Writing Wednesday 027: Is Luck Real?

I’m lucky. I just am. I believe in the kind of luck you make through hard work and right action. I also believe in pure luck, the kind that appears to be magical and beyond what we can seem to directly influence.

Luck can be good or bad, and have an impact in matters big or small. Luck is not the only thing I rely on in life. That would be unlucky. The awareness of the force of fortune is present, but there are other forces and factors. Wishing VS willing. Striving VS chilling. Luck cannot find us if we do not pursue our true desires and dreams. It is not just going to solve every problem in our lives, or give us everything we seek without action. Opportunities can often be lucky or fatefully delivered, yet it is up to us to execute and capitalize on the opportunity. We greatly affect half of the luck equation. The other half has divine tendencies and less explicable cause and effect logic. My life has demonstrated both halves throughout my duration here on earth, enough so to instill a great conviction on the currency of luck.

I do not blindly believe. I have been shown luck many times in my life, both the kind I work for and the kind that has come to me beyond my control. I have not only had good luck in my life. I have had my slumps, ruts, and runs of bad luck too. Yet, when I look back on my life the bad luck does not register — I choose optimism, and practice positivity. What we focus on and believe in affects us. My belief that I am lucky shapes me, just like someone who believes they have bad luck is shaped by that belief too.

Where luck is involved, superstition, and skepticism are not far away. People ritualize the process of experiencing good fortune. People also vehemently avoid situations, and even objects that portend the unfortunate. Not everyone believes in the two halves of luck as I do, many are skeptical of such nonsense. Without a rational explanation the doubters become entrenched opposing half of the luck equation. More often than not, one who doubts will doubt the luck that we make through consistent right action and choices. They doubt we can impart an effect on the universe. That is fine, you may have a valid debate on whether we can make our own luck, or whether luck is valid whatsoever. Let us open up the debate: I believe luck is real and multi dimensional, and I will represent my beliefs.

Whether you are a believer or disbeliever in luck as a force in life: I venture the opinion that if you looked back there has been at least one moment where you have gotten lucky. Something went your way, just barely. You had just enough time, money or help to get something important done. We all have had experiences where divine grace has intervened on our behalf, and provided something that we needed or wanted. Maybe even saved our life. Luck saved my life a few times. Most significantly, avoiding a head on collision with a drunk driver by inches. The right reaction time, vehicle, and road conditions allowed me to maneuver out of the way — luckily.

There is both chaos and order in the universe, a balance. Most people subscribe to one option: either we live in a fully chaotic universe, or that we are in a perfectly ordered system. Likely we exist in a mixture of organization and entropy. Both can actually be examples of the validity of luck.

If we examine the chaotic model luck remains valid. With the frame of reference that our universe is completely random, and nothing is certain, how can we deny luck? To even exist in an environment like that as conscious beings is a great example of the divine type of fortune. We happen to be here. Me writing, and you reading, in a completely unpredictable and violent cosmos. Sounds lucky to me.

What about if the universe is perfectly ordered?

Does luck still play a role?

Yes, for a few reasons. If all is ordered and organized then we can follow a set of orders to produce a result. We can do X and result Y with predictability. Luck plays in to this equation a few ways. How lucky would we be to find out the formula for health or wealth? In a pre-ordained universe, we must already be going in a direction with the turns and trials laid out for us. Who reaps the rewards of such a system? The lucky among us. The universe designed them to be a superstar, or fated them to lead a nation.

Whether the universe is organized, pure chaos, or some amalgamation — we are lucky to be alive.

However, we can become even luckier. We can develop and cultivate the other half of our luck. We do this by using the divine, and diverse gifts we have all been given. We become luckier as we work harder towards becoming better, and giving back. When we appreciate how provident we are to be breathing in this moment, and use our time to make ourselves and the world better, we are magnets for the auspicious.

Right place at the right time? That is an aphorism worth examining. What is the right place for us to be right now? When must we act upon our dreams? Discovering and pursuing what we are here on earth to do is every humans purpose. The right place to be is in that discovery process, in that pursuit. The right time to do that is now. At any moment we are never less than 50% lucky. The perpetual half is our heartbeat, our life itself. The remaining 50% fortuitous factor is up to us. We have half of what we need, the rest is luck.