Why does everything have to be hard?

Is the goal actually to achieve all the hard things in life, or is it to have a more pleasant and meaningful life? Growth is one of my values, which is wonderful in so many ways, but sometimes it can mean I fall into the all-too-common trap of thinking that doing more makes me a better person. If I'm striving, if I'm working hard, I'm more meritorious, right?

As a society, in the West at least, we seem to have this real aversion to laziness, which can make us feel like if not we're pushing hard at all times, we're sometimes failing. Phrases like idle hands are the devil's workshop, emphasise the very protestant idea that if we're not actively working on something hard, we will get up to mischief.

I recall the parable of the fisherfolk which my dad once told me. There were a couple of fisherfolk lying on the beach relaxing after having pulled in a huge haul of fish and sold them at the morning market. A businessperson walks up to them and asks them what they're doing. "We're relaxing after a hard morning's work," they say. The Businessperson waves their hands in dismay, "but why aren't you back out there fishing?" The fisherfolk explain that they have made enough money from their fish to be able to pay for their needs for the day, and now they're enjoying the sunshine on their faces and the waves splashing at their feet. The businessperson gets very hot under the collar at this, "but if you continue fishing now, you could sell more fish at the market." "And why would we do that?" "Then you could buy a boat, and you would be able to bring in more fish to sell. "And why would we do that?" "Well then you could hire some more staff and sell even more fish," "And why would we do that?" "Then you could buy a bigger boat and hire even more staff," "And why would we do that?" "Then you could have them take over and you could take a holiday." "And what would we do on holiday?" "You could do what I'm doing, go to a beautiful beach and relax." The fisherfolk looked at the businessperson with interest. Then eventually, one of them said. "But. we're already doing that."

I used to think that parable was about not striving for things, but I think it's. perhaps more nuanced than that. The fisherfolk were perfectly happy to work hard, they got p early and did their work in the wee hours before dawn. What is different about them to so many of us, however, is that they knew what they wanted from life. They knew how to be satisfied with enough, and to enjoy the life they were actually living, rather than constantly striving for something out of reach, getting so exhausted doing it that they had to take a holiday just to be able to go back to work again.

So often, I (and I believe, many of us) fall into this trap. I like working hard, I like achieving things. Yet, if it's a sunny day on a work-day, I spend most of the day looking grudgingly outside, lamenting the fact that I have to be in the office. I recently spent three months off work, and I don't think I spent a single day not 'working'. I was writing, learning to be a coach, coming up with ideas for various books, figuring out business plans, and so on. It's just that I did that while sitting in a cafe on a beach in Sri Lanka, I listened to workshops walking along with my feet in the water. I've come to realise that it's not work that I dislike. I enjoy most of what I do, it's the freedom to do things my way. I want to be able to take a two hour walk in the hills listening to podcasts about writers and entrepreneurs. I want to go for a run while the sun is still up, to sit with a cup of tea in hand writing my story in the darkness because I just have to get this idea down.

For many of us, our work ethic isn't the issue. The issue is remembering what matters to us. If we know our values, we can remember our why. If we know who we are, we can lean into our strengths, allowing things that comes naturally to us to be the things that make money for us, rather than always feeling we have to push hard to be something we're not. We can identify who we want to be and strive to show up as that person each day. If we know what our priorities are; we can take time out of that busy work day to go and see the kids at their assembly, or to go for a walk in the sunshine because it could be raining in an hour. I wonder if perhaps life isn't about working as hard as we can at every little thing. I realise how easily I become that business person. It’s easy to feel that life is not meritorious if it’s not all hard work. And yet, many of us spend our whole year hanging out for that one vacation, working extra hard to be able to get it.

I wonder if it's more about how we can embrace a sense of ease in what we do and how we do it. That way, maybe we can enjoy every day, or at least most of them.