The glorification and vilification of work ethic
You probably saw that I was celebrating my birthday recently and if I’ve ever wished you a happy birthday, you’ll know that I always ask people the same question on their birthday, “What was your biggest lesson?” 🤔… And I do the same to myself too.
Reflection of my 28th Lap around the Sun
Every year I take some time out to reflect and think about the biggest lesson I’ve personally taken from the previous 12 months.
I think it’s important to reflect as not everyone got the last 12 months so I put the time aside to think about what I did with the ones I was gifted with.
This year’s reflection on my 28th lap around the sun came with some pretty significant breakthroughs.
Lauren celebrating her birthday in another Baby Lemonade dress - use discount code ‘BIB’ for 15% off
The Abundance Code
I’ve been reading this book called ‘The Abundance Code’, and it’s challenging me to ponder on my own self-limiting beliefs 🙈.
For many of us, it’s been a year of surrendering, which is what led me to create a little blog series called, The Surrender Project. I’m using this blog to talk about what I’ve learnt throughout 2020, and I’ve shared my thoughts on learning to surrender, discarding beliefs that no longer serve me and how to battle my self limiting beliefs 👊 in business, marriage, money and life.
My Journal 🖊️
While journaling on my birthday, my breakthrough started because I *thought* one of my biggest self-limiting beliefs 👊 was the idea that you have to trade time for money.
I know that’s not true logically because obviously, I’ve created a business that offers lots of different residual and passive income streams, so I don’t always have to trade my time for my money 🤷♀️.
But over the last 12 months, I’ve really noticed that I have this guilt around slowing down because something unconsciously tells me that the only way to be successful is to keep working hard, like I had for the first couple of years in my business.
I used to take pride in the fact I have a great work ethic and all my success I have had - nothing was handed to me - I worked hard to create it for myself, by myself...
This reflection happened around the same time that I hit a massive professional goal and pinnacle leadership position within my company called EMD being the same week as my birthday.
My Work Ethic 💪
It’s really interesting because as I was getting recognised, I was getting a lot of beautiful messages celebrating me. Something that kept coming up was comments like “I don’t know anyone more deserving”, “You’re a unicorn Lauren!” or “I don’t know anyone that works as hard as you, you’ve got such a great work ethic.”.
These kind messages reminded me that people also know me for my work ethic but it also made me feel guilty because I don’t feel like I work that hard anymore! 😳 It is like ‘working hard’ makes someone deserve respect and their success. Work ethic is like a yard stick we use to measure our respect for ourselves and others.
Was I still deserving of my success?
Graph of the HSE Bonus Rewards Scale
HUSTLING VS FLOW
All these comments also made me realise that ‘hustling’ isn’t cool anymore.
For most people it feels unattainable and not something people aspire to do (including myself). A few years ago there was a glorification around working ourselves as hard as physically possible, yet the last two years I have realised it’s just not sustainable (especially for women as we aren’t wired the same as men - we are cyclical)…
and instead being “in flow” is the new cool... 😎
Flow
I’m all for flow! But I do think it means in the process of making it cool, we’ve now also built a vilification around ‘hustle’ – It’s no longer sexy to hustle. I’ve noticed within my business it can be really polarising to have work ethic because a lot of people say they can’t do what I do, or that they just don’t want to do what I do.
It’s like ‘hustle’ has become a dirty word and women are no longer inspired by hustle, working hard or work ethic. Comments like this trigger me because I genuinely don’t think you have to work hard to be deserving of your success.
But - because I am a straight shooter and I care about your success, you can trust me to tell you the truth and not just what you want to hear that is going to make you feel comfortable, trust me when I say those people who are enjoying ‘flow’ had a season where they hustled.
WORK ETHIC DOES NOT EQUAL WORTHINESS
To achieve anything or get anything off the ground 🚀, you need to have commitment and energy💪. It’s going to take a burst of inspired action, and you might have a bit of strategic imbalance for a while as you create what you want, but it won’t stay that way forever.
Although I threw a lot of energy into my business at the start, and it was ‘harder’ in the early days, it was only tough because I was building up an income around a full-time job. If I didn’t have the work ethic to get started and continue to show up even when didn’t feel like it (lets be honest most days it would have been easier to sit on the couch after work), I never would have gotten anywhere, let alone where I am now.
It didn’t stay that way though, because I was in flow and I loved what I was doing, I persisted, I mastered the skills I needed to grow my business and as my confidence grew so did my income. I simply believe that you need to have a passion and put in the hard yards to set yourself up, and the rest will follow naturally ✨.
Consistent Work
The last two years of my work haven’t been ‘hard’. Yes I’ve been consistent. I’ve been passionate. I’ve been committed to my growth and stepping out of my comfort zone, taking inspired action and having uncomfortable conversations (those things come hand in hand with leadership).
But I have also had good boundaries, I’ve scheduled my joy every day and have made sure I’ve prioritised my own health and happiness. I don’t believe that takes away from my success at all. My income continues to grow, and I keep creating more white space, new opportunities and freedom 👏.
So if this self-limiting belief wasn’t coming from the idea that I had to swap time for money, what was it? 🤔
Lauren Kerr at the Beach - Babes in Business
THE WORKING-CLASS BELIEF
If you come from a family that is very abundant and very wealthy, very rarely will you stop and consider if you are worthy of it.
