Do you feel lucky, punk?
Luck is all in your mind
The idea that you make your own luck has a lot of merit. Many of us will have a tale of someone who seems to have had a lucky break, although we know they’ve worked for years to get there.
For instance, a good friend of mine barely scraped through high school. Teachers informed me the future for this friend was bleak, a life of struggle.
Fast forward some 20 years and my friend is now working for a large corporate, in a very respectable role. He has a beautiful two-story house near the ocean in a coastal suburb, where he lives with his wife and two children.
He has more friends than I could count. If the measure of success is the number of people who turn up for your funeral, this guy will leave us all for dead.
(excuse the pun, but given I could edit it out but choose not to, I have to confess the pun is very much intended…)
One thing I can count on though, is that if I go first, he’ll most certainly show up for my funeral. He probably wouldn’t miss it for the world, and the same goes for his many other friends.
He loves boating and being on or in the water, and makes time to enjoy his water-based hobbies as often as possible. He’s even won multiple Australian national championships pursuing one of them.
You could say, he’s lucky. But his success is due to something his teachers weren’t considering. My friend’s success comes down to following this formula (based on my observations, but I reckon he’ll agree if he reads this):
Knowing what he values, and focusing his mental energy on the things he values. Then building lasting relationships and applying a solid work ethic to anything he does.
Anyone who has read ‘The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck’ by Mark Manson, will recognise this philosophy. Decide what you value most, then give all your fucks to those things and none to anything else.
That doesn’t mean you never do anything you don’t care about. In my friend’s case he often needs to spend physical energy on things he doesn’t give a fuck about. But mental energy for these things is limited to what’s necessary to save energy for the things that matter to him.
Maybe you have to work a job you don’t care for, to support something you do care for. In this case, it helps to keep the bigger picture in perspective when it feels like you’re grinding your way from ‘9 to 5’ (or longer…) in a job you don’t enjoy to provide for a family you care deeply about.
This is much easier said than done. Trust me, I know! But sometimes in life, you’ve just got to do what you’ve got to do, so in these situations, it’s best to let go and focus your attention on getting it done as well and as quickly as possible. With this approach, you may even enjoy it. I’ve lost count of the times I’ve found enjoyment in something I thought I’d hate doing, just by getting on with it.
With that done, you can get back to focusing on what you really care about knowing the thing you don’t care about is taken care of. So even if you never get a ‘lucky break’, it won’t matter because you’ll spend your life feeling lucky.
So “you’ve got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do you, punk?”1
Cover image: Photo by wirestock on Freepik
Line by Inspector "Dirty" Harry Callahan in the 1971 classic Dirty Harry
Good article - there is too much noise in our worlds these days, and narrowing the focus to what is important to each of us is key.