Luck

We feel lucky when we win the lottery, have a loving and happy family, have a good paying job with minimum stress and short commune, to be able to fall asleep as soon as the eyes are closed, to escape a horrific accident unscathed, to go through life with minor ach, pain, and discomfort, etc. Life is filled with moments of ups and downs, highs and lows, bitter sweetness and painful happiness. No one has not been injured by it physically, hurt by it emotionally, and damaged by it spiritually. Some say life is unfair. Some think it is hell. Most of the people endure it because of no other choice. Only a lucky few end their life with a smile on the face. The reason is simple. We are not here to enjoy life and to have a good time. Everything that happens appears to be random and unpredictable. Fortune comes rarely, misfortunes pop up in bundles, and success comes only after many blunders. Few relationships are without argument, distrust, broken promise, and emotional roller coaster.

Reliability

Our body is biologically complex, functionally versatile, and mentally intelligent. No other living thing on Earth has all three attributes. Our body is a perpetually moving and breathing automata. In any given moment, there are billions of billions of parts moving from place to place carrying the assigned task to keep the body alive 24/7/365/75 (average age, 2016). It is so complex that it is self healing, self generating, self aware, self analyzing, and self sufficient. When our body is impaired by illness, sickness, or injury, we seek professional help to fix it up. It is not by luck that an average person can expect to live a long and healthy life. Our body is based on a design that is the result of 3.5 billion years of trials and errors, tinkering, and tweaking. It has taken us only 7 thousand years to figure this out. Luck may have work its magic in the short term, but, only quality, reliability, and stability work in the long run.

Challenges

Each person’s life is different due to the differences in needs, urges, and nurtures. Some have an easier journey while some journeys are tougher. But, everyone has to meet the challenges in order to satisfy one’s needs and or urges. And everyone has to face and solve uncommon problems that can pop up anywhere and anytime. Only a few lucky ones go through trial of life in living colors:

1. To be the leader of a nation, one may have to overcome speech stuttering, the constant traveling agenda, the uneasiness of speaking to strangers, the daily meetings of the mind on matters of great urgency, etc.

2. To be a doctor, one may have to overcome a life of poverty, the difficulty of verbalizing and comprehending a bookful of tongue twisting and mind scratching technical terms, the duty of getting personal with people from all walks of life, etc.

3. The bread winner if a family of four just got lay off and sometimes later, one of the family member got involved in a bad traffic accident. It will take a lot of love, leverage, and luck to help them get through the ordeal and prepare for the next problems, etc.

4. A socially active person suddenly struck down by an accident and was paralyzed waist down has to learn to live a new life style. It will take a lot of determination, devotion from family and friends, and discipline to help get through the traumatic experience and prepare for the next problem, etc.

Probability

Scientifically, luck can be explained by probability and chance. For example:

1. To win a lottery ticket, one has to guess correctly, usually, all 5 numbers. Each number can be from 1 to 50. So, the chance for that to happen is [Y = 1/50 x 1/49 x 1/48 x 1/47 x 1/46]. If a person buys one ticket per week for 60 years, that is [X = 52 x 60] tickets. The probability of guessing the winning number in the person’s life time is X/ (1/Y) which is very small. Thus, a person is considered lucky to win a lottery ticket. For a person who never buys a lottery ticket, one is considered out of luck of winning the lottery ticket. A person can increase one’s luck of winning by buying more ticket with different numbers. Finally, a person can be a sure winner by coming up with enough money to buy up all the ticket’s numbers.

2. WW2 had caused the death of more than 100 million people. Especially in the battle zones, those who survived considered themselves lucky. The scenario can best be experienced by the soldiers who were ordered to storm a highly fortified beach head. In a realistically made movie, we see the soldiers rushing onto the beach from the landing crafts are cut down like weed by the enemy fires whose only aim is to eliminate as many soldiers as possible. Since there is no safe path on the beach and the firings is totally random, each soldier has a chance of not making it and the lucky survivors are relief to be alive to fight for another day.

Hope

A person is lucky to be born:

1. Into a well-to-do family to never having to worry about how to make ends need.

2. With good hand-eye coordination as they face few problems to pick up new skills,

3. With a healthy body as it enables the person to spend more time to pursue one’s dreams than to be in the hospitable,

4. With a brain that can create music; the only medicine that soothes a stressed mind without side effects.

   Life may have given them a head start. But,

1. The well-to-do may not be so lucky in personal relationship,

2. The skilled technician may stumble in the financial market,

3. The dreamer may face depression as crude reality setting in,

4. The musician may fall victim to the psychedelic drugs.

   No person is fully equipped with all the capabilities to meet life’s challenges and obstacles. It is naturally that in a person’s journey through life, one will make mistakes and enemies, swallow failures and criticisms, endure bodily injuries and illness, and taste rejections and sadness. Everyone needs a little luck here and there to keep us thankful, hopeful, and wonderful.