Do you believe in luck?

[Shaun @ Tru6]

Good luck, bad luck. Not the kind where you get a good parking spot, or win the lottery or any kind of one time fortuitous event. I mean both consistent and focused luck, again, both good and bad. Something you can plot on a graph, but just as important, luck that is transformative.

[herr_oberst]

I do believe in luck. It's all about perception, attitude, circumstantial awareness (or a lack of the same). That kind of thing.

[Instrument 41]

preparation plus opportunity= Luck

[jyl]

Kind of. Suppose you manage risk so that bad luck doesn't hurt much, while nurturing opportunity such that good luck will help a lot. It will feel like you have consistently "good luck".

[jyl]

And of course sometimes life just lands heads ten times in a row. Humans are wired to see patterns, to the extent that we see patterns that aren't there. We are also wired to extrapolate that current conditions will continue, because in the caveman days they usually did. So we can easily convince ourselves that randomness = consistent luck or that consistent luck = skill. A lot of money gets lost that way.

[doug_porsche]

But if everyone didnt believe in luck, even just a little, Las Vegas would be a VERY different place!

[pwd72s]

Originally Posted by Instrument 41

preparation plus opportunity= Luck

I remember a scene from "The Hustler"...sombody telling "fast eddie" that he shot good, but lucky. He replied that he was lucky.

Pool and life are much the same...the more you learn and practice something, the luckier you get.

[weseeeee]

+1.....preparation plus opportunity= Luck

[HardDrive]

+2. You make your own luck by being prepared to act, and recognizing opportunity.

I don't believe in luck, but I do believe in karma.

[WilShel]

Here is a quote from Warren Buffett

“I had the luck of getting turned down by Harvard, which meant I got to study under Ben Graham at Columbia, which changed my life. All kinds of things have worked out. So I just hope I stay lucky. I’ve been lucky for 80 years.”

[GDNF2ET]

When I was in my teens, I was a very good and cocky pool shooter..I once made a remark to my good friend that I could beat him ten straight games..He said, "your real good, but I think I'll get you at least one game in ten"..The bet was $20 and all he had to do was win one game..We flipped a coin to see who would break the 1st game..He won the toss, broke and sank the eight ball
All my talent was meaningless...What are the odds of him sinking the eight ball on the break, of the 1st game of that bet ? He was lucky, and I was humbled..I deserved it big time !

[lukeh]

No doubt there is luck. With 6+ billion people on the planet some are going to catch more breaks than others. Those that are at the extremes and get way more than average are lucky and those that get the opposite are unlucky.

[red-beard]

Chance favors the prepared mind

[jyl]

In Larry Niven's Known Space series, most people on earth could win the right to breed only through being lucky at a lottery. Many generations of this practice eventually produced people whose lineage was six, seven, eight generations of lottery winners. These people had effectively been bred for luck.

[GH85Carrera]

It is strange how some people win door prizes more then others. I was a member in the Mercedes club for many years. at every dinner we had a door prize drawing. Every person received a random number and then a drawing for the numbers for the door prizes. On our first visit the president tried to be sure we won something. He kept calling numbers until ever person in the room won something except my wife and myself. For years one lady seemed to win something every month. I don't win at random drawings.

[Bill Douglas]

I'm 50/50. But I buy lotto tickets so if good luck wants to come my way it can come in the form of a lotto win.

[Hugh R]

I believe in luck as in a flow of good signs. I was born WASP in the USA, I was born normal, not with a handicap or seriously short or seriously ugly. I had at least average intelligence, maybe more, I sometimes wonder. I came from an academic family so I strived towards getting a college degree or two. I bought an Aston Martin DB4 in 1971 for $1,750 (then the price of a used Ford Pinto) and hung on to it for almost 40 years and sold it for a boat load of money.

In 1976, I hit a taxi in Boston that did an abrupt left turn in front of me on my bicycle that forced the down handle bars on my 10 speed into my sack. I don't remember anything after the accident, but I woke up two days later at Mt. Auburn Hospital in Cambridge. The handle bar went into the sack destroyed my right nut, took out my spleen, 1/2 my liver and a few feet of intestine, and the handle bar came out about an inch from my belly button. I was told that since it was a Catholic teaching hospital I was given the last rites. I have no recollection of the events. I was also told that due to the damage to my left nut (it was severed and re-attached), I would probably never have kids. I have two natural born kids. And I function sexually very well. Yeah, I'm lucky.

[herr_oberst]

^^ Exactly the point I was trying to make. Perception, attitude, circumstantial awareness.

I just couldn't come up with the proper anecdotes.
I don't win lotteries, prizes, raffles, but I am 6 feet tall, relatively trim, not hideously ugly, not too stupid and I have enough money and friends plus a little more to keep me satisfied...

Damn right I'm lucky, and I don't always remember to remember.

Thanks for the thread, Shaun.

[M.D. Holloway]

I think I am the luckiest man I have ever met...

[LeeH]

Originally Posted by HardDrive

+2. You make your own luck by being prepared to act, and recognizing opportunity.

I don't believe in luck, but I do believe in karma.

^^^^^^^^ My feelings exactly.

My friends think: Lee's really lucky. He bought a small business and sold it a few years later for a chunky profit.

I think: I got a degree in business, spent two years looking for just the right opportunity, managed the ownership transition carefully with regards to employees and customers, worked 6am to 8pm for the first year or so while learning a new industry, carefully managed a brilliant but PITA key employee, added new product lines, merged with a competitor, spent money to retain employees, identified that the market for our products was peaking, tracked down a business broker who truly knew his stuff, prepped the business for sale, and took a chance on an oddball offer that led to a sale price that was 20% above the asking price. Pretty lucky, right?