“If you are willing to do only what is easy, life will be hard. But if you are willing to do what’s hard, life will be easy.” – T. Harv Eker

You reap what you sow. The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, the second best time is today. Everything you do or don’t do has a manifestation of some type. Not being willing to do more and always taking the easy road is what leads to an average life, or worse, a life of hardships.

At some point in life it has to be hard. And if for you, that moment is now, accept it. The sooner you do the hard work the better you are in the long run. Since as you get older, you’ll just have less energy and willpower to push through when shit hits the fan – and it will, eventually.

We all seek comfort. How many people do you know that shower with cold water? (It’s healthy by the way…) Probably not that many. Or only those that have to. And you probably don’t know people like that anyway (since you’re reading this and you have an internet connection), unless you live in Africa or some remote place. We are used to the comfort zone and we avoid any type of pain, always seeking the easiest path. That’s short-term thinking. You feel better now, but you’ll feel far worse later.

The choices you make today will shape how your life looks ten years from now.
Or even five years from now. Or even just a year. And you make many choices, every day. Who you’ll spend time with, what you’ll do with your day, how you’ll use your resources.

It all depends on how well you can delay gratification. Eating junk food is easier. It may even be quicker now than if you have to go to the store, cook, and then clean up yourself. It may even be cheaper. And right now it seems like a better option… but a few years down the road, you are fatter. You are less efficient. Your brain doesn’t work as well. As a side effect, you’re less productive. Stupider. Then you get sick, and spend a bunch of money on therapy. In the end, the quicker, cheaper, and tastier instant-gratification option ended up being way worse than the slower, “more expensive” option in the short-term.

Waking up at 8 or 9 is a lot nicer than at 6 or 7 am. It’s easier. But sleeping just an hour less gives you 365 more awake, working on your future time. That’s 15 full 24 hour days, or 45 eight-hour workdays. It’s easier to run away from the task at hand than face it. I’m not saying you shouldn’t have any time for leisure and fun, but that should be part of the plan. You need that to be creative and have a clear mind, but that’s one thing, and procrastination and having a Facebook addiction is another.

At some point in life you’ll have to put the work in. It’s easier when you’re young. Some people spend years partying, wasting their money, time and livers on nothing. There’s a time and place for that too, but overdoing it just because you’re lazy and not ambitious or passionate about anything is the problem. That’s the easy option, pushing things under the carpet. You’ll “work later your whole life” – exactly. You will work your whole life later, just because you didn’t want to work earlier. When your mind is fresher and less polluted with everything that happens when you just get caught up with life.

Don’t choose the easier path. “Suffer now and,” as Muhammad Ali said “live the rest of your life like a champion.”
Wake up earlier. Eat healthier now. Work more now. Focus more now so that you can end up with a lot more leisure time later. You always have something to invest, if not money, then time – your biggest resource. Money is unlimited, but time isn’t. Time is more valuable, if not at this moment, it will be at some point once you start making a lot of money. And money, if you’re organized well, can buy you time.

If you feel that your life is easy now – think about your choices. Are you making the easier choices? Unless you inherited millions, if you didn’t invest a lot of your time into something and are now reaping the rewards, you should be struggling now, at least in some areas. And struggling is good because it means you are probably choosing the harder path. You are probably willing to do what others are not, so you can soon live how others can’t. You are willing to do what’s hard… and that’s why things aren’t easy now. And you’ll often feel like quitting. Don’t. Take a breath, maybe a short break. Go take a hike for a few days to clear your mind and then dive back in and keep swimming with the sharks. Taking a breathe and plugging out for a few days will help you refocus, and get some new ideas that will push you further.

Don’t feel bad when it’s hard, that usually just means you’re doing the right thing – the harder thing. You could eat rice every day and live super cheaply, and then if you need less – you’ll have more, but that’s not the point either. The point is that struggling shouldn’t be your enemy. Welcome it. Of course, struggling isn’t always good, it depends on the situation, just always look for how you can work smarter instead of just harder, try something completely different. After all, as Einstein said: Insanity is when you keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect a different result. Change your strategy, but stay on your path. It’s often an uphill battle, but still, you are moving. And moving is living. You are struggling now so you can live like a king, or queen, later. It will just keep getting easier and easier over time. The hardest part is the beginning, the first steps, the first few years of anything, when you’re starting something new. Then it just keeps getting easier.

Be willing to do the hard stuff. Don’t be ashamed of anything. Don’t care about what other people will think. They’ll all try to be your best buddies later when you succeed. Don’t get discouraged if nobody believes in you or your ideas. Prove them wrong. Problems will keep you going, they make you alive. As you know, dead people don’t have problems, so problems are just a sign of life, and if you view them as challenges, your life seems to appear as a game with stages that you’re passing and getting to higher and higher levels of the game. You need to learn how to play, repeat, again, and again, until you master it. And when you put it the hard and smart work, when you invest the time, eventually you’ll get much better at it. As long as you continually seek a better strategy when things don’t work. You do have to keep thinking outside the box. And if one strategy doesn’t work, try something else, and then try something else again until you find something that works. When you fail, pick yourself up and learn. It’s an extra experience you have and now you’re better equipped for new challenges.

I always think about my mistakes as something that’s good for me, because the sooner I make these mistakes the better off I am in the long run. It’s much better if you make mistakes in business, with money, people, your time, and if you make bad choices all around when you’re younger. Fail as much as possible. If you don’t get discouraged or lose your confidence, then those were all good lessons and success is just around the corner. It hurts, and it’s hard now, but it makes things way easier later. You learn what works and what doesn’t.

Think of your life now and how hard or easy it is and how hard or easy you’re making it. Working out regularly is harder than watching TV and eating pizza, but it pays off in the long run. It’s much easier to work out now when you’re still lean than to try and change your habits when you’re older and super fat. You simply won’t have the willpower then. But if you start now and make a habit out of it, then nothing can stop you.

T. Harv Eker, the author of Secrets of a Millionaire Mind (a really, really good personal finance book!) was mostly referring to spending less now so you can have more later, the quote “if you are willing to do only what’s easy, life will be hard. But if you are willing to do what’s hard, life will be easy” is from his book. The concept with money is the same like with anything else… if you keep choosing the easier choices now, spending money you don’t have, buying things that are above your means just to show off, all of this stuff will lead to a harder life later. When those credit card bills add up and the bank owns you. You have to suffer at least a few years and save up as much as possible so you have enough money to buy yourself time – time that you can devote to any idea that may not generate cashflow immediately, but that you need time to develop. The money you saved up is what will give you the freedom to quit your job and devote yourself to your own thing, whatever it is. If that’s what you want of course. You can buy yourself luxuries now, or you can save up to invest in your ideas and your freedom, so you can buy endless luxuries later on, instead of just a few things now.

You are where you are now because of the choices you’ve made up until today, the results you see now are because of those choices, and the harder your choices were, the better your result is now. And if things are easy, you’re not trying hard enough.

… If you are willing to do only what’s easy, life will be hard. But if you are willing to do what’s hard, life will be easy…

Are you willing to do the hard things or will you keep picking the easier road?