How to Become Addicted to Hard Work

There is a version of this video I would have made six years ago. And in that version, I would look right into the camera and tell you, "We're all lazy. We're all undisiplined.

We don't have enough willpower. Just get off your phone, rely on your discipline, and push through things. That is exactly how you achieve hard things in life." I'm not going to make that video now because I don't believe in that approach anymore. In today's video, we're

going to talk about how to achieve hard things in life through enjoyment, through regulating your energy, not through pushing through and suffering, through a softer approach. Because this is the kind of thinking that is genuinely changing my life right now. Hi, if you're new here, welcome.

My name is Veronica, and on this channel, I help you slow down, regulate your nervous system, and reconnect with your true goals and values. Before we get into it, I want to invite you to join my free weekly newsletter, Aligned. Every single week, I send out an email with all of my personal reflections and all the things that I don't talk about here on YouTube. It's completely free and

the link is going to be in the description. All right, so let's begin with the first section. And

here I want to talk about this phrase that we all love to use very often. I'm lazy. I'm lazy. That's

why I don't want to do this thing. That's why I don't want to achieve hard things in life. That's

why I don't have any goals. I used to believe that I was lazy in the past. And I thought that you are either a lazy person or you shut up and just do it. And then on the other side, you get to pump your chest and say, "Look at everything I have achieved. I'm great. I'm amazing." Now,

thinking back to around six years ago when I was in college and I loved to use that phrase, I loved calling myself lazy. Now, I realized that I wasn't lazy at all. I was exhausted. I didn't

have any energy for anything else except for my work and my studies. And so, when I asked myself, am I lazy now? The answer is obviously no. like this framework is definitely missing something and a very important something. That is the whole reason for today's video. My approach

to doing hard things in life has completely changed. Now I'm learning to achieve hard things in life through enjoyment and through prioritizing my energy, not through suffering and just pushing myself. Because otherwise if I don't do it, I'm going to call myself lazy. And

the reason why I started thinking about it more and more is because randomly I wanted to journal about this interesting idea. You can do it too. I like to call it a grandmother test or you can do a grandfather test. Imagine you're old. You're a grandmother looking back at your life. And

we're going to look at two different versions. So version one is you decided to suffer through every single achievement in your life. So now you're a grandma and you're looking back. You think,

"I pushed through everything. I was never lazy. I suffered through every single achievement."

And how does it actually make you feel now? When I did that exercise, I wrote disappointed. Like I

wasted my life on completely useless stuff just to prove a point to sit here and be like that is me.

You know, I suffer through every single thing in life and I'm here and I'm great and look at me. So now let's look at version two. You're a grandma now and instead of the suffering path,

me. So now let's look at version two. You're a grandma now and instead of the suffering path, you chose the enjoyment path in life. The path where you were prioritizing your energy. Every

hard thing you wanted to do in life. Every goal you set for yourself, you found a way to enjoy it. to enjoy the process of doing it. And when I look back from there, the word that I wrote was

it. to enjoy the process of doing it. And when I look back from there, the word that I wrote was peace. I feel peaceful. I feel like I am in the right place. Like I did it right. Truly right. And

peace. I feel peaceful. I feel like I am in the right place. Like I did it right. Truly right. And

when I do this exercise right now, like if I want to do it again and again and again, the suffering path always loses for me because I understand that at the end of the day, I don't really care about, you know, pumping my chest and telling everyone that look at me, I'm the best. What I care about

is this inner peace. you know, understanding that all of the things that I wanted to do and achieve in life, I did that through enjoyment, not through burning myself into the ground. Before I go deeper into this idea, let me show you something that's been genuinely helping me do hard things in life,

because it fits into our conversation today perfectly. This video is sponsored by soundcore and these are their new Anker soundcore Liberty 5 Pro and Pro Max. One thing I talk about constantly on this YouTube channel is over stimulation. And so much of the friction around doing a hard thing

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set of questions that I like to ask myself. Now before I commit to doing something really hard, we remember that in the past I would ask myself, am I lazy? Am I not lazy? Am I disciplined? Am I

not disciplined? And now I like to journal about something completely different. So the first thing I ask myself is, does this thing, this goal, this hard thing make me feel grounded? Like I know it's hard, but does it make me feel grounded or like I'm braced? Like my full body is just extremely

tense. And the second question is, how much would I pay not to do this thing? Because if I would

tense. And the second question is, how much would I pay not to do this thing? Because if I would pay a lot to get out of it, that is very useful information worth listening to. I'm going to share a personal story right now to illustrate all of these questions a little better. So, a while ago,

