The Abhorrence of Luck
It's a strange thing with creative and business types when it comes to luck. Everywhere else, luck is seen as a good thing, embraced and talked about in reverence, but not everyone feels the same.
I find that creative people and business people hate the term luck, at least when it's applied to their success. The reasoning behind it is easy to see: saying that someone got to where they were because they're lucky is like saying that a pro basketball player is lucky... all the time.
Sure, that pro basketball player might get a lucky shot now and again, but if you said that the whole reason they were a pro and why they were so good was due to luck, they'd be mad. They train every day, practice every day, and make sure that they don't get complacent. To say they got there from luck is an insult.
The same with those who are CEOs or bestselling authors. Saying they're lucky diminishes their accomplishments and hard work they put in day in and day out to succeed.
But luck was still a factor.
If I were to assign it an arbitrary number, let's say it's 10% luck, 90% hard work.
Just because you have a great idea for a business, and you run it decently, doesn't mean you'll succeed. You may make a good profit, but it also might not reach the same status that another, similar, business might attain. Luck does factor in because there are things that you can't account for, like say if a blogger or critic randomly decides to enter a restaurant and raves about it. That's random, that's chance, that's lucky.
It's the same with books, you could write the next great american novel, play everything right, and still not become a bestseller. I hear about debut authors whose novel magically rises to the top of the bestseller lists. The books are well written, thoroughly researched, and loved, but who could have said that it would take off, especially with an unknown author? The Martian comes to mind. It was initially self-published in 2011 and sold over 35000 copies in 3 months. It had a winning combination, and the luck to drive it into the spotlight.
Sure, you might be able to quantify some of the success, like saying the blogger or the critic was the factor that brought you the foot traffic, or that the market was ripe for a thriller like the martian which drove sales, but you can't account for all of it.
That's luck. There's no shame in denying it either. There is shame in people thinking or saying it's only luck or that the person in question is lucky. A lot of work goes into creating something, so the next time you want to tell someone creative and successful that they're lucky, don't. Say that it must have been a lot of hard work to get there.
Maybe they'll reply back that they're just lucky.
I find that creative people and business people hate the term luck, at least when it's applied to their success. The reasoning behind it is easy to see: saying that someone got to where they were because they're lucky is like saying that a pro basketball player is lucky... all the time.
Sure, that pro basketball player might get a lucky shot now and again, but if you said that the whole reason they were a pro and why they were so good was due to luck, they'd be mad. They train every day, practice every day, and make sure that they don't get complacent. To say they got there from luck is an insult.
The same with those who are CEOs or bestselling authors. Saying they're lucky diminishes their accomplishments and hard work they put in day in and day out to succeed.
But luck was still a factor.
If I were to assign it an arbitrary number, let's say it's 10% luck, 90% hard work.
Just because you have a great idea for a business, and you run it decently, doesn't mean you'll succeed. You may make a good profit, but it also might not reach the same status that another, similar, business might attain. Luck does factor in because there are things that you can't account for, like say if a blogger or critic randomly decides to enter a restaurant and raves about it. That's random, that's chance, that's lucky.
It's the same with books, you could write the next great american novel, play everything right, and still not become a bestseller. I hear about debut authors whose novel magically rises to the top of the bestseller lists. The books are well written, thoroughly researched, and loved, but who could have said that it would take off, especially with an unknown author? The Martian comes to mind. It was initially self-published in 2011 and sold over 35000 copies in 3 months. It had a winning combination, and the luck to drive it into the spotlight.
Sure, you might be able to quantify some of the success, like saying the blogger or the critic was the factor that brought you the foot traffic, or that the market was ripe for a thriller like the martian which drove sales, but you can't account for all of it.
That's luck. There's no shame in denying it either. There is shame in people thinking or saying it's only luck or that the person in question is lucky. A lot of work goes into creating something, so the next time you want to tell someone creative and successful that they're lucky, don't. Say that it must have been a lot of hard work to get there.
Maybe they'll reply back that they're just lucky.
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