You’re born into it, so you don’t doubt if you’re deserving, you just accept that it’s the way things are 💁♀️.
Are you Worthy of Success?
The flip side of that is that when people like me come into money or start creating money that they don’t necessarily have to work as hard for, you start feeling like it’s a dishonest way of life.
It’s almost like you think that you’re cheating the system or doing something wrong because you’re not working hard to create it, despite seeing so many of your loved one’s working hard their whole lives.
This realisation has been my biggest breakthrough because I acknowledge that this has been my blockage.
I did have the belief that work ethic equals worthiness and I needed to flip it. it was no longer serving me. Because when I dig deeper, I do know that you can create more and do less, business can be easy, wealth can come easy - And none of those things makes you less deserving of it 🙌.
THE VILIFICATION OF HUSTLING
Real talk, though. I still do honestly believe that getting anything up off the ground, in order to create flow and build abundance; you do have to have some work ethic or hustle at the start to get momentum. As well as then needing the skills and confidence to maintain it.
My advice for you is that if you’re working hard on something, make sure that it’s something that brings you joy or will mean you won’t have to ‘work hard’ long term.
My highest value is time freedom and flexibility 👐 So, I worked hard for a season, which was only around 2 to 4 hours on top of my full-time job each day to get my business off the ground and build that residual income stream.
But I only ‘worked hard’ so that I didn’t have to continue to work at that level, pace or intensity forever. I want to spend my time with my friends and family, with my future kids enjoying being a stay at home mum, relaxing, at the beach, prioritising my own health and happiness and more time researching, reading and writing.
Lauren Kerr on a blowup swan in the pool
What is ‘hard work’ anyway?
Maintaining your efforts and committing to being consistent to get a side hustle or business off the ground whilst juggling a job is hard. But is staying in a job where you commute 2 hours a day, miss magical moments, have a capped income, feel unfulfilled, uninspired and hungry for more, but do nothing about it…any easier?
There is a big difference between ‘working hard’ and ‘hard work’. Yes I ‘worked hard’ for a season to set myself up and get momentum in my business and build my brand, but it wasn’t ‘hard work’.
If you align yourself with your highest values and passions and work out a way to either monetise them or create a lifestyle so you can enjoy them - you want to show up and put the work in. Because it’s important to you.
THE CURRENCIES OF LIFE
There are three currencies in life:
1. Money 💰
2. Audience or your relationships (your network) ❤️
3. Time 🕐
I believe you need to leverage off at least two of those currencies to create the third one.
For example you leverage off your time and audience to create money (either by selling a service or product).
You leverage off your audience and money (by outsourcing, hiring employees or paying for systems to automate) to create time.
You leverage off your money and time (by investing in your network) to create more audience and be connected or introduced to other high achievers or world thought leaders / influencers / business owners.
When I first started, I didn’t have the money, but I had the time, so I focused on building and investing in my relationships with content and value to create the money. And now I use my money and audience to create the time I was missing.
Whatever goal you’re working towards, remember the difference between working hard and hard work.
If these are goals that align with you and your highest values, you should be in a feeling of flow. After your season of strategic imbalance, where you go all in, and you work a little bit harder than you usually do, you won’t have to continue this way of life forever.
Lauren Kerr out with girl friends in another Baby Lemonade Dress. Use discount code: BIB for 15% off!
Are your beliefs outdated?
Did you realise that you carried the same belief that work ethic equals worthiness?
Not only does work ethic not equal worthiness, but you don’t need to find your worthiness in what you do for work either 🤩.
Money that comes easy isn’t dishonest - it’ smart!
There are so many ways to create wealth these days that no longer require you to trade your time or work hard for it.
Beliefs are just thoughts you keep thinking.
They are tools to help you get where you want to go. When you’re experiencing frustration in an any area of your life, it usually means there is an old belief system that needs to be updated and when you’re being triggered in any area of your life, it usually means someone or something has contradicted one of your beliefs.
So here are some tips to help you rewire yours to help you have your own breakthrough:
Identify the belief that is no longer serving you.
Weaken that belief by looking for evidence of the contrary to prove to yourself that belief is no longer true.
Override that belief by getting clear on the new one you want to keep thinking, the one that is going to help you get to your next level. Write it out daily as an affirmation until you believe it. Get as much proof and evidence as required to convince yourself of the new belief when you have doubts.
And if you’re struggling to get your head around your new belief just remember that you believed in Santa for 10-years, so beliefs can change! They’re just thoughts, not facts.
So in saying that personally right now, I’m working on:
Continuing to look for evidence to prove that money, success, and business can be easy.
Writing and reading my new affirmation daily - Let it be easy. My business and wealth continue to grow with ease while I focus on joy!
I will stop asking people what do they do for work when getting to know them and instead ask them questions like ‘What do you do for fun? What do you want to consciously create this year? What do you dream about? What are you passionate about?
Likewise, when people ask me what I do - I will respond with ‘Do you mean with my time or for money?’
I hope this serves you! If it reminded you of a gf or bizz bestie be sure to forward it to them too!
A big thanks again for sharing my 28th lap around the sun with me…it’s been wild! Excited to see what the next 12 months have in store for us all!
Love always your biggest cheerleader and friend,
