“The world belongs to those who hustle” is the mantra of our day.
Rush, push, work harder.
Persist, fight, and claw to the top.
If you work hard and hustle more, you can own the world.
Our media is full of advice encouraging us to hustle, hustle, and hustle some more.
Here are just a few titles ripped from recent headlines:
- 3 Steps to ‘Hustling’ for Success (Time Magazine)
- Hustle as Strategy (Harvard Business Review)
- 10 Habits Of Highly Successful Hustlers (LifeHack)
- The 6 Best Ways to become Rich (Yahoo!)
We post hustle quotes as inspiration on our social media feeds and posters in our workplaces. The Internet boasts thousands of them:
- Hustle until your haters ask if you’re hiring.
- Good things happen to those who hustle.
- Hustle like you’re broke and keep that passion.
- Hustle until you no longer need to introduce yourself.
- Don’t stay in bed unless you can make money in bed.
You can even buy a “Hu$tle t-shirt” if you want.
I don’t disagree with the adage. No doubt, those who hustle will end up owning the world.
I’m just not sure the world is what I most want to own.
What does it benefit a person to gain the entire world, but lose themselves along the way?
Some of the greatest blessings in life cannot be experienced if our lives are constantly filled with hustle chasing after the world.
In fact, many of the most important pursuits of our lives require us to stop “hustling.” They require quiet, peace, solitude, even rest.
Becoming the best version of ourselves will always require less hustle. The pathway to bettering ourselves and our souls requires meditation, solitude, and drawing away from the world around us.
Becoming a present and intentional parent (and/or spouse) requires less hustle. The requirements are listening ears, quality time, and focused attention.
Becoming a selfless and giving difference-maker in your community requires empathy, compassion, attentive eyes, and frequent conversation.
Even becoming a leader worthy of admiration requires patience, thoughtfulness, and willingness to serve.
I encourage you to work hard. We should all be using our talents and gifts to make a difference in the world.
But for those who are tempted to lose their soul through hustle in a relentless desire to gain the world, you are making an unwise trade.
There is great reward to be found in more stillness… and less hustle.
About Joshua Becker
Amen and thank you for the confirmation!
Oh, sometimes when I read your emails tears of joy flow down my cheeks because at least someone in the world thinks like me, am not so awkward after all, subhanallah is all i say being muslim. These are prophetic teachings, these words should be written in gold and taught to our kids. Thank you for blessing our days with your warm words. I don’t need the world, i need the hereafter. The world is but a means.
I have the exact sentiments and I’m trying to get others to think the same by promoting awareness and inviting to Islam constantly.
What’s interesting is that I have found that I am more successful and more effective in my career (I am a special education team lead) when I slow down and prioritize self-care. I leave work at 4:00 everyday and go to yoga class every evening. This has made me a much more level-headed leader and has helped me to go much further in my career that I did when I was “hustling” back in my 20’s.
I couldn’t agree more. It’s taken me many many years to figure this out 🙏
Thank you for this inspiring and important message. One can get absorbed in the hustle so quickly. So important to be reminded that there is more to life than running from pillar to post.
Tanja — so necessary here, and hard to do but I try to eat less unhealthy food and manage my budget regularly. This is how I learned about my expenses and therefore to live slowly. It is so easy to get absorbed so quickly, in fact, the flow and fast pace in a consumerism world makes it so complicated../…
After getting absorbed by a cleverly written hustle blog yesterday, I wrote my own ideas of what a successful me might look like and it echoes a lot of what you put in this post: integrity, spiritual wisdom that aids real life, compassion and presence for self and others.
Thanks for the confirmation that THIS is the right place for me 😊
I am not seeking the world. Only peace and joy.
Thank you so much for this precious insights. It makes me think about my life priorities.
Thanks for this post. Many thanks!!
It went straight to my soul my friend.
Thanks. many thanks!!
Yes! And the same goes for “Rise & Grind!” I shudder at the thought of having to GRIND every day. Not a pleasant image at all. So glad you touched on this topic. Makes perfect sense to me!
Much needed post. I am a early retired IT professional at 45, now 49. Even after 4 years, i still get that feeling quite often that i should do more, push more, get more. I have all that i need and get to enjoy a nice life with my family. We are programmed to hustle and get more. i am slowly deprogramming this thinking but it is so deep within me that it is very long process, but a very much needed one. In minimalism, the hustle is swimming against the current…
Thanks Joshua and thanks to all that write constructive comments, i often find insight in them.
By saying that the “Hustlers will own the World”, well maybe they already do. I am referring to the 1% of the richest in the world, and the control & power that goes to be in that category. Although I think that some of those people may be doing good deeds with some of that money, others are not, and their only wish is to acquire more.
This makes me think of the movie “Wall Street” which came out in the 80’s. The theme was to get to the top, regardless of who you might hurt or destroy on the way, with an insatiable lust for money, greed, & power. Very, very sad scenario.
Amen.
All these personal development gurus and personal growth talking heads and programs preach “Be-Do-Have.” Imagine yourself being that person (who owns XYZ, do the work to get there, so you can have XYZ). Very “successful” folks (by their metrics) look on to content people like they just went limp in their pitiful lives. No hunger, no goals to strive for. This school of teaching also insinuates those who don’t HAVE XYZ didn’t believe or they haven’t done enough.
After all, we are told that it is human nature to be a goal seeking machine. Sharpen your skills to be the best marksman of those goals, short, medium and long term. Rinse & repeat.
I am all for setting meaningful goals, I am all for hard work. I am all for believing in oneself and seeing the good in others.
