The current issue of Newsweek (cover-dated 02 February 2009) has a fantastic article from Ben Sherwood entitled “What It Takes to Survive”. Ostensibly, this piece is about how people handle crises. Why do some people panic, some people lead — and most people stand around in a daze?
This larger topic is fascinating, of course, but even more interesting is the article’s sub-theme: some people are lucky and some are not. But what we think of as “luck” has almost nothing to do with randomness and everything to do with attitude. According to Richard Wiseman, a professor in the public understanding of psychology at the University of Hertfordshire in Britain, only about 10% of life is purely random; the remaining 90% is defined by the way we think. Our attitudes produce our luck.
From the Newsweek article:
“Luck is not a magical ability or a gift from the gods,” Wiseman writes. “Instead, it is a state of mind—a way of thinking and behaving.” Above all, he insists that we have far more control over our lives — and our luck — than we realize.
This echoes almost exactly the sentiments in the book Luck is No Accident, which I reviewed last year. In that slim volume, the authors write:
You have control over your own actions and how you think about the events that impact your life. None us can control the outcomes, but your actions can increase the probability that desired outcomes will occur. There are no guarantees in life. The only guarantee is that doing nothing will get you nowhere.
I’ve certainly found this to be true in my own life. When I sit around and moan about my misfortunes, more misfortunes seem to come my way. But when I attempt to learn from my mistakes, or from the bad things that happen to me, when I take action instead of remaining passive, even bad luck can be turned to good.
In the Newsweek article, Professor Wiseman suggests four reasons that luck favors certain people:
- Lucky people frequently happen upon chance opportunities. But this is more than just being in the right place at the right time. “Lucky” people also have to be aware or the opportunity, and have the courage to seize it.
- Lucky people listen to their hunches. In other words, they listen to their gut instinct. This reminds me of Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink, which argues that often our first instincts are correct.
- Lucky people persevere in the face of failure. You’ve all seen that Nike commercial from Michael Jordan, right? “I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”
- Lucky people have the ability to turn bad luck into good fortune. The past couple of weeks have been pretty shitty for me. They’ve sucked. It would be easy to surrender and just give up. Instead, I’ve tried to find the positive, and to build something constructive out of my experience. Instead of focusing on the loss of a close friend, I think, “What can I take from this?” As I wrote and delivered my eulogy, for example, I tried to learn more about speaking in public. (My second eulogy at tonight’s memorial service should be even better.)
I encourage you to read the entire Newsweek article. It’s well worth your time. And it may prove to be the luckiest thing you do all day!
Photo by cimarroncat.
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I guess this proves your “luck” with blogging. We see 75,000 readers and nearly 1 million views in a month and think “wow he’s lucky to have such a successful blog.”
Lance Armstrong had a quote that is similar to your third point.
He said “People ask me all the time, ‘How to you do so well, what are you on?’ What am I on? I’m on my bike six hours a day busting my ass. What are you on?”
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Great post. MJ is such a good example for this since he works so hard to be the best.
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I do believe that we make our own luck. Sitting around and wallowing in self-pity or complaining about how crappy everything is really won’t get us anywhere. I don’t mean to suggest that there isn’t a time for self-pity and whining, but we need to put a time limit on it. For example, “I’ll allow myself to wallow in this for the rest of today, but tomorrow, it’s time to get moving.” It’s not that the lucky ignore their grief or their struggles, but they do try to learn from them and then use that knowledge to grow. I’m eager to read the rest of the article.
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Luck is a term that people who don’t work hard use to excuse themselves from being successful.
Luck is a term that people with no skill or drive use to write off the successes of others.
@Chett, great quote from Lance.
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I think “lucky” people keep busy pursuing opportunities and will consequently find more good opportunities (along with more dead ends and rejections).
You might know someone with a successful home business and think they are lucky – maybe they were to some degree, but more likely they tried a number of different business ideas (that didn’t work) before finding one that worked.
Lucky people just keep working at it.
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one quote i’ve always lived by “the harder i work, the luckier i get”. it’s all about noticing opportunities and acting on them.
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I’m not sure that you can attribute all of someone’s success to their own hard work. Certainly you have to grasp opportunities, and work hard – but the opportunities need to exist in the first place. Where opportunities are frequent (say business) then success is down to you. Where opportunities are rare (say art) then not so much.
