of me that knew better and the part of me that was tired of being ignored found each other and shook hands.

I went home, considered everything and something in my gut just said “I quit”. So I called him, and I quit.

What Sensible Really Costs

He was genuinely shocked. After ten years of me staying, of me adapting, of me finding ways to make his impossible plans work, he couldn’t comprehend that I would leave.

“But you’re part of the family here,” he said, using the phrase that had kept me trapped longer than any golden handcuffs ever could.

“That’s exactly the problem,” I told him. “Families protect each other from hard truths. Companies need people who will tell them what they don’t want to hear.”

I thought the next few would be difficult, but strangely enough, they weren’t. Immediately on the heels of my quitting and old business associate called me and said “Susieeeee! Baby!!! Ineed you to come work for me!”

The CEO worked overtime to get me to change my mind but once I had pulled the trigger I could not be swayed.

The View from the Other Side

Six months after I left, I was happily working where better leadership wanted to hear what I really thought, not just what they wanted to hear.

A year after that, the company was sued and the CEO fled the country. To this day he calls Panama his home.

It wasn’t satisfying in the way. No vindication feels good when it involves real people losing real jobs. But it was clarifying. The train wreck I’d seen coming had arrived right on schedule.

Some of my former colleagues reached out then, sheepishly, admitting they’d known things were bad but hadn’t wanted to believe it. Others asked if I’d seen it coming, as if my departure hadn’t been answer enough.

One person- someone I’d genuinely liked and respected- said something that stayed with me: “I wish I’d had your courage.”

But it wasn’t courage. It was sensible.

Learning to Trust the Uncomfortable Truth

At 61, I’ve come to understand that being sensible is often uncomfortable. It requires you to act on information that others are ignoring, to make choices that feel premature, to trust your analysis over your emotions.

It means leaving parties before they get really fun because you can see how they’re going to end. It means saying no to opportunities that look good on paper but feel wrong in your gut. It means disappointing people who’ve grown comfortable with your willingness to ignore problems.

The hardest part of being sensible isn’t being right. It’s being right alone.

But I’ve learned something else: sensible people aren’t pessimists. We’re not joy-killers or dream-crushers. We’re the ones who see clearly enough to build something sustainable, who care enough about the future to make unpopular choices in the present.

The Wisdom of Small Sensible Choices

Being sensible doesn’t always mean dramatic exits and vindicated predictions. Most of the time, it looks much smaller and quieter than my CEO story.

It looks like going to bed at a reasonable hour even when everyone else is staying up late. Like saying no to social commitments when you’re genuinely tired. Like spending less than you earn, even when credit is easy and everyone else is leveraging themselves to the hilt.

It looks like having difficult conversations before they become crises. Like addressing small problems before they become big ones. Like trusting your instincts even when you can’t fully articulate why something feels wrong.

These aren’t exciting choices. They don’t make good stories at cocktail parties. They don’t get you celebrated for your spontaneity or admired for your risk-taking.

But they create a foundation solid enough to build a real life on.

The Long View That Sensible Provides

Today, when I’m tempted to ignore red flags or stay in situations that no longer serve me, I remember that fateful meeting and ensuing conversation. I remember the relief I felt hanging up the phone after quitting, the way my shoulders dropped and my breathing deepened as soon as I was free.

I remember the months of uncertainty that followed, but also the slow dawning realization that I’d saved myself from going down with someone else’s sinking ship.

Being sensible doesn’t guarantee you’ll be happy. It doesn’t promise smooth sailing or immediate rewards. But it gives you something more valuable: the knowledge that you’re living in alignment with your own wisdom, that you’re making choices from clarity rather than fear or wishful thinking.

The Invitation to Trust Yourself

Today I choose to be sensible. Not because it’s easy- ”it’s often the hardest choice. Not because it makes me popular- it rarely does. But because sensible choices honor both my present reality and my future well-being.

They honor the part of me that sees clearly and deserves to be heard, even when, especially when, what I see isn’t what others want to acknowledge.

If there’s something in your life right now that doesn’t feel right, that makes your stomach churn in meetings or keeps you awake at night with worry, you probably already know what the sensible choice is.

The question isn’t whether you’re right. Your gut usually is. The question is whether you’re ready to trust yourself enough to act on what you already know.

Being sensible isn’t about being boring or safe or small. It’s about being honest enough with yourself to make hard choices before circumstances make them for you.

It’s about honoring your own wisdom, even when you’re the only one listening.

Sometimes being sensible means staying and fighting for what you believe in. Sometimes it means leaving before the fight is over.

The key is learning to tell the difference. And having the courage to act on what your clearest, wisest self already knows.

Because ten years is too long to ignore your own good judgment. But it’s never too late to start trusting it again.

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