I do not need more goods to see the good in this world, nor do I need more goods to feel good about the fruits of this hustle. Unless it is the dance Hustle, I prefer calm repose and still point recharge.
Why not just Be – Do – Be – Do- BE. Scooby would agree. 🐾 😎 🎶
Amen! Thank you for another great post!
I sure do hope the people that need to hear this…. Read it and apply it!
God bless you and keep up the great work!!
Your sister in Jesus,
Valerie Dorsey
This was great! Thank you!
The desire to Be More, Do More, Achieve More, is utterly exhausting — and in fact, it doesn’t bring you closer to your end goal.
That’s the part that gets dismissed —
you really CAN have it all. There’s no need to run yourself ragged getting there —
you want to have money in the bank that provides peace of mind and security?
You ABSOLUTELY can have it — just calmly figure out the best path to take in which you aren’t frazzled and burnt out.
If we are lucky, life is long. I truly believe we should enjoy the journey — not race around frantically trying to get to some arbitrary finish line.
lots of love — xoxo steph
We were criticized by others in the family because we were satisfied with just a warm house, bills paid and food on the table. I worked before we were married and when we decided I would stay home and just be a housewife because I loved taking care of a home and he loved coming home to a warm inviting place with meals ready and a relaxed wife, Some people went nuts. So old fashioned and just wasn’t done,
We would be celebrating our 50th this year but he died in February, We never envied the vacations, boats, new car every year, big house of our friends and family. We paid off our modest little house, drove 8 year old paid for cars and only occasionally ate out. We missed nothing. Most of them are still hustling and trying to pay off their enormous bills every month.
Thank you for sharing this encouraging life! I hope you have happy memories and a sweet time remembering your love on your 50th.
Great post Joshua. It reminds me of the fisherman story. There was a man who fished all day and spent evenings and weekends enjoying his family and friends. Then one day an American business man came and told him to grow his business and get employees and other locations and a corporation so that at the end of it he could fish all day and enjoy his family in the evenings. The fisherman said “I already do that”
Hustling is about working too hard now so that maybe you can enjoy life later. Instead let’s work hard but maintain balance and create the life we love while we are living it NOW!
So many people I know who hustled all their lives are now doting on their grandkids because they missed engaging with their own children when they were growing up.
What does it benefit a person to gain the entire world, but lose themselves along the way?
Mark 8:36
I think the concept of minimalism goes against the grain of hustle, or to hustle. Less is more is always going to be better than more of more. To be sure living minimally gives us more time to hustle; but who does that serve? Matthew 6:24
People are just trying to make ends meet, not own the world.
Nope, they are trying to own the world.
I like your article. If you had read the article 10 Habits Of Highly Successful Hustlers (LifeHack) you would see it speaks of many of the things you do. Don’t judge an article just by its title.
Just reading your piece Joshua, made me feel calmer and nourished today. It was the nourishment of connection, because I share these values with you and it’s satisfying to have them reflected back to me again.
I’ve come to the simple realization that as a society we’ve all been programmed wrong. Is it good for a capitalism? Yes. Is it good for the individual? I don’t think so.
So I agree completely. Less hustle, and more being present for those that matter.
Couldn’t have said it better this time, Joshua. Loved this post.
It is just that western culture is so into ‘more’… I think more important than anything else is to change those values. Hustling, the pursuit of the world, owning better and faster. There are means to change those ideas, hopefully some day there would be more people like you, making these kinds of posts, intending exactly that.
The lure of money costs too much. To see thru this fleeting worldly facade takes some wisdom. They won’t teach that in school. Your parents may not even know. It’s an innate feeling.
When I read Trevor Noah’s book Born a Crime, he had a different take on hustling, one that I think is more accurate:
“Hustling is to work what surfing the Internet is to reading. If you add up how much you read in a year on the Internet—tweets, Facebook posts, lists—you’ve read the equivalent of a shit ton of books, but in fact you’ve read no books in a year. When I look back on it, that’s what hustling was. It’s maximal effort put into minimal gain. It’s a hamster wheel. If I’d put all that energy into studying I’d have earned an MBA.”
― Trevor Noah, Born a Crime: Stories From a South African Childhood
“Attention is the greatest form of generosity.”
Simone Weil
“Attention is the beginning of devotion.”
Mary Oliver
Let’s ask ourselves to what/whom do we offer our attention.
Thank You…Wonderful!!
I adore this. I’ve saved it as a reminder too, because it’s all to easy to get caught up in the hustle.
My favourite part:
“I encourage you to work hard. We should all be using our talents and gifts to make a difference in the world.”
But it’s different to hustle.
Simple, elegant, necessary. Thank you.
Jesus often spoke of this very thing 🙏🏻❤️🙏🏻
I’m from Europe and was wondering what the term actually means. I understand the definition you give though ;) and I wholeheartedly agree. I’ve always struggled with this in my working life. The feeling you “should go the extra mile” while I felt 9-5 is miles enough for me. It’s why so many people keep working overtime – instead of spending their valuable time with their loved ones – and are unable to find peace and rest. Feeling that they don’t deserve it because it feels “lazy”. I sometimes even feel lazy when all I want to do is read a book or drink a cup of tea. It’s that ingrained in our brains these days.
Away with the hustle. In with the peace <3
Hear hear!! I fully agree with you!
LOVE, LOVE, LOVE your articles! Keep ’em coming, please; they help to keep me balanced in a world that is NOT!
Nice! Thanks for your blog, Joshua!