The Soft vs. Hard Life

Do you want a soft life or a hard life?

Before you answer, define those terms for yourself. I am not asking you to choose what sounds more acceptable to other people. I want you to consider the life you actually want.

I began exploring this after hearing people talk about the soft life. I understood it as more leisure, comfort, space, and relaxation, compared with a life designed for more challenge and work.

I am sharing how I thought about it for myself, not telling everyone to make the same choice.

A hard life can be a good life

For most of the years I spent building my company, creating my brand, and helping people, I chose what I would call a hard life.

I do not mean unwanted suffering. I mean something like a hard workout. I set myself up to work hard and do difficult things on purpose.

I loved the results and the process. I wanted to become as strong as I could.

Then I spent a year focused more on love, travel, friends, and relaxation. I was still working, but in a much less demanding way. I wanted to explore desires that were not centered on work.

That gave me a contrast I had not experienced in quite the same way.

Recognize the privilege in the choice

My friend Aprille Franks talked about wanting a softer life and not always having to be the strong Black woman.

She was describing challenges I have the privilege of not facing as a white woman. Her perspective made me think about what strength and softness meant in my own life.

I also had the financial means to make a softer life much easier. That is a privilege.

Not everyone has the same choices. Some people create more comfort before they have financial success, and that may require giving up other things.

I want the decision to be conscious, including the tradeoffs, rather than assume there is one correct way to live.

Comfort is not automatically the destination

People told me they envied my ability to relax and travel. But my experience was not simply that I had finally arrived at the best part of life.

I enjoyed it, and I also learned that I wanted more challenge again.

Wealth can create an unintended softness if you are not conscious about how you use it. I have seen that in conversations with people who inherited money as well as in my own experience.

When someone asked me when enough would be enough, I found the question odd. If working toward success is challenging in a way you love, why assume you should want it to end?

The answer changes if the process is painful in a way that does not serve you. That is why examining your own experience matters.

Choose the kind of coaching that helps you grow

I have learned most from teachers and mentors who challenged me.

My algebra teacher, Mrs. Gabil, was very tough. I wanted her approval, but she kept expecting more. At the end of the year, she told me she knew I was smarter than I was showing in class. She set the bar high because of that.

I think about being that kind of coach to myself: someone who has high expectations and believes in my capacity.

Earlier in my life, I tried being tough with myself while fueled by self-hatred. I could not reconcile that. Learning to love myself and still challenge myself changed the ingredients.

That is also how I approach coaching. I love my clients fiercely, and I am willing to push them. My job is not to get them to like me or approve of me. It is to show them their own thinking and help them grow.

That approach is not for everyone. Consider what kind of teacher or coach helps you perform and learn.

Balance can happen in seasons

I do not think every day must contain equal amounts of hard and soft.

For me, balance has happened across seasons: months or years of greater challenge, followed by months or years that are softer.

Some softness each day matters, too. But expecting every moment to be comfortable can lead you to give up on goals because they feel too hard.

The harder work I chose helped create my option of a softer life. After enjoying that option, I felt hungry for a higher level of work and expectation again.

You may want a different mixture. The point is to choose yours.

Emotional strength creates a kind of softness

There is another way to understand softness.

When you are not afraid of your emotions, you can relax into the fact that difficult feelings will be part of being human. You do not have to keep running from them.

You can encourage yourself through challenges and be kind while expecting a lot of yourself.

The reason you are tough with yourself can be that you love yourself.

Giving up and then beating yourself up is not a soft life. It is a suffering life. Letting yourself off the hook for something important may be failing to support yourself, rather than an act of kindness.

I want to distinguish comfort from the love that helps you keep going.

Decide what you want to sign up for

Define a hard life in both a good and a bad sense. Define a soft life. What do those terms mean for you?

Would you like more comfort? More challenge? A season of hard work that creates other options? A mixture of both?

For me, contribution includes facing failure, criticism, and difficult relationships. I want to be open to those experiences because they let me discover what I am capable of.

I also want enough softness to make the hard life delicious. The combination lets me live more fully.

Choose based on your own desires, not what the world thinks should be enough.