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Luck– random chance– is real and has a huge effect on our lives. Of course blaming all your problems on “bad luck” is no way to get ahead in life, but it’s possible to go to the opposite extreme and blame other people’s genuine misfortune on their “bad attitude”. To anyone who believes as #4 above that “Luck is a term that people with no skill or drive use to write off the successes of others,” I am certain that something random could happen to you tomorrow in spite all your skill and drive that would bring down all your success around your ears, and take a long time to recover from (if you were lucky enough to have the chance to recover). And you would not be the first.
I’ve had a string of lousy breaks in the past couple of weeks, and I checked out this post hoping that it might contain useful insight, but all I see here is an overstatement of things I already know and practice. Of course I try to jump on opportunities (and look hard for opportunities that might not be obvious). Of course I focus on personal growth when I can’t control my circumstances. But bad things can and do still happen, and they aren’t magically transformed into good things because I work hard and wish hard. Surely we’re bright and mature enough to recognize that and keep our good attitudes without resorting to made-up 90/10 statistics.
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You know, this goes right in line with Steven Covey’s habit #1 – Be Proactive. Instead of being reactive. Love the blog, keep up the good work.
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Anonymous wrote: Luck– random chance– is real and has a huge effect on our lives.
Yes. Absolutely. I don’t mean to make it sound as if happenstance has no effect on us. Hell, I was born a white male in the United States. By most accounts, that’s a sort of privileged existence in this world, a very real sort of “luck” over which I have had no control. Each of us can cite instances in which we’re more fortunate than others. We can also cite instances in which we’re less fortunate.
And I agree that the 90/10 statistic is arbitrary.
But the larger point remains: Though we cannot change the hand we’re dealt, we can choose how we play it. Too many people fold when they could keep playing…
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Isn’t it simply the psychology of attribution at work? If I attribute my successes to luck rather than hard work and talent, then I will continue striving because my success is a fluke rather than well-earned.
Also, I think plonkee is on to something. Don’t we drain the meaning out of the word luck if it becomes a proxy for hard work and expertise? I wouldn’t use luck to describe either Jordan or Armstrong’s success. I would use it to describe me making a half court shot or winning a leg on the Tour de France.
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I often think about my career up to now as being quite “lucky”. But when I look at it from outside, I’ve always been planning, and learning.
So, when my job was looking a bit uncertain, I sat down and planned out what I would do if I was made redundant. I talked to people about the plans. It meant I wasn’t scared of redundancy. But it also meant that when a friend saw an advert that matched my plans, they told me. I never was made redundant. I answered the advert, decided that I’d rather do my “emergency plan” than hang around getting despondent with my job in jeopardy, and completely changed the course of my career.
Lucky? Only partly. There was a small element of luck, but most of it was actually being proactive, making plans, and most importantly, telling others about them.
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Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.
You take care of the preparation, and when the opportunity comes along you can choose whether to avail yourself of it – or not.
If you’re not constantly preparing and learning (and saving!), when an opportunity arises you won’t be able to take advantage.
Hang it on the wall, and it’ll help you prepare (work) more/better every day.
Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.
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Luck isn’t pure chance . . .
I am with Paul– You need to be prepared for good fortune (aka opportunity).
The expression I always remember is:
“Better to be prepared and have no opportunity, then to have an opportunity, and not be prepared . . . “
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@B I think you missed the point. The common person will look at someone and their success and want to call that person lucky (their perception not the reality) what people often don’t see is the preparation and awareness of opportunities that the “lucky” person possessed.
True luck would be more along the lines of the lotto, but hey I guess they’re right on that one as well “You can’t win if you don’t play.”
After I read the article I wondered does Wiseman discuss anywhere how to move from the 80% or bottom 10% to the top 10%? On my site there are a lot of people that have defeated mentalities and I would like to help them move to a mindset that they can control their outcome to a certain extent. I think that is what “anonymous” was alluding to in the failed concept of the percentages.
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I believe much of the “luck” in business,and other areas of life, happens for people who are more in tune with their “gut feelings.” As J.D. mentions, Gladwell had it right when he said our first instincts are usually right. However, most of us have been taught to analyze things, sleep on decisions, avoid risk,etc, and so we miss the window of opportunity. While some analysis is prudent, sometimes you just have to go with your gut.
Preparation is also key, as we have to stay in the right frame of mind to make these gut-feel decisions. Like golfer Gary Player said, “The harder I work, the luckier I get?”
