Since time immemorial, one has been fed a particular success philosophy. This ideology prescribes the formula for success as something like this – work hard, push yourself, don’t stop, keep hustling, brace yourself for stress, learn to use your stress to push you harder, and so on. The successful entrepreneurs of the world have continued to attribute their business success to this approach of hustling, pushing, and literally "hard" working their way to success. This has only continually reinforced this very-limiting and actually self-damaging philosophy.
You never really asked yourself -
Is hard work necessary for success?
Is there another way?
Must I struggle for success?
Is being worried and stressed along the journey inevitable?
The erroneous philosophy of pushing, struggling, and working HARD to be successful
What if I tell you today – you can be as successful as you can imagine sans the never-questioned baggage of pushing, stressing, and working yourself to the bone. Was your first thought on hearing this that this is only possible in a fantasy or a dream world!? Or maybe you began thinking that this freedom from struggling for success is only possible if you were born with a golden spoon! In either case, don't stop now. Just read on!
To properly answer the question - Is hard work necessary for success? - let's understand a few things first.
Nearly all of humanity, unaware that they are operating from a severely limiting ego-mind, have unquestioningly bought into this self-damaging philosophy of pushing and hard working. To explain a little, the ego-mind limits one’s vision and awareness of their true self. It literally blinds one into thinking of themselves as isolated individuals living in a fight-for-yourself world. This kind of mind energy gives rise to the thinking of “I must work hard always to gain success”. There is no place for ease and joy here. Your answer to the question - is hard work necessary for success - is a resounding and almost resigned YES.
However, when one opens themselves up to and begins to align themselves with their true self, they begin to understand that there is a higher intelligence at play 24*7. At the highest level, people are part of this higher intelligence (but more on this later). Becoming sensitive to your true self expands your awareness to understand that you are not really the “doer”. You are actually “being done”. And the more you surrender to this higher intelligence, the more you begin to feel like you’re literally not alone, and that you’ve always had a guiding voice within you. Slowly, but surely, your internal PUSH-TO-GET-DONE philosophy will begin to give way to a TRUST, FLOW, AND ACT philosophy. You will begin to experience a slight sense of ease in whatever you are doing in your career. And this will also percolate to other aspects of your life.
"I wanted to do well academically. But it was equally important to do things in an effortless manner."
- Amal Clooney
How to be successful and happy?
The more you drop your ego-mind energy and adopt the higher-mind energy, the lesser and lesser will your previously dominant forces of fear and stress become. They will give way to forces of ease, lightness, and joy in your work. It will all start seeming a little magical. The more you trust this force, the more the magic will show up in your life.
Life is meant to be enjoyed, not slaved through. The only effort you really need to make is to drop the ego-mind. Consciously let go of all the philosophies it has been feeding you. Raise your awareness and catch yourself every time you drop back to the ego-mind. Because when you do drop your awareness, you will once again identify with the illusionary stress or worry that it creates.
This does not mean that you should not take action, it simply means you take action from the right mind. Operate more and more from only your higher-mind.
"Success in life could be defined as the continued expansion of happiness and the progressive realization of worthy goals"
- Deepak Chopra
As you do this, the magic of life will begin to unfold. Your so-called “luck” will begin to improve. Things will actually start “showing up” at the right place and the right time, instead of you having to struggle and struggle to get where you want to be. Another fun thing would be that you may get directed to a different path to achieve your goal, a path that you never thought of before. Maybe your end goal itself will become a little different but in a delightful way. It may even be possible that you set out to achieve one goal and ended up adopting a new goal. Or a better way to think of this would be that you end up getting guided to a slightly altered goal (by your higher mind). Whatever actually happens (physically) will almost no longer really impact your level of peace and contentment. This is how to be successful and happy.
So is hard work necessary for success? NO!
It's one hundred percent possible to achieve your career and/or business goals without the "constant struggle". Not only is this true, but it is also what you were actually designed to do. Once you've learned how to be successful and happy, you will now be plugged into a state of easy and joyful work. This may even include working for long hours, without it actually feeling like "hard work". Moreover, it will begin to feel like a joyous flow of effortless work.
You will have forever dropped the “hard” from your work. You will now be responding almost effortlessly to what life is guiding you to do, as opposed to pushing and striving as the ego-mind previously guided you to do. It will feel like you are “being done” as opposed to “having to do”.
What you seek………will now start seeking you.
About the author, Aman Chandra -
Dealing with the separation of his parents at the age of two years and battling crippling anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) at the age of twelve years are just a few of the challenges that Aman dealt with. With a burning desire to learn “how to be happy in life” despite there being so much suffering, Aman began a life-long journey of studying under various global personal and spiritual growth masters, such as Eckhart Tolle and Tony Robbins. With this was born his tried-and-tested Bulletproofing-HappinessTM formula, and he uses the same to coach seekers across the globe on how to overcome challenges and live a truly happy life.
DID YOU ENJOY THE ABOVE POST? DROP YOUR COMMENTS BELOW TO SPARK A CONVERSATION!