Hard Work And It’s Advantages

I believe in the simple adage : Hard work pays. I also believe hard work and intelligence do not always go hand in hand. The emphasis is on the word always because many a times I have seen people who are highly intelligent turn out to be very lazy. On the other hand hard working people are not always very intelligent. But they sail through uncharted terrains by dint of their hard work. I guess I fall in the latter category.

I am the perseverant kind who keeps at it till I am absolutely certain I have extracted the entire juice out of the fruit. When I say hard work pays I don’t mean in terms of material gain or the generally accepted success quotient. It pays in a different way. If you are deliberately put in a situation which you know nothing about one thing is for sure you will sweat your way through till you master it. That’s me and it has happened with me several times in my working life.

Since in our work sphere change of job after a certain age does not happen we have to stick to wherever we are placed by sheer grit. Though the scenario is changing very fast. The professionally trained youngsters prefer private sectors of employment and change jobs for better prospects very frequently. My nephew has already changed job thrice and earns what I earn now after almost thirty five years of ‘rubbing’. However, burn outs in private jobs are more and no personal life.

So coming back to hard work. My work life can be divided into two neat halves barring the first eight years wherein, now as I look back, I took things very lightly. But it was fraught with politics in office and turmoil in personal life. I was too young and green. At times the thought of running away was overpowering. So I leave that period aside.

After eight years I managed a transfer to my home town and was reunited with my family which bestowed some sense of sanity on me. I could now devote my attention to work. First thirteen years I was placed in Administration Department which was a good training ground. But it was not me as the job was not mentally challenging enough. Whenever I asked for a change of assignment I was loaded with more work along with the existing ones. The existing one was a 24 x 7 job. I pulled through this phase again by sheer hard work. No super intelligence was required because after a while it’s all stereotypical and routine stuff.

Then our smaller corporate entity got merged into a bigger one. I was the first few who were immediately sucked into the bigger entity. According to my boss, he did me a favour. But privately I felt it was not such an altruistic move.

In the bigger entity soon a transfer was imperative. I was shifted to the corporate level where my reporting officer first thought I might be of no good. Soon he realised his position was threatened by my presence and stopped delegating work to me. Seven years with him was trying to the utmost. Thereafter, he was shunted out and I was thrown into the vortex about which I knew nothing as he had kept me unaware and unprepared for the scene.

But I survived again by sheer hard work and whatever I could extricate out of my erstwhile superior which was loads as I was a keen observer and without my conscious knowing my brain kept working as a repository of facts and precedences.

You can say it’s my survival instinct, workaholism, determination to grab what I am kept at bay from but fact remains the simple adage which I began my post with came handy and has and will always stand by me.

Even after all that battling I have not gained much in terms of material prosperity. But as I always say I got what God thought I deserved. I just put in some additional effort. That’s it.

In conclusion, I will say hard work is an invaluable trait which gives you the confidence and diligence to wade through difficult as well as unknown and unthought of scenarios life is apt in putting you in.

So all the best.

Pic from Pexel