She may have been the most controversial Prime Minister in British history but Margaret Thatcher once said that “I do not know anyone who has got to the top without hard work” and I couldn’t agree more with her message. I am also a strong believer in Tim Notke’s opinion that “hard work beats talent when talent does not work hard”. I believe that you make your own luck in life, if you word hard, it will pay off.
The reason for my slightly philosophical start to this article is due to my life over the last 12 months. As many of you are aware, I took my GCSE exams this summer in the final year of high school and on Thursday, I received the results. Many students possibly see results day as an opportunity to compare themselves against their friends or even their enemies as to who has come out on top of the intelligence ladder. However I don’t have the same view. Firstly, the education system, particularly in England, doesn’t just judge your intelligence but more so it tests which student has the best memory or which student is able to write it down in the best way. In every class, each student is taught the same material and whichever student can regurgitate that information most successfully, will achieve the best results. Being successful in exams does not always mean you will be successful in life.
On the other hand, I do think the exam season does replicate probably a more important aspect of life and that is hard work rather than intelligence. Yes, exams may be about memory but you aren’t born with a good or bad memory like some people believe. The only way to improve your memory is repetition and revision, there is no secret to hard work. In addition, discounting people with mental disabilities, I also don’t believe that anyone is born more intelligent than anyone else and I think it is your upbringing and work ethic that ultimately decides your fate.
You may still be thinking, why have I written this article for a darts website? But hard work is just about needed in every profession, hobby or sport. Without being big headed, I know if I set myself an ambitious but realistic aim, I will work hard and I will achieve it. It was about 12 months ago when I set my sights on achieving all A* and A grade GCSE’s and on Thursday, I achieved this aim with 7 A* and 5 A grades. Again there was no secret to my success other than hard work. In my opinion, my biggest success is not the grades, but I am happier about being able to say, I achieved what I aimed for and therefore, I strongly believe it doesn’t matter about your grades as if you achieved your aim, you have been successful. This is because learning to be able to achieve your objectives for the rest of your life is much more important than how good you are at analysing a Shakespeare play.
Therefore, exams is about hard work, life is about hard work and darts is about hard work. Every single professional darts player has worked unbelievably hard to get as good as they are and I believe all that separates the best from the rest, is who works the hardest. One of my pet hates is hearing people say young players like Michael Van Gerwen or Adrian Lewis are naturally talented as they are young so haven’t worked as hard or as long as other players. Bullshit. It is actually totally the opposite as they have worked so hard that they are already so good at such a young age. Do you really believe that these people came into the world being able to hit 180’s? Yes, some people may be blessed with better co-ordination than others but dreams don’t work unless you do and the only way to improve your darts is practice and hard work.
Now I have achieved my GCSE aim, I will set myself a new target for the future. Hopefully I will get the chance to set myself a darting target soon but it is about balancing my priorities and right now, playing darts is not one of them. But once it is, I will set myself another aim and I will work hard and achieve it just like any of you have the ability to achieve any realistic aim you work hard for. ‘Dream It, Believe It, Achieve It’. You can be a future world darts champion, ‘Dream Big, Work Hard’.
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