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I have an uncle who has been very successful. When I was a kid, I used to ask him how he got so lucky all the time. He looked at me and said, “Todd, you make your own luck – no one’s going to give it to you.” It has always stuck with me as good advice on how to be successful. Find opportunity in the things you do.
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“I’ve tried to find the positive, and to build something constructive out of my experience. Instead of focusing on the loss of a close friend, I think, “What can I take from this?” As I wrote and delivered my eulogy, for example, I tried to learn more about speaking in public. (My second eulogy at tonight’s memorial service should be even better.)”
I agree with your points above, but this last one is extremely callous. One should never flip a tragedy to find personal gain for oneself. Take comfort in the memories of his life, learn what you can about love, live, friendship, and mortality; but the loss of someone’s life is not an opportunity for you to work on your speaking skills. Its an insult to a person’s memory.
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Great blog you have going here! THANK YOU!
Today’s post reminds me of an exercise i do with people who take my meditation class. It meets one night per week for eight weeks, and the first night, i ask the attendees to play a little game with me for the duration – pretend that EVERYTHING that happens to you is your fault. The objections come fast and furious – “If i stop at a stop sign, and a meteor hits me, it’s my fault?” “You’re the one who chose to drive and stop at that sign. Yes.” By the end of the class, people are amazed at how much more powerful and in control of their lives they’ve become. One of the best things *i* get out of the class!
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I read this article last night and agree it is well worth the read. It was a wonderful article!
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It’s interesting to watch this same theme show up over and over again. Napoleon Hill popularized it in “Think and Grow Rich”, but it was an idea before that.
J.D., I believe that you chose even your place and time of birth as well as who you were going to be in this life and what major lessons you wanted to learn.
Life gets a lot more interesting the more you believe you are in control of it. Car accidents are no accident. Illnesses and deaths aren’t, either. Once you accept the reality that whatever happens to you (including “accidents”) is completely under your control, your viewpoint changes in quite a profound way…
Once I started accepting the reality that any sickness I got was my fault and not some random chance, I began realizing I needed to change. I changed my diet, got more exercise, and started learning to ask my colds what lesson they held for me. Result? I’m healthier than I’ve ever been before, and I feel much better on a daily basis.
If you really believe it, eventually you will get to the point where you don’t buy insurance. Why buy insurance if all events in your life are 100% under your control? That’s when you know you’ve stepped into that reality. It’s absurd for most people in our society to think about, but remember, for 99% of humanity’s time on Earth we’d be considered the weird ones.
-Erica
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The best way to predict the future is to CREATE it! I was just listening to Earl Nightingale’s classic “The Strangest Secret” in which he says all of the great philosophers agree on ONE thing – we become what we think…
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Balance is needed! On the one hand, a positive, optimistic attitude makes for a more pleasant existence. On the other hand, it won’t do anyone any good to say that randomness doesn’t exist as part of the physical laws of the universe. We can’t control everything in our lives and we can’t blame those who have had bad luck (experienced random negative events) for their situation. Nor can we think it will never happen to us because we are making our own luck.
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“You can’t direct the wind, but you can set your sail.” I agree completely with this, and this article. I’m in the midst of unraveling some recent mistakes to see how I could have prepared better or made better choices.
That said, I’ve seen that “You make your own luck.” is really good to motivate yourself, not so much as a comment to someone in the middle of a hard situation. It might be right, it may even be the best advice they could get, but if they’re not ready to hear it…
And from reading comments here, I think there is some confusion of the meaning of luck. It seems like some use it as pure random chance, and others as ‘where preparation meets opportunity’. A lot of that has to do with how we see very successful people as lucky.
It seems like most people get a whole lot of the random luck – some good, some bad. Occasionally extremely good or bad – airplane crash, war nearby, being born to the Kennedys, etc. Of course, how often are we exposed to ‘extreme luck’? Anyone here grew up next to a war, been in an airplane crash, or such? Possibly, but not many.And barring the extreme, your perception, preparation, and attitude decide nearly completely what that ‘luck’ means in your life.
Most people then confuse the ‘luck’ with the result. “He was lucky to buy all that land before they decided to put in the new park.” No, we were all lucky to live here and have the chance – he was perceptive and prepared to take advantage of the situation.
