What does it mean to work hard?
Here’s a cool Tweet from Wall Street Playboys:
The number of hours you work is 100% not related to working hard. Data entry for 16 hours is NOT “hard work.”
This lesson is so important because we’ve all been taught that hard work = long hours. This isn’t true. Working long hours may be hard, but it isn’t necessarily hard work.
Hard work is all about thinking.
Using your thoughts to make your life and the lives of others better. It’s about solving problems. It’s about thinking the right thoughts. This thinking may not take a long time, but it provides enormous value. The value provided by thinking about hard things far exceeds what most people consider hard work.
I’m sure you’ve heard of HIIT workouts, right? High intensity interval training. This is the type of workout where you exercise all out for 20 to 30 seconds and then you rest for 20 to 30 seconds. You repeat this cycle 5 or 6 times and your done. These HIIT workouts don’t take a lot of time, but they’re extremely effective. They’re actually more effective then spending hour upon hour on the treadmill.
Hard work is the exact same thing. It’s about extracting more value from shorter periods of time. One of the best ways to understand the value of hard work might be from an actual example from when I was building my real estate business. I hated having to constantly chase prospects.
So I started asking myself the following question:
“How can I get prospects to chase me?”
Answering this question required a great deal of thought and study. I had to look for situations where prospects chased professionals. I had to figure out how to do something similar in my business. This required a lot of testing different marketing approaches and tracking the results. Once I solved the problem, my business changed dramatically. My sales tripled without any prospecting. This entire process didn’t require years of work, so it wouldn’t typically be considered “hard.” It did require a great deal of thought and testing.
On a high level, hard work is thinking about solving problems. Your problems and the problems of others. Here are some random “hard work” ideas to help get you started:
Do I have a scarcity mindset or an abundance mindset? If I have a scarcity mindset, how can I change myself to an abundance mindset?
How can I design the ideal lifestyle business?
How can I build a million dollar business?
What are my assets and how can I leverage each one to create more income?
How can I achieve financial freedom in the next 3 years?
How can I have fun improving my health? (Nutrition, exercise, etc)
How can I help my children become Cashflownaires?
How can I improve the systems operating in my business?
How can I find opportunity in this adversity I’m dealing with right now?
How can I reduce the level of aggravation in my business/work?
How can I create new recurring income streams?
How can I get more clients profitably?
How can I increase positive cashflow from my current income streams?
Thinking about the answers to these questions IS hard work. It may not take a long time, but the work is extremely valuable to you. Sadly, most people don’t work hard.
When the average person has a problem, they immediately run to someone else for a solution. The other person does the hard work for them. The other person thinks about the problem, figures out a solution, and then turns the solution into a new income stream for themselves.
The other person does the hard work and gets paid multiple times for their thinking.
