My Grandma Used To Say...

Work hard now, it will make your life easier later.

this phrase is very famous in Jordan, and I think in many other Arab countries. But what does it mean?

I’ll tell you. It means while your are in preliminary school you have to study hard to make it easier on you to work your way up through high school. But when you are in high school, you have to study hard to make your way through to university, and when you finally make it to university, you have to study hard in order to graduate with at least good grades to make it easier on you to get a job or continue your post graduate studies . Until now ít's totally true, and I agree with it 100 %.

But when you complete your study with at least BA or BSc, you need to find a job, and here comes the first shock. It’s not easy to find a good job even if your grades were high unless you are connected (talking about the Arab countries), and even if you were lucky and got that job, you will not be able to get better positions according to your knowledge even if you were super genius. But, say that you are not connected and you got lucky and got a job in a good company, how can you proceed to higher positions? Again, hard work. But even hard work will not get you to the top.

So, what's the right answer here?

I think the answer is that you have to be practical smart, and there is a big difference between practical smart and academic smart. I’ve seen a lot of academic smart people who are still struggling with low level jobs just because they are not smart (practically) enough to make their way to the next level.

So, back to our subject, you need hard work and smartness. But say you made it to the top management, is that the time they were talking about? When your life becomes easier and you get to rest? No! I don’t think so, because in order to keep your position, you need to work even harder and not be smart but genius, and work even in your sleep.

Ok, the next level, you are the owner of you own business, is that it? Is that what they were talking about? No, it’s not, because you will have to work like you’ve never worked before to keep the business going. It’s not going to be easy on you to work for someone else after you become your own boss, so you have to make it work. You have to win the battle.

Conclusion!!

You will never be able to rest and your life will never become easier, unless, you are lucky enough to be someone like Bill Gates, and retire in your early 50’s with a net worth of over than USD 45 billions.

So come to think of it, is it worth it to lose your best days in your youth trying to reach that point? I don’t think so.

And so
Live your life to the fullist, and don’t waste it perusing this illusion.