STRONGER TOGETHER: Choose your hard

"STRONGER TOGETHER" is a weekly column where Tanya explores key issues. This week, Tanya discusses the reality that hard is unavoidable, and that the real choice is often which hard we’re willing to carry.

By IMPACT Community Services Managing Director Tanya O'Shea

I didn’t hear it myself.

I heard it second hand, at a family get together, when my husband and son where sharing something that they had talked about during smoko on a job site.

They’d been sitting with a group of tradies, perched on eskies chatting over lunch, when one of the other blokes started talking. He’s a plumber who’s been around a while. The kind of tradie other tradies respect. The one people listen to, not because he’s loud, but because he’s lived enough to know what matters.

At some point in the conversation, he said it simply:

“You’ve gotta choose your hard.”

It landed.

He wasn’t delivering a lecture. He was talking about bodies that don’t recover the way they used to. About backs, knees, shoulders. About mates who can’t work anymore. About the difference between short term discomfort and long-term consequences.

Getting up early is hard. Training when you’re tired is hard. Eating better is hard. Saying no to the extra beer or the second pie is hard. But so is chronic pain. So is being exhausted all the time. So is losing your livelihood because your body finally gives out.

You don’t get to avoid hard; you just decide which version you’re willing to live with.

What struck me most was that this wasn’t a motivational quote pulled from a podcast. It was wisdom passed down on a job site, shared among a group of men quietly listening to someone whose experience gave weight to his words.

There’s a lot of pressure these days to make life easier. Easier choices. Easier comfort. Easier paths. But “easy” often just delays the bill, and when it arrives, it usually costs more than we expected.

Avoiding the tough conversation feels easy until resentment settles in. Skipping the workout feels easy until your health limits your options. Putting off the decision feels easy until indecision makes it for you.

Choosing your hard isn’t about being extreme or punishing yourself. It’s about agency. About understanding that effort now often buys freedom later.

Hard work builds strength. Hard conversations build trust. Hard boundaries build peace. None of it looks impressive in the moment, but it compounds quietly over time.

So maybe the question isn’t “How do I make this easier?”

Maybe it’s “Which hard am I willing to carry?”

Because whether you’re on a job site, in a boardroom, or around a kitchen bench, you’re making choices every day.

And as a wise tradie reminded my husband and son over smoko, you don’t get to skip hard.

You just get to choose it.