I found this yoga studio that I really wanted to go to, but the thing is it's like 40 minutes away from my house, 40 minutes there, and 40 minutes back. And the classes that I really wanted to go to started at around 7 something a.m. So, that would mean I would have to wake up at around 6:30

a.m. And I wanted to go to that studio and attend all of those classes every single day. That was my

a.m. And I wanted to go to that studio and attend all of those classes every single day. That was my ambitious goal, ambitious thing that I created in my head. But obviously now I know it was completely unrealistic. And how did I understand that for me it was completely unrealistic after

completely unrealistic. And how did I understand that for me it was completely unrealistic after I answered those two questions I shared with you before? Because just the idea of, you know, sitting in traffic for so long, every single day, every single morning specifically was making me

feel tense, braced, but definitely not grounded. And second, I actually paid for some of the classes, for the membership to go there. And of course, I didn't attend all of the classes. Like,

I wasted a lot of my money. And the thing that I realized was that I wasn't lazy. The problem

wasn't that, you know, I lacked discipline or willpower or there was something wrong with me. No, that was just my boundary. Like, I love exercising. I can exercise every single day. But

me. No, that was just my boundary. Like, I love exercising. I can exercise every single day. But

if I create the routine for myself and if I don't have to spend like an hour and a half in traffic every single day, I understand that, okay, for me to feel comfortable, for me to feel grounded, I can only go to the studio probably twice a week. And all of the other days I practice at home.

That's it. And just to be clear, I'm not trying to say that if you want to go to a studio or a gym that's really far away from your house every single day, it's a bad thing and you shouldn't be doing that. Absolutely not. What I'm saying is it depends on you. We're all so different. The point

doing that. Absolutely not. What I'm saying is it depends on you. We're all so different. The point

is learning how to tell the difference between this is not for me, this is my boundary, and uh I'm just being lazy. Another thing that helps me do hard things in life is understanding the difference between things that are frictionless and things that are full of friction. When we

doom scroll, that is often frictionless. And plus, it's a supernormal stimuli. It has way more dopamine than you know talking to your friend in real life. That is why the brain gets hooked. It's the design. If we compare reading for example, you know, with doom scrolling,

hooked. It's the design. If we compare reading for example, you know, with doom scrolling, reading is full of friction, especially if you don't have the reading habit yet. You try to focus, you try to understand all of the sentences. Sometimes you space out. So, you have to read the

same paragraph multiple times. Your brain has to actively work to understand all the information and memorize the key aspects. And so the question that really matters when we set up difficult goals for ourselves is, do you actually love the thing underneath all of that friction? Because every

single hard thing in life is going to come with some sort of friction. If you put your phone away and picture yourself reading and something deep in you lights up and like you realize that, okay, this is who I am. I love reading books. it feels amazing. Then the goal isn't to suffer through

reading. The goal is to find a way to actually enjoy it. So let's say with a book example,

reading. The goal is to find a way to actually enjoy it. So let's say with a book example, you can pick a book that has very short chapters, especially if you don't have the reading habit yet. Every chapter you finish is going to give you a dopamine hit. It's going to make you feel

yet. Every chapter you finish is going to give you a dopamine hit. It's going to make you feel better. It's going to make you feel like you've accomplished something. You can pick a book that

better. It's going to make you feel like you've accomplished something. You can pick a book that is just easy to read, like a children's book, for example. something that will give you the joy of reading back. Something that is going to help you establish the habit instead of picking a book that

reading back. Something that is going to help you establish the habit instead of picking a book that has 800 pages that you know you're never actually going to finish because yes, the idea of reading an 800page book feels very good for our ego, right? It feels really nice to tell your friends,

guys, I've just read an 800page book. But that is just your ego. If you really think about it deep down, who are you trying to prove it to? You already know that you can do hard things in life.

You don't need to prove anything to anyone. And when I choose books to read, for example, I want to enjoy the process of reading, not just the destination. And you know how at the end of every single year people post on their social media, guys, I read 20 books, 50 books,

100 books. I mean, all of those achievements sound amazing and impressive, but to be honest, for me,

100 books. I mean, all of those achievements sound amazing and impressive, but to be honest, for me, it is so much more valuable to actually enjoy the process of reading every single book I pick.

