Only through hard work will one attain true happiness

[Apollys]

I made a meager attempt at translating this phrase "only through hard work (or dedication, perseverance, etc) will one attain genuine happiness" given my very limited knowledge of Chinese, I'm wondering if you guys can help me improve the translation.

 

只有努力才达到真的幸福

 

(or maybe this is better? 只有努力才会达到真的幸福)

[Apollys]

Any feedback?

[arrow]

精诚所至，金石为开？ Nothing to do with happiness though

[arrow]

I found this idiom on the internet, pretty close to your original one:

苦尽甘来是真福

[Apollys]

Sorry I'm not quite sure what your second phrase means.  (I think the first one is a pretty different meaning from what I'm going for.)  Since you're a native Chinese speaker, I'm wondering if the line as I wrote it sounds awkward or bad to you, just in terms of wording or grammar, since I'm pretty new to learning Chinese.

[Publius]

A very literal and generic translation:

祇有通過(不懈的)努力才能獲得真正的幸福。

 

There's some collocation problems with your line, Apollys. 'Attain' can be rendered by 達到/到達/得到/取得/獲取/獲得/實現/完成/成就/臻/屆/遂/etc etc, which one to choose depends on what goes after it and the overall tone of the sentence.

[arrow]

Yes, 只有努力才达到真的幸福 is awkward to me, usually we say 才能 or 才会 like you mentioned in the original post.

And if the sentence is intented to be used as a motto or something, it doesn't sound concisely enough to me.

In Chinese, good motto should also be concise narrative, and it's better to add a little classical Chinese flavour to it.

[Apollys]

Okay, any suggestions for how I could write it in a more natural sounding way?

 

(Or if you're unclear of my original meaning in English, anything I need to clarify to help?)

 

I've changed it slightly to sound a little "smoother" (in my opinion), but I may have thrown some grammar out the window in the process.  Here's my new version: 只有努力才能达到真实幸福.

 

Maybe I will try to go for a more succinct sounding one, but I'm really not too experienced in this type of language.  I could try something like: 只有努力才达真幸福.  Or maybe something to do with 乐 for happiness?  意乐?