Maybe even more significant, “You experience what you believe, unless you believe you won’t, in which case you don’t, which means you did.” Belief changes how we see things, so the person who believes they can’t get ahead won’t see the land or will assume that something will go wrong. The person who believes in their own success will be looking for opportunities, see them easier, and trust that they will work out. Leading to some spectacular crashes, but often great success.
@Chet (#15): Beliefs are given to you by trusted sources. If you want to help your readers’ mindset, you need to help them with new beliefs – by trusted sources, you or through tasks that they can see success and become their own trusted source. I’ve had the experience of ‘I don’t need faith: I’ve seen this happen.’ And that was a powerful force for change in me.
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People say others are ‘lucky’ because they are jealous about someone else achieving and not them. They ignore the hard work and efforts by that person, mainly because that would make them see that it is possible for them to do more with their life if they just tried harder.
Erica: “Car accidents are no accident.”
I don’t understand that. You say that I was in control and let the guy plow right into me? I let him make an illegal turn and hit me? Please explain, as I would rather read what you have to say about that versus just making some snarky remark.
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I completely agree with this post. I have learned that I have a direct connection to the luck that I have in my life. About a year ago, I was in a state where I was not making enough money to pay bills. I spent about a month feeling sorry for myself. Nothing of any good happend to me.
I decided that I needed to do something about what was going on in my life. I did not know what at the time but I worked to make my “luck” happen. I started writing very part time and it snow balled into my writing career today. People often ask me how I got so lucky to become a freelance writer. I just smile and say that they wouldn’t believe me if I told them.
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Jean-Pierre wrote: I agree with your points above, but this last one is extremely callous. One should never flip a tragedy to find personal gain for oneself.
Hm. Maybe I did a poor job of making my point. I’m not saying, “Wow, Sparky died! Let’s see how I can turn this to my advantage.” I’m trying to find a way to channel my mourning into something productive. Is it callous to attempt to learn from the things we do, even when the things are unpalatable? Even when the things hurt us? If so, then yes, I’m being callous. But I certainly don’t feel callous. All I feel is sorrow and grief.
I actually think Sparky would be proud of what I’m doing. The last day we spent together was at my public speaking gig last November. He helped me prep for it, and then gave me feedback afterward. In a way, I feel like this is an extension of the time we spent together.
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I agree with the post. I don’t believe in luck, but I do believe in increasing your chances of success which usually involves ACTION.
In my life, I’ve definitely tried to associate with people who make their own luck as opposed to hoping to win the lottery.
Great post!
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@Erica and @Victor
I don’t buy the “car accidents are no accident” either. When I was rear-ended in March (or was it April?), this was sheer happenstance. My action (or inaction) played no role in it. Yes, of course, the other driver had a role (a 100% role, actually), but I had no control over whether he was going to crash into the rental. That’s an example of the portion of life that is luck, or chance, or happenstance.
Actually, I just re-read Erica’s comment, and I completely disagree with this: I believe that you chose even your place and time of birth as well as who you were going to be in this life and what major lessons you wanted to learn.
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A cursory understanding of statistics will show you that not everything is even. Over time, given a large enough sample, you will usually find a nice distribution, but if you look at actual data or a handful of data points it doesn’t look that way.
When you go to a casino every pull of the slot machine or roll of the dice is a practice of luck. There will be some people who walk out as millionaires. And there will be people who lose everything. But on the whole an unskilled bet returns ~99%. If you take enough data you will see that.
That is what luck is, and that is what intersects your attitude and preparation in life. We will all have bad things happen, some of us more than other because that is the way the universe works. How bad it effects you is determined by your preparedness. I analyze my life and determine my exposure to bad things happening. How likely is my car to break down? My house to go up in flames? My husband to die? I have insurance against those things from which I can’t insulate myself. I have a fund for car repair, home insurance, and life insurance. When I have a string of bad luck it hasn’t broken me because I knew SOMETHING was coming. It always is.
That is where the discussion of “luck” meets “getting rich slowly”. You WILL have setbacks. What people see as good luck is often people who are prepared to defend against the bad, not just take advantage of the good.
So real luck is out of our hands, but attributing things that ARE in our power to luck isn’t smart. Take power and responsibility for things that go wrong. How could you have been more prepared or handled things better? This isn’t for self incrimination but to TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR LIFE AND TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR DECISIONS. It’s amazing how empowering it is to me to think of how I could have handled things better. And you wouldn’t believe how often I’m able to apply those lessons.
