How Laziness Will Kill Your Chance At Success

Why is it that we fail as often as we do? The simplest answer would be that we fail because we make mistakes. Yet that does not seem quite right. I have failed in my endeavors before many a time and few if any were a result of mistakes. The occasional slip or mishap is of course commonplace, but they are only a part of the process and not the reason behind our failures.

The reason why we fail is much simpler than that and I believe obvious: we fail because we are lazy, we don’t put in an effort. Laziness has killed careers, futures, relationships, families, friendships, you name it and there has been at least one case where laziness played a large role, and effort played none.

We have all seen it on comedy sitcoms where a couple gets married and a few years after both the man and the woman get lazy. The man prefers to watch TV when he comes home instead of spending time with his wife or with his kids. He doesn’t make an extra effort in his grooming or in wooing his wife. She doesn’t bother to dress sexy for him anymore and doesn’t bother putting on a dress for when they go out to dinner — which in itself is rare. Neither of the two bothers to make an effort toward keeping the relationship exciting. It’s not they that don’t care about each other or that they don’t love each other, they simply are too lazy.

Your best buddy from high school and you used to be close. You went to separate colleges and kept in touch for the first two years. Year three, you guys got a bit caught up in your own lives. By the fourth year, you barely talk to each other and by the time you enter the workforce, you no longer speak to each other. You grew apart — it happens.

But why does it happen? Because neither one of you wanted to make the effort to keep the line of communication open. You could have at the very least sent an email at some point just to check up on him — just like you can send one right now. But you won’t, that would require more effort than you are willing to put forward. Plus, now that it’s been years, you feel awkward about the whole thing.

We like to fool ourselves into believing that we aren’t good enough or “ready” for success. That’s bullsh*t. You are ready right now — you just need to get your sh*t together and do what needs to be done. Our destiny is a sum of our actions; you decide when and how to act, therefore you decide your destiny.

Don’t be fooled into believing that that those you admire or look up to, those that have made that money, achieved what they wanted to achieve and have found love in their lives are any better than you; they’re not. The only difference between them and the rest of us is that we are too lazy to put in a true effort. We are all on an equal playing field — luckily for those on top and unluckily for the rest, not everyone decides to play.

You are a good employee. You come into work on time; you leave on time. You don’t take advantage of your breaks, but always take the full hour. You don’t take on additional projects, but you do what is asked of you. You never do more than is asked of you and you never try to learn more than is required. You are a good employee — but not a great one.

There is nothing that differentiates you from the rest. Why do you believe that you deserve a promotion more than the next guy? You say that you want one and even feel that for the amount of time that you have been in the company would suggest that it is your time. Yet, you get overlooked for that promotion time and time again for someone that hasn’t been there for as long, but at the same time seems to be passionately involved in his or her work.

I was about to write about how an entrepreneur’s dreams get crushed due to her laziness, but a lazy person would have to be a complete moron to decide to become an entrepreneur. It would be like a midget hoping to play for the NBA one day — it simply isn’t possible. People have different capabilities; each career choice requires certain skills. If the person simply doesn’t meet the requirements, then unless they can change, they won’t be able to compete. Laziness ruins everything. Being lazy is living wrong, living halfheartedly.

You either want to experience, to enjoy, to explore and to live, or you’d rather watch as things happen. You either want to be a part of the world or you want to watch from the sidelines — there’s no middle ground. Many of us attempt at reasoning with ourselves, telling ourselves that we are only half lazy, that we can be agile if we would so wish.

We believe it’s life’s fault for being boring, for not exciting us. The trick is that the world can never excite you. It’s the way you experience the world that can be exciting, not the world itself. You can either live life following one philosophy or the other, not both because such a life would be one of contradiction — which is even dumber.