“Continuous effort– not strength or intelligence – is the key to unlocking our potential.”
Winston Churchill
Obviously working hard is important to be successful, I always knew that. But I have never figured out why. What made working hard and getting good grades in school have anything to do with getting a good job? Because as I went to school I found that the smartest people in school can be rude and standoffish, acting all superior to the rest of us. Why do the teachers have such a bad judgement of character to parade these assholes to us, claiming that we should follow in their footsteps? So what is it that makes everyone value hard work so much?
It took me a while but this is the conclusion that I have arrived at. Hard work builds character, but more than that hard work builds personality. It allows avenues for self discovery and growth. It gives people the opportunity to find their wants and needs, their likes and dislikes.
In a land without hard work life would be not worth living. Hard work and passion generates love and a purpose. I have felt lost and confused for a long time, not sticking to anything and being allergic to working hard I have never took anything seriously and always thought it was lame to do so. Little did I know that the lack of commitment and perseverance was the plague that caused me to lose control of my life, living with no real purpose.
Oh how wrong was I to think that working hard is lame.
But through this self discovery I have created this “theory” to visualise the importance of working hard.
(I just wanted to remind everyone that this is just my ideas compiled into a graph, please do not take my word as fact because I could be dead wrong. After all these are just some guy’s thoughts on the internet)
This is a breakdown of how I feel the relationship between a person and a certain activity is, whether it be sports, studying, work, music etc.
A:
It all begins with the initial passion towards the activity, the mindset being that it is new, fun and exciting so you put in the work. Your passion and hard work grow at an exponential rate getting better at your activity with each and everyday. You have been struck by the love of the new thing.
B:
You have hit your passion cap so to speak. This is fullest extent of how much you initially love the activity, you have reached the highest initial passion. But after a while, the new thing becomes mundane and apart of your routine. It doesn’t bring you excitement anymore. You also realise that the harder you work on this activity, results aren’t showing as fast as they did before when you first started. Things just aren’t going your way, causing your passion to stagnate.
C:
You try to work harder, chasing that ever dwindling progress that was so easily achieved in the start, but realising that doing the activity becomes more of a chore than something you want to do. Your passion drops at an alarming rate, you feel that somehow working harder and harder causes you to take steps in the wrong direction. You start to even question the point of it all, working this hard for no improvement. We have reached the “make or break” point. This is where you can either have faith and keep going, or you can just give up.
D:
You have made it, the investments in yourself are finally starting to pay off. You notice small improvements here and there, you start believing in yourself again. Your passion grows steadily as you improve steadily. You fall back in love with your activity, learning to appreciate it. You are grateful for the times when it made you happy, and for the frustration you had to go through to reach your current point where you are. This appreciation and gratefulness leads to lifetime gratitude towards yourself and the activity. You’re happy you didn’t just quit.
I used to tell myself whenever I barely passed a test without studying ” I passed?! Imagine if I actually tried.”
So do it, be uncomfortable, go through with it, just try. And if you do succeed, it just makes the victory that much sweeter.
It Never Hurts To Try
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