Is working hard the only thing you need for success?
Hustle culture is toxic AF. Hustle, hustle, hustle, you’re not working hard enough. How many hours? Only 12? If you wanna make it happen you need to work at least 16. I work 17, just to be safe.
Huh, you feel like you’d rather die than spend another minute hustling? Well, my friend, that’s exactly what happens to lazy f*#ks who wake up at 7:30 am in the afternoon. Successful people wake up before they even go to sleep, everyone knows that.
Just put in some extra hours of hard work and everything will work out. How many times have you heard that? It seems to be the Hustle culture’s go-to answer for every question.
Whenever something we do doesn’t work one of the most common pieces of advice we’re given is to just put in some extra effort. Whatever the problem may be, the common solution to everything seems to be “working hard”. Sometimes just working hard isn’t enough, you have to work harder than your friends, harder than your competition, you even have to be willing to work more than everybody you know and don’t know and everybody on the East and the West Coast and in the middle. If that doesn’t cut it just find another job, and maybe then you’ll be able to hustle your way into the culture.
Working hard on your dreams is pretty damn good advice, how else are you gonna achieve them. I have nothing against working hard. But is it the only thing standing between you and your success?
I don’t think so.
One of the biggest problems of this mentality is that it inevitably makes you feel lazy. It makes you feel like you’re not doing enough, no matter how much effort you put in.
It leads you to believe that your only problem is not working hard. And even though it might be a great reality check for a couch potato, for regular people who show up and try their best every single day guilt is not the answer.
Hustle Culture neglects some success factors that are just as important (if not even more)
The way I see it, concentrating only on working hard and neglecting some other equally important aspects of life isn’t the smartest way to approach this topic.
Being able to rest productively is just as important as being able to work productively, and If there’s one thing that’s guaranteed to mess up your resting time, it’s definitely guilt. Feeling guilty that you didn’t work hard enough, or that you didn’t do everything you were supposed to do that day is completely counterproductive. You might be able to get some sleep, but would you be able to mentally recharge after hours of feeling guilty? I know I wouldn’t.
How about motivation and a positive mental attitude? Guilt and a positive mental attitude are mutually exclusive, and you’ll have to make a conscious choice which one to keep.
Benefits of working hard
Working hard is one of the most important parts of achieving your dreams and goals. It’s actually one of the most important parts of achieving any goal. But it’s only one of them. It’s not THE most important one, and definitely isn’t the only one.
Sitting, doing nothing, and expecting something is not the best strategy. But thinking that only working hard at any cost is the answer is equally as silly.
Hard work is pointless unless it’s paired with motivation, vision, creativity, resilience, enjoyment. If you completely neglect every other part of your life, two questions arise. How long can you last until you completely burn out? And the most important one, Is it even worth it?
Again, I don’t want to sound like I’m against hard work. I want it to be a conscious choice. If you feel inspired to work on a project for 16 hours, if you feel inspired to stay up all night until you finish, then that’s fantastic. That’s pure inspiration.
But if you work hard to your detriment, just because hustle culture has taught you that 9 hours a day isn’t enough, and that’s why it still hasn’t happened for you, then please stop, and do a self-evaluation.
Drawbacks of working hard
Putting all your eggs in a “working hard” basket is a sure way to make an unforeseen omelet.
Muscles don’t grow in the gym. They grow during the resting period. Just working progressively harder in the gym every single day won’t take you anywhere, and you’re bound to inflict some serious damage on your body.
And it is actually pointless.
Without a proper diet, a workout plan, enough time to rest, heavy lifting alone does more harm than good. It only works when it’s an integral part of a healthy mix.
Working hard just for the sake of working hard is pretty much the same.
If you’d like to find out what are some other drawbacks of only concentrating on working hard, here are a few amazingly helpful articles that explore some serious disadvantages of working too hard, as well as some serious health problems that can occur.
Working hard vs working smart
Now that we have established that working too hard is bad, what are some other approaches that deserve exploration?
MAKE A DAILY PLAN
Making a plan is one of the most important and most beneficial practices one can adopt. Smart planning has the potential to transform both your personal and your professional life in a matter of weeks.
Make plans. Plan each day. Make a list of a few important things you have to do tomorrow, and stick to it. Add some fun 5-minute activities to cheer you up during breaks. It doesn’t take long to mentally recharge during the day, all it takes is to do something fun for a very short period of time. Try it out.
Planning your day is a life-changing activity, it only takes 5 minutes. You can do it before you go to sleep, or after you wake up. Just make sure to make an achievable plan and stick to it. In a matter of weeks, you’ll see life-changing effects.
MANAGE YOUR TIME WISELY
Learn how to properly manage your time. Prioritize tasks you have to accomplish, set some time for each of them. Learn how to wisely manage your time, see what’s time-wasting, what should be given more attention. Stick to it, and I promise. You’ll see changes as you’ve never seen before.
TAKE SHORT BREAKS DURING THE DAY
Take short breaks during the day to recharge. This is pretty important. It prevents exhaustion, and it’s a great way to calm your mind for a few minutes.
SET CLEAR AND ACHIEVABLE GOALS
Setting achievable goals is one of the most important aspects of working smart because setting a bar too high can lead to disappointment, and setting it too low can lead to loss of interest.
Set clear goals. Goals that are not easy for you to achieve, but yet not almost impossible. Be smart about this one, stay consistent and the results have no other option than to come.
Burnout – the inevitable side effect of hustle culture
One of the main problems with hustle culture and the toxicity it promotes is that the burnout of all the hard work is inevitable. It’s impossible to be in a completely unhealthy mindset without it taking a toll on both your body and mind. Exhaustion and complete burnout is an impending outcome of hustle culture.
On an online troubleshooting quest, each of us embarks upon whenever we need to make something work, finding out terrible advice is just as common as finding out amazing ones. It took years to learn how to distinguish healthy ones from those which are not, but I’ve developed a system. It’s simple. If It promotes healthy behaviors and patterns I take it into consideration. If it doesn’t it’s not for me.
Hustle culture isn’t for me.
I don’t agree with what it has to offer, and I’d advise all my dear friends to stay away from it.