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Excellent post, as it really makes me think about the times I pushed myself and obtained success. =)
Post car-accident, I hobbled into my Bosses office. Leaning on my cane I told him “My body is broken, but my mind is sharp. Is there anything you suggest I work on to move up?” I was given the opportunity to prove myself and became MCSE in 6 months. Lots of early/late hours studying, and for that I am now in a better position. I just heard someone tell me how lucky I was. Silly people!
Shara: TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR LIFE AND TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR DECISIONS. –Awesome quote! Totally agree with you. =D
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You do make your own luck. When you do the right things, good things do happen. Still, we’ve had some “Murphy” happen in our life — and we’ve been able to pay it all off with cash. We’re still on the right track. If you keep doing enough of the right things, you’ll win in the end. We’re proof, though we have a long way to go before we finally win.
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Luck is such an odd concept. Often, we can’t even decide whether an event is good luck or bad luck (a house burns down but no one is injured, for example), but still we want to ascribe it to luck. I agree with most of the comments here that luck is what you make of it, both good and bad.
My partner had an accident on his motorcycle two years ago and we wound up with about $8,000 in out of pocket medical bills. Bad luck about the accident, bad luck about the portion of bills not covered by insurance.
Due to our habit of saving, we covered the bills without debt. Was that good luck? Due to his incredible work ethic, his boss kept paying him for several weeks for little to no work because he was so valuable that they didn’t want to lose him. Was that good luck? Due to his habit of generosity and helping others both my parents and his boss offered to pay the bills for us, which we declined. Was that good luck? Due to his obsessive ideas about motorcycle safety and 25 years of riding over 300,000 miles, this was his first accident and he was able to limit the extent of his own injuries (pelvis broken in 3 places but not a *scratch* on him). Was this good luck? I remember sitting in the hospital before we knew if he’d need surgery (he didn’t) thinking that we might have to sell the house to pay the hospital bills. Was I lucky to have a house to sell or unlucky to think we might lose it?
Luck is just too murky an idea to really take hold with me. I don’t believe that we have control over every aspect of our lives as Erica does, but that which we do control has much greater influences on our lives.
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@ Jean Pierre the title of your blog is appropriate for your shot at JD and the point he is trying to make. Maybe the final mention of “My second eulogy at tonight’s memorial service should be even better” is the part that bothered you.
Why can’t someone use another persons death to inspire change, and development of others? Isn’t that the reason we celebrate MLK? I don’t think people thought to themselves “great he was assassinated, now it’s my time to shine.” He motivated people to do more with themselves and inspire change around them. I’m not trying to compare JD’s friend to MLK, but he had a positive impact in a friends life and the message is JD is using that as an opportunity to do the same for others. JD I think readers here would like the opportunity to hear your eulogy, maybe then Jean could get the correct context of your comments.
My overall purpose in life is to make a positive difference in the lives of others, both in my classroom and the friends around me. If I find out after I die that they did nothing with it, I’ll be pissed and probably come back to haunt them.
Okay I’m finished commenting for the day. I had another snow day today and have been sitting at the computer working on a book and keeping popping in to follow this thread.
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A big area of luck is, some people are passionate about doing things you can get paid a lot of money to do, and some people aren’t. The person who is driven to be a social worker may be just as passionate and work just as hard as the person who is driven to be a software engineer, but the lifestyle isn’t going to be the same.
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I like it – if you can’t live with the way things are – get out and make your own luck.
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@Steph
Good point. It isn’t luck but LIFE. People who believe in luck often seem to have a tally sheet of *bad* luck and *good* luck, like it’s a score and you win if you have one or the other. It was *bad* luck that your partner was in an accident and *good* luck that the injuries weren’t more serious. Beyond that it wasn’t luck, but circumstances, most of them a compilation of decisions and opportunities which I don’t consider luck at all.
Bad things happen, good things happen. Luck exists in the form of chance. But many people seem to use it as an excuse why something isn’t their fault/responsibility. But what is IS, jump in and do what needs to be done.
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I came across a very similar article few days ago. The author talks about the same 90/10 principle.
http://www.boreme.com/boreme/funny-2006/principle-90-10-p1.php
Good discussion!
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So true!
If you see misfortunes and misfortunes they’ll become bad luck. If you misfortunes and opportunities they usually become good luck.
