We Need To Redefine ‘Hard Work’ To Include ‘Hard Thinking’
Look for shortcuts instead of time
The person who outsmarts you is out-working you. The person who finds shortcuts is out-working you. The person with a better strategy is out-working you. Usually, the hardest work is thinking of a better way to do it.”
~ James Clear
We tend to believe that the hardest working person is the one who puts in more hours, never takes breaks, and he’s always stressed and busy with a lot of work. We tend to believe that the person who comes first and leaves last is a hard worker while the person who puts in fewer hours is a lazy person.
Well, we need to take a step back and reconsider our beliefs.
The traditional meaning of working hard should not be welcome nor celebrated in your business or your life. It’s not sustainable, it’s toxic. What is really worth celebrating is the act of thinking for better and smarter ways to reach your goals.
Because you may be feeling overwhelmed right now with all the tasks and projects that you need to get done. Maybe you’re working on a project that feels very heavy and you can’t handle it anymore or you regret working on this project in the first place.
So what should you do?
You have 2 choices:
1- Work hard all day long and put tens of hours from your life into this project
2- Think hard and find an easy and effective way to achieve your goal
How to do that?
By asking one question, a question that changed my life. This question was mentioned by Tim Ferris in his famous book “The 4-Hour Workweek”.
And that question is:
If this was easy, what would it look like?
Just take a moment and think about it. This heavy task that keeps you stressed every day, if it was easy, how it would look like? This question is really powerful and deep because we always tend to overcomplicate things. Maybe because other people did it in a certain way and they said it was hard so we think it is. Or we just believe we’re not skilled and as a result, this task “should” be hard.
In most cases, these “hard” tasks are not as hard as we may think, we just feel it’s heavy and complicated and that we don’t have what it takes to accomplish this task or achieve this goal.
But we do!
You’re smarter and stronger than you think.
You just need to ask that question and find the answer. Just ask yourself, “let’s hypothetically believe this thing is actually easy, what would it look like? What the process will be if it was easy?”
Take any example you want. Let’s say you’re a professional podcaster and you decided to create a course that teaches people how to start a podcast. Now, ask that question, if this task was easy, how would it look like?
The answer is more simple than you think. The answer is to simply create a new podcast and show people the process along the way. You won’t have to create a course program from scratch or anything like that, you will just create a successful podcast and share your journey along the way with your student. That’s the best way to teach them.
You need to look for ways to make your life easier, that’s the real hard work. Now you may say, “Well, I asked that question but my task is still hard, should I work more hours?”.
Not necessarily. As Bob Sullivan explained on CNBC.com, “Research that attempts to quantify the relationship between hours worked and productivity found that employee output falls sharply after a 50-hour work-week, and falls off a cliff after 55 hours — so much so that someone who puts in 70 hours produces nothing more with those extra 15 hours, according to a study published last year by John Pencavel of Stanford University.”
This means that putting in more hours doesn’t really help. It just keeps you busy from feeling stressed or depressed until later when you go back home.
The number of hours you spent on a certain task doesn’t really matter. In fact, research from the Behance team found “that placing importance on hours and physical presence over action and results leads to a culture of inefficiency (and anxiety).”
“The pressure of being required to sit at your desk until a certain time creates a factory-like culture that ignores a few basic laws of idea generation and human nature: (1) When the brain is tired, it doesn’t work well, (2) Idea generation happens on its own terms, (3) When you feel forced to execute beyond your capacity, you begin to hate what you are doing”.
So stop trying to work hard and start thinking hard.
It May Be Hard, But It’s Simpler Than You Think
Of course, I’m not saying that there are no difficult problems, tasks, or projects, and you shouldn’t think I’m saying this. What I want you to take from this is that you’re capable of doing it.
Whether it’s creating a YouTube channel, learning to code, or building a startup, if someone else in the world did it then you can too. Quite often though, we are able to solve problems simply by rewording them. As the famed author, Dr. Wayne Dyer once said: “When you change the way you see things, the things you see change.” This is what this magical question can do. It allows you to take a step back and see if there is an easier path that you are missing or avoiding for some reason.
Now you may be thinking to yourself, “wow, can it really be that easy?”.
That’s exactly the reason why we get into trouble. Because we don’t want to believe that things are actually more simple.
So stop worrying and ask yourself this question, “If this was easy, what would it look like?”. Let me know what are you working on right now that made you feel overwhelmed and how would it look like if it was easy. Let me know in the comments below 👇👇👇
If you want to be more productive and achieve more goals in life, download Systemize for Free. It’s a habit tracker app where you can create systems and track your progress over time to make achieving goals easier.
This post is part of a series of stories that explore business growth strategies that actually work.1. We Need To Redefine ‘Hard Work’ To Include ‘Hard Thinking’
The mind-shifting strategy to work smart not hard.2. How To Stand Out In A Crowded World
The power of story-telling.3. The Best Marketing Doesn’t Feel Like Marketing
How to market your products like a pro.4. The One Piece Of Advice That Changed My Life
A must read before starting any project.5. How I Went From 0 To 541 Email Subscribers In One Day
Give before you get.6. 10 Things Successful Creators Do That You (Probably) Don’t
Lessons from successful creators.7. 5 Side Hustles You Can Start This Weekend
Making money online is easier than you think.8. Here’s Why You Should Go Niche Your First Year Of Business
If you want to go big, go small first.9. 4 Actionable Tips To Find A Profitable Business Idea In 2022
A practical approach to come up with a profitable business idea.10. The Unfair Advantage Of Business Success
Here's why business is more than hard .
