On a recent trip to a local store, the manager asked me to fill out a ticket for the drawing they were having for Mother’s Day. As I was filling it out, I stated casually that I am never lucky at such drawings or at lottery. She added, but you are lucky more than you know. If your car broke down irreparably, you could afford to go buy a new one.
I
am not so sure that is my definition of ‘luck’ as I have worked extremely hard
my entire life, saved, and drove cars way past their expiration dates. To me
they are just means to get from point A to point B in a safe way. Yet she
inadvertently made the point that ‘luck’ has a different meaning and definition
for different people – some agree, and others disagree in their definition and
interpretation of ‘luck.’
Luck
is defined in the dictionary as a chance happening of fortunate or adverse
events, prosperity, success, or one’s personal fate. But the dictionary
definition of luck does not include the many-faceted interpretations of the
word and concept as used in the 21st century.
Economically
speaking, luck is seen as being born in wealth, sometimes generational, other
times just parental wealth which will someday get passed on to their offspring.
What they choose to do with this wealth is a different story.
Luck
is being in the right place at the right time. Luck is being born with gifted
genes which allow you to develop into success with less effort. Luck is hard
work for some, with the reward of a better life because of it.
Luck
is winning the lottery, sometimes multiple times. Luck is escaping near misses
and staying alive. Luck is surviving a disaster when everyone else around it did
not. Luck is surviving a disease and chemotherapy when others do not. Luck is
not being buried by an avalanche or a volcanic eruption. Luck is escaping a
devastating fire or numerous lightning strikes. Luck is escaping drowning and
sharks when lost at sea for days and weeks.
Luck
is being born healthy and having a strong genetic constitution. Luck is being
born beautiful and athletic. Luck is having artistic, musical, scientific, and mathematical
talent at an incredibly early age. Luck
is surviving an airplane crash. Luck is
surviving alone at sea for days and weeks and being found alive. Luck is surviving the Titanic disaster and making
it out alive again after two subsequent ships sunk with the same survivor from the
Titanic tragedy.
Luck
is having unforeseen blessings in life – people, family, friends, faith, love,
and other life-changing events.
Some
think that luck is being able to achieve your dreams. Luck may be a variable in
reaching one’s aspirations and dreams, but so are education, skill, dedication,
determination, courage, and hard work.
Reza
believes that luck is seizing opportunities presented equally – two immigrants
have the same opportunities upon arrival in America, but one becomes a taxi
driver and the other becomes an engineer.
Others
believe that luck is where you are born, what family you grow up in, what town
you grow up in, and the neighborhood surrounding you, i.e., Americans are lucky
to be born here.
Joyce
Q. thinks that the choices you make have a component of luck. You are also lucky
if you have abundant food, thus food safety, clean water, hospitals, and a dependable
and safe roof over your head.
Ozmarina
believes that luck is represented by ancestors who determine what we do and whether
we inherit good things or bad things in life. “The sins of the fathers follow
until the third generation.”
Susan
S. said that she has been lucky because she was blessed. “Everything in my life
happened for a reason. I have had many troubling situations, but God has
brought me through them. He put so many people in my life, and it has made all
the difference.”
People who escaped socialist/communist
oppressive regimes consider themselves lucky to live in a capitalist society
and do not understand the younger generations’ determined drive to replace
capitalism with the repressive and regressive socialism.
Central Americans risk life and limb to trek
to the United States, illegally across the southern border, to economic
abundance and freedom from government subjugation and fear which they had lived
under the socialist hellholes they were unlucky to had been born into.
The truth is, if you build something worth
having, someone is going to try to take it away for themselves or for others
who have not earned it. That is not ‘luck,’ of course, it is hard work on the
part of the owner and confiscation on the part of those who did not earn it.
David C. believes that there is zero
likelihood that such thing as luck exists. “Nothing happens by accident or by
chance. People micro-manage the Author of the atom and e=mc2 into so
much less than He is.”
Luck is being born with a talent which takes
little work to pursue and the talented do not have enough appreciation for the
gift they were endowed with by their Creator.
They expect everyone to bow to their majesty. Others must labor for
years to develop and market their God-given talent. And others squander the
‘luck’ or talent they were given and regret it in later life.
“Luck is a human perception of something that
happened to them.” Luck is also perceived as the experience of something
positive which occurred by random chance. The Romans consulted their soothsayer
for their luck or misfortune. Wild predictions into the flight of birds and the
shape of animal entrails were spun into one’s future events of luck or
misfortune. Many believe that luck is elusive and that the present and the
future are dependent on the luck of the draw and predestination. But ultimately,
you are lucky to be born.
Can I say that I am lucky to know you Ileana? Perhaps it would be more accurate to say I am blessed to know you.
ReplyDeleteI am blessed to know you as well, Bill.
DeleteFor me luck was 55 years ago, when I journeyed from Warsaw to Paris, crossed the dreaded Iron Curtain, without triggering a single landmine, or being detained inside the Gulag....and found my place in the free world! Let Freedom Ring!
ReplyDeleteAnd you made life better for many patients across so many continents and countries, Aurel. God bless you!
DeleteMany years ago (maybe 60 or more) I heard that in England, when shipping companies hired a captain for voyages, asked him a mandatory very important question: "Are you lucky?" - Vladimir P.
ReplyDeleteMy faraway Tasmanian question (of course, not to you, dear Ileana) would be “Is Hunter Biden lucky?” I guess lots of Americans would answer it with “Sure, he is!” Generally such an attitude is the main reason of the contemporary transition from “We the people” to “We the sheeple”. I believe. it’s one of the main reasons also for allowing any shameful trash to be elected as the sheeple’s representatives - just to talk a bit later all kinds of bla-bla about big bad Pelosi, big bad Maxine or big bad Fauci. No, no: the only Big Bad one, which ought to be talked about, is a Big Bad Citizen, and nobody else. Alas, there are no lucky chances for such a discussion in any modern Leftlands, but of course!
ReplyDeleteWith many thanks for your good article – respectfully, Slava
From Dr. Aurel Mircea:
ReplyDelete"Allelujah, my compatriot and Happy Easter to you too!"
Happy Easter to all my Orthodox friends and relatives!
ReplyDelete