I think it’s often more about personal resposibility and drive. Some people don’t want to take responsibility for the consequence of their actions, it’s easier to blame bad luck. Others don’t want to work hard and invest in themselves to make their lives better so they blame it on bad luck, not bad personal management.
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I believe this more and more each day. Luck, positive thinking, opportunities all have been playing in my mind for a while now. I’m enjoying the process. We have built in an emergency fund and as such “bad luck” things haven’t derailed us. We have found our strengths and have maximized them. WE have also found joy. We are “lucky”
Thanks for the article
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I believe a lot of luck lies in positioning yourself to take advantage of opportunities. I wrote about digging myself out of $20,000 in credit card debt in one year, I freely admit luck played some part in making that happen. But it’s not the kind of “blind luck” associated with gambling or playing the lottery. I went to college, got a degree, worked hard and built up a good reputation in my field. I was able to use those skills to negotiate a signing bonus and large raise when another company was desperate for my help. I was lucky that another company really needed me, but if I hadn’t put in the work beforehand I never could have taken advantage of the opportunity before me. The unprepared will always appear to be “unlucky”.
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I totally agree that having an acute sense of awareness will often lead to a prosperous result, thus the association of luck.
If you were to ask people to define ‘luck’, I would be surprised if there were similar answers. I would expect many people would encompass their own personal experiences to derive their own thoughts on ‘luck’ or what being lucky means to them.
‘It’s better to be lucky than good’ as the saying goes in poker.
Stupidly Yours,
Matt
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I think there is a difference between luck and simply improving your situation. I don’t believe you make your own luck at all. I believe you improve your situation and increase the probability the outcome will be what you want. Many people think they are unlucky, because they simply do not shape their environment to better themselves. Luck is by chance that has no bearing on anything that you do.
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Hmm… I think there IS luck, i.e. a set of circumstances just coming together without an innate logic behind this being so. But I agree that recognising, and then following up on, opportunities is a BIG factor in the lives of so-called “lucky” people.
I also think that this is what Napoleon Bonaparte meant when he asked of his officers due for promotion to general: “Does he have luck?” Spotting opportunities is surely a major ability needed by a senior military officer.
The opportunity-recognition thing was drilled into me by my mother, along with going the extra mile (or two, or three, if needed) to follow up on them. I guess a real piece of luck in my life was to be born to such a mom (who was widowed early, btw, and raised me on her own.) A lot of my personal luck had to do with simply learning of a job or a public or private programme (anything from scholarships to housing), and then mailing off an application. The rest of the edge comes from not following the herd, particularly in terms of personal finance.
But people usually refuse to believe it was that easy, mostly I think as an excuse for themselves to not even research these things, never mind following them up.
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Make your own luck is what I say. You need to be open to opportunities to be lucky. Luck seldom falls in your lap. It’s often a result of seeing the opportunity and taking it before it gets away. Great post!
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I guess I need to have a better attitude to win the lottery. Yep. No such thing as random chance.
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This is an excellent and well timed post! Right now there are so many opportunities to be either totally afraid or totally engaged, and obviously engaged is the better way to go.
My teacher (I’m a singer) has a saying that you have two choices at every challenge: Shame or talent. You could also say death or life, no luck or luck, faithless or faithful, 0 or 1, off or on etc.
We always have the choice!
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1000 percent true. I have always believed we make our own luck. After turning our hurricane katrina disaster into a new happy life, I believe it even more.
I once had a friend who thought everything was just handed to me and that I was super lucky. she never saw the adversity. I didn’t have any fewer obstacles than she did, she would just give up, or freak out and make bad decisions.
Your luck is the culmination of all your little decisions.
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Yes, it’s true that hard work makes people seem more lucky, but it’s also true that actual, honest to God chance does affect people’s lives in very real and significant ways. It’s important to remember that for the sake of both humility, and for keeping one’s own failures in perspective. It’s not an either/or thing between chance and will.
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Another perfectly good stand-in for good luck is good connections. Is it luck when you find out through back-channels about a perfect job opening? Or meet a future friend or spouse? In my opinion, not so much. It’s the result of time spent connecting with people, being genuine, and offering value. So many “lucky” events revolve around personal connections that have been cultivated over time.
I’m also in the camp that will not be cutting my insurance anytime soon. No matter how awesome I may be (and let me tell you, I can be pretty awesome at times…), I can’t control everything, just my response.
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