The Hard Work Equal Success Belief Is Nonsense
We’ve all heard this at some point in our lives
“If you work hard and give your best effort, you will eventually achieve success”
I am sorry to disappoint you, but this belief is complete garbage.
This may seem like a distorted conclusion to you, but I think you should hear the rest of my story.
I grew up in Haiti, a little island country in the Caribbean where poverty and misery are sovereign rulers.
In fact, they call it the poorest country in the western hemisphere. The literacy rate of the entire country is about 52% with less than 30% of students reaching 6th grade. (Schools for Haiti facts). According to the world bank 59% of Haitians live on less than $2 per day, 29% live in extreme poverty, and about 62% of the population cannot rely on public power.
From an early age, my dad engrained in me the philosophy of hard work and the importance of education. He often told me
“If you don’t wanna sell bags of charcoal and little bottles of kerosene by the side of the road, you better work hard and take your education seriously”.
After listening to a variation of this quote for years. I certainly took his advice to heart. I was always on the honors roll list throughout high school. I competed for a scholarship to study in the US and I won. I went on to graduate college with a 4.0.
By now you’re probably thinking that my hard work paid off right?
To be honest I can’t really argue with that because the evidence seems to prove it. However, there is a lot more to my perceived success than you might think. Because I believe hard work had very little to do with it.
There is popular belief in Haiti that Haitians are the most hard-working people you’ll ever meet. Believe it or not, they really are. The sheer hardship these wonderful people go through daily just to make ends meet is just unbelievable. So, why are they so poor if they are such hard working people?
This is a question I’ve struggled with in recent years, and the reason why I think working hard alone does not lead to success.
What was the key to my success then?
Looking back, I can identify three important factors that contributed to my success.
A Stable Family
I was fortunate enough to be born in a stable home which is very uncommon in Haiti. The country is known for its disproportionate rate of orphans, with about 400,000 children living without parents. (End Slavery Now)
My parents came from dirt poor backgrounds, but they spent every single penny they had to make the life of my siblings and I bearable. They used to wear worn out clothes because all their money went towards brand new clothes for me and my two siblings.
Their ultimate goal in life was to give us better lives than they had themselves growing up.
Educated Parents
I benefited greatly from having parents who could not only read and write but teach. My Dad was a high school teacher and a minister, my mom taught in kindergarten.
That gave me a great advantage at school because when I had trouble with school materials, I could rely on my parents’ expertise. Most kids don’t have that privilege in Haiti.
I can attribute my high academic achievements to this factor alone.
Connected Parents
Having a dad as a teacher and an affluent person in my community opened doors to opportunities that most kids my age couldn’t dream of.
I was sent to summer camps only opened to teachers and ministers’ children. This broaden my horizon and allowed me to make friends and develop connections that I benefited from years later.
In fact, some of the friendships I made at those summer camps are the reason why I was able to find out about scholarship opportunities in the United States.
What I Learned
The conditions I just laid out are by no means universal rules that applies to everyone. Because I know people who succeeded despite not having any of them. However, they were crucial in my case and without them I would not be where I am today. Furthermore, they shape my opinion about the actual benefits one can gain from working hard.
I know many people in Haiti whose work ethic surpasses mine by miles, but are still struggling daily because opportunities are scarce.
I am talking about people who walk miles up and down steep mountains twice a week just to have enough to feed their kids. People who wake up at 4am every day and work until dark just for 2 miserable dollars.
I’ve met brilliant kids who would make US college courses look like nothing, but their parents can’t afford an English language course. These are kids who are spending hours studying with the help of a candlelight.
God knows, I had to do that more times than I can count.
The people in Haiti are stuck in a cycle of poverty. They are what we would call the hard-working poor, who will stay poor no matter how hard they work because the system and environment they are operating in is just not optimized for success.
The same also applies to the working poor in the US. People living in the poor communities in California are not lazy, they just don’t have the same opportunities that other affluent communities enjoy.
You can work your butt off every day and still be poor and unsuccessful. That is the sad reality that many people face around the world, especially my Haitian brothers and sisters.
It’s undeniable that a good work ethic can serve you well. However, it is worthless if the conditions are not right for you to succeed.