Another principle that helps me do hard things in life is thinking of hard things not as hard but as unfamiliar. Unfamiliar to my schedule, unfamiliar to my energy, unfamiliar to my nervous system. Because if you really think about it, new things, new goals, they aren't hard so much as

system. Because if you really think about it, new things, new goals, they aren't hard so much as they require bandwidth. And right now we spend a lot of our bandwidth on scrolling, on comparison, on looking over the fence at everyone else's life, on all the drama. When you reclaim your bandwidth,

when you prioritize your energy, your recovery, restorative breaks, and actually resting properly, all the hard things in life stop feeling impossible. You just start realizing that, okay, I have this new goal. It looks hard. It looks scary. But at the end of the day, it's

just unfamiliar. Like I don't know how to approach it and where to actually start. And that is why

just unfamiliar. Like I don't know how to approach it and where to actually start. And that is why it makes me feel scared. It makes me feel like it's hard. Before I started my YouTube career, I dreamed of making videos. And I thought it was extremely hard. you know, figuring everything

out and actually recording something interesting, something that people are going to want to watch.

And plus, I wanted to make videos in English and English isn't my native language. Like 6

years ago in 2020 when I started, my English was at a completely different level. And yes,

you can say that I set a very ambitious goal for myself. I wanted to do a very hard thing, but I decided to break it all down and I really wanted to think about it as okay, this is just unfamiliar and I can figure it out. I can make it more and more familiar. Now, for example, I don't think of

speaking English as something unfamiliar. I do it every single day. It's a part of my life. The same

way about speaking on camera. At the beginning, it felt very unfamiliar, very hard. But now,

because I've had a lot of practice, I feel way more confident, and I know that if I say something wrong, I can always re-record it. But you know, if there's no enjoyment in the process of figuring things out, of learning how to do a hard skill, if the only reason why you want to do something is so

that you have, let's say, a picture of you doing a handstand, I don't know, just the example I had in my head, then it's probably going to be very, very hard for you to actually practice, to train, and be consistent. So, the key isn't to suffer more. It's to maximize the enjoyment of doing

the hard thing that you deeply truly love. Now I want to talk about how you can understand for yourself when it's actually time to stop like to quit doing a hard thing because yes there is a lot of conversation right now how we forgot how to do hard things in life. We're addicted to

cheap dopamine. But I think a lot of us are also struggling with guilt and shame associated with

cheap dopamine. But I think a lot of us are also struggling with guilt and shame associated with realizing that okay, this doesn't really work for me and I want to stop doing it. There is

this great fallacy called the sunk cost fallacy. What it means is you only do something because you have already poured so much of your time into it. Truly, you don't want to do it anymore.

there's no enjoyment. Like, you're over it. But you still do it because you think, "Okay, I've already spent so much time and I can't quit now." And I lived through all of that experience when I was in college. I was learning Chinese and my major was the Chinese language. And I

wanted to become an interpreter. You know, I got really good. My level was high enough to translate business and economics documents from Chinese. But then at some point I realized that I actually didn't want to build it into my career. I wanted to do something else. And that was when

I experienced the sun cost fallacy because in my mind I was thinking I've already poured so much energy and so much of my time into it. I can't quit now. And now that I have quit, I've stopped working in that area. My Chinese is pretty much at a beginner level. I would say it's

back to the basics. And I think the scary part isn't just about quitting and realizing that, okay, I'm not going to do this anymore. It's what will people think after I tell them that I stopped doing that thing. The reason we're often so scared to stop doing a hard thing isn't the thing itself.

It's all of the emotions that are going to come up. It's you realizing that okay my priorities have shifted and yes it probably means that I will have to work on something else and that are the thing is not going to be at this high level anymore and there's this really famous theory that

fits into this conversation perfectly the four burners theory it comes from a David Sedaris essay in the New Yorker the idea behind this theory is this imagine four burners on a stove, your family, your friends, your health, and your work. So, the theory says that to be really successful,

you will have to turn some of the burners down. You can run on all high at the same time. And we

can apply this to all the different goals and hard things in life. If we uh pinpoint like a certain goal, you have to dedicate real time and energy to actually do this thing. And it means that you can't fully chase another hard thing at least with the equal amount of time and energy. Yes,

maybe you can do two things or three things, but doing four very difficult and demanding things at once at, you know, full blast is probably going to be very hard or even unrealistic. Right now,

