@Ozzyy 30 July 2020 more from that month

Hard work or 'Hard Work'

I think I do have a bond with confusing titles, but let’s leave those ties for now. 'Hard Work or “Hard work” ' is something I came up with after ten minutes of deep thought on what to title this piece, so I guess we’ll all just have to go with it. My article is a sort of response to one of the beliefs of most people of my parents’ generation, especially in an African setting. My parents believed (and unfortunately still believe) that the only meaningful purpose in life is through the path of long, hard labor. In other words, if it’s not in a cubicle or an office behind a desktop computer or mountain of files, then it is not a responsible or profitable source of income. In our vernacular, we say ‘them too like suffer-money’ meaning that they only believe in money that is earned true continuous toiling in overbearing conditions. Of course they will not like to see this point in this light; they sometimes take offence in the face of blunt truth when I’m making arguments like this. I think the virtues of effort and hard work have been twisted to a new term: “hard work”. For example, my parents did not believe in Bitcoin’s potentials back when it was a new project in 2010. We all see how that ended up, and yet they do not believe that it will last for long. In fact, they don’t believe in the idea or authenticity of ‘cryptocurrencies’ – mysterious ‘online’ money. Note that they barely trust things they see on the internet, and keep on waiting for the day I’ll tell them the so-called Read.Cash scam (in their words) did not transfer my ‘internet money’ to my ‘internet wallet. Hopefully, they will wait till eternity. They are conservative to the core, I must say – they look out of place when I see them using phones and driving cars – they sound more like they should be on a ranch in the Wild West, fighting cowboy wars and the likes. Some people have become addicted to suffer-money so much that they are unwilling to take an option that does not put a strain on them. In other words, if you enjoy it, it won’t earn you as much as it would if you hated it. Brethren, where is the chill? What happened to earn doing what you love? Aren’t you tired of hating Monday mornings? Unfortunately, that’s why we have some African parents that enjoy the books of greats: they could spend hours talking about Achebe, Shakespeare, and Nora Roberts, and advising their kids to become like them. But when their children decide to become sculptors or writers, they bring down the house. You might call it a lazy attitude, but I do believe there you can work hard without necessarily having to ‘work hard’ and you can still live a successful life. It’s all a matter of what you’re doing and how you’re doing it. Make it a lot less about strenuous efforts and more about the direction in which the force is applied and the planning. Stay Creative!