“I've found that luck is quite predictable. If you want more luck, take more chances. Be more active. Show up more often.”
Luck is about being ready when the opportunity shows up. We like to focus and talk about the one time that you will succeed and get “lucky”, but what about the numerous times when you don’t. We rarely talk about the cost of each missed opportunity, the emotional investment you put in each try, the disappointment after you believed that this would be it.
I find that our emotional capital is limited, and we drain it each time we believe and get disappointed. The solution you may say, is not to believe. But How do you want to succeed then, how would you give it your 100% to maximize the chances of success, especially sentimental matters since they require more emotional investment than material endeavors.
“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference between the two.”
Mother Teresa
With this in mind, it is quite challenging to quit even when you know that all the odds are strongly against you, when you fall deeply in love with the situation you are in, with the false hope, with the extremely slim chances still in your favor.
“We rip out so much of ourselves to be cured of things faster that we go bankrupt by the age of thirty and have less to offer each time we start with someone new. But to make yourself feel nothing so as not to feel anything — what a waste! Have I spoken too much?”
Call me by your name
So luck isn’t maybe about taking more chances, but about investing deeply in the ones that matter to us, to appreciate what we have, what we had, and to know when to quit even if that might be very hurtful sometimes.