<p>When Lord Louis Mountbatten, the last British Viceroy of India, overheard a man applauding his intellectual brilliance and ability in dealing with the most complex problems, he interrupted him saying, “The truth is I am a very ordinary person and if I have any success it is only due to hard work.”<br /><br /></p>.<p>Nothing pays like hard work. Good luck might bring some temporary gains. Good fortunes could ring in stop-gap returns. Windfall profits are the result of a fleeting phenomenon. Ex gratia rewards are but a one-off feature. Inheritance happens once in a life time. The only sure way then, of reaping returns of a permanent nature, is through consistent hard work.<br /><br />Hard work paves the way for opportunities. It opens doors to brighter prospects. It jettisons the hidden apathy to endurance buried deep within ourselves thereby sealing the casket of laziness which lures men into it. <br /><br />Hard work increases exponentially our success rate in life. Anglo-Irish playwright and Nobel laureate, George Bernard Shaw, remarked in support of this thesis, “When I was a young man I observed that nine out of ten things I did were failures. I didn’t want to be a failure, so I did ten times more work.”<br /><br />Hard work adds meaning to one’s calling in life and helps in developing a passion for the task at hand. This in turn leads to excellence at the job. <br /><br />Thus, however insignificant a man’s vocation might be, working hard at it is paramount. As Martin Luther King Jr rightly pointed out, “If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well.”<br />Recognition and importance is bound to pay more visits in the lives of the hard working. As a professional consultant put it, “Be so competent at what you do that your organisation cannot run without you.”<br /><br />Hard work in the end is the only choice available to earn a living and to live honourably. A woman advertised for work in her garden. Two men applied for the job. She was interviewing them out on the front lawn when she noticed her mother, on the porch, making signs to her to choose the shorter man, which she did.<br /><br />“But I liked the taller fellow’s face. It was a strong face.”<br /><br />“Face!” exclaimed the mother. “When you’re hiring somebody to work in your garden, look at his pants! If the knees are worn out or patched, you hire him. If they’re worn or patched on the seat, you don’t!”<br /></p>
<p>When Lord Louis Mountbatten, the last British Viceroy of India, overheard a man applauding his intellectual brilliance and ability in dealing with the most complex problems, he interrupted him saying, “The truth is I am a very ordinary person and if I have any success it is only due to hard work.”<br /><br /></p>.<p>Nothing pays like hard work. Good luck might bring some temporary gains. Good fortunes could ring in stop-gap returns. Windfall profits are the result of a fleeting phenomenon. Ex gratia rewards are but a one-off feature. Inheritance happens once in a life time. The only sure way then, of reaping returns of a permanent nature, is through consistent hard work.<br /><br />Hard work paves the way for opportunities. It opens doors to brighter prospects. It jettisons the hidden apathy to endurance buried deep within ourselves thereby sealing the casket of laziness which lures men into it. <br /><br />Hard work increases exponentially our success rate in life. Anglo-Irish playwright and Nobel laureate, George Bernard Shaw, remarked in support of this thesis, “When I was a young man I observed that nine out of ten things I did were failures. I didn’t want to be a failure, so I did ten times more work.”<br /><br />Hard work adds meaning to one’s calling in life and helps in developing a passion for the task at hand. This in turn leads to excellence at the job. <br /><br />Thus, however insignificant a man’s vocation might be, working hard at it is paramount. As Martin Luther King Jr rightly pointed out, “If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well.”<br />Recognition and importance is bound to pay more visits in the lives of the hard working. As a professional consultant put it, “Be so competent at what you do that your organisation cannot run without you.”<br /><br />Hard work in the end is the only choice available to earn a living and to live honourably. A woman advertised for work in her garden. Two men applied for the job. She was interviewing them out on the front lawn when she noticed her mother, on the porch, making signs to her to choose the shorter man, which she did.<br /><br />“But I liked the taller fellow’s face. It was a strong face.”<br /><br />“Face!” exclaimed the mother. “When you’re hiring somebody to work in your garden, look at his pants! If the knees are worn out or patched, you hire him. If they’re worn or patched on the seat, you don’t!”<br /></p>