I'm spending all of my time learning Spanish. And obviously I'm always improving my English because that's my job. And that means that unfortunately I can't dedicate a lot of time to my Chinese practice. This is just how real life works. And I have to set those priorities for myself. That

practice. This is just how real life works. And I have to set those priorities for myself. That

is not failure. That is just how our energy works. And the final reason why so many of us are afraid of doing hard things is because we might have this fear. The fear of the beginner stage. A lot

of us never start doing hard things because we are scared of sucking that messy and clueless beginner stage. And honestly, that is our ego too. Because our ego is connected to perfectionism and it tells

stage. And honestly, that is our ego too. Because our ego is connected to perfectionism and it tells us that if I start doing something, I have to do it perfectly from the very beginning. But that is not how real life works. At the beginning, you're going to suck big time because you're not going

to know a lot of things. And that is normal. That is exactly how doing hard things in life works. And the way I want you guys to think about it is this. If you're afraid of being a beginner,

works. And the way I want you guys to think about it is this. If you're afraid of being a beginner, you have to understand that you will always stay a beginner because you never start, right? And not

starting is the beginner stage. And I think there are probably two main explanations for why we're afraid of being a beginner right now. The first one is the obvious one, social media. Because on

social media, we see people who can do everything perfectly. Who've been practicing a certain skill for 10 years, for 20 years, and you know, it looks like they know everything about it, everything they do. Let's say if you follow a makeup artist, the way they do makeup looks completely flawless

they do. Let's say if you follow a makeup artist, the way they do makeup looks completely flawless because they've been doing it for many, many years. And let's take me only in 2025, I started actually learning more things about skincare and makeup. And at the beginning, I didn't know

anything. And it made me feel really frustrated, really weird, like what was I even doing? And that

anything. And it made me feel really frustrated, really weird, like what was I even doing? And that

is actually the second reason why we're afraid of being a beginner. All of the emotions that come up, all of the uncomfortable feelings. Because the hard part is actually not really being a beginner.

The hard part is regulating all of the emotions that come with being a beginner. The awkwardness,

the embarrassment, the discomfort of not being good enough yet. And that is often why we procrastinate on our dreams and our goals and on all the hard things that we want to do in life.

because it's been proven time and time again that procrastination is not about your time management skills. It has nothing to do with your time. Procrastination is an emotion regulation problem.

skills. It has nothing to do with your time. Procrastination is an emotion regulation problem.

We avoid doing something because we want to avoid the feeling that this thing, this task gives us. Instead of feeling uncomfortable, instead of feeling awkward, we choose doom scrolling because

us. Instead of feeling uncomfortable, instead of feeling awkward, we choose doom scrolling because that makes you feel happy. That gives you a lot of dopamine. Scrolling has become a hobby right now for a lot of people because everything else makes you feel uncomfortable at the very beginning. This

is how it works. If you want to learn a new skill, you are going to feel uncomfortable at the very beginning. the friction at the very beginning is going to be very very high. And that is why

beginning. the friction at the very beginning is going to be very very high. And that is why when you know that okay that is normal you know feeling all of these emotions it's completely normal it really helps you actually and second you try to somehow reduce the friction something that I mentioned at the beginning of the video where instead of reading a book that's like a

thousand pages long you read a book that is very short and that has very short chapters so that every single time you finish a chapter you get a small little dopamine being hit and you prove to yourself that you are a reader. You are a person who shows up because at the end of the day, what

is consistency? Consistency is the art of showing up. All right, guys. I think it's going to be it

is consistency? Consistency is the art of showing up. All right, guys. I think it's going to be it for today's video. If you liked it, please don't forget to give it a thumbs up and subscribe to my YouTube channel. The big question that I want you to stop asking yourself is, how do I force myself

YouTube channel. The big question that I want you to stop asking yourself is, how do I force myself into doing this? And instead, I really want you to replace it with how do I find a way to actually enjoy doing this hard thing? Because when you do hard things in life through enjoyment and

not suffering, you don't just achieve more. You actually like the process of achieving different things. And it doesn't feel like it's a race. You know, you just have to do it because you

things. And it doesn't feel like it's a race. You know, you just have to do it because you have this goal. It's a race. And if you don't do it in a year, it doesn't count. Like if you don't read 50 books in a year, you're a failure. No. If you see yourself as a reader, a person who reads, like, I'm always going to come back to reading. Honestly, it doesn't even matter how many books

I read this year. The main thing we're trying to do right now is we're trying to get unaddicted from all of the frictionless stuff like doom scrolling and readdicted to things that are actually good for us. And the bridge in between those two things to actually do it successfully

is through enjoyment, through protecting the art of showing up, not through punishing yourself and burning yourself into the ground. All right. So, if you're thinking about watching something next, I highly recommend this video right here. Otherwise, I'll see you in my next video. Bye.