Outskirts Press, INC.

DO WE MAKE OUR LUCK, OR DOES IT MAKE US?

Searching for luck is something we all begin doing at an early age. We see things almost every day that seem to turn on a lucky break, but does luck even exist? Is it a physical force? Is it a mystical phenomenon? Most importantly, what might we do as individuals to cause luck to treat us differently? Astrologists, palm readers, and crystal ball-gazers all try to predict our luck. Some pray to a Higher Power to bring good fortune. Many others believe any luck we receive is due to our own persistence in the presence of an opportunity. Others believe luck is simply happenstance. Luck is difficult to identify before it arrives. After luck passes, its residue remains for each of us to sort out for ourselves – were we lucky or not? This book explores how we attempt to win luck’s favor, as well as how we try to make the best of the situation before us. These pages will describe the many forms in which luck can appear, and how it inspires us, impacts us, and very often changes us. Because luck is a uniquely personal pursuit, your task, as a reader, will be to analyze your own life’s circumstances and assess how, when, why – or even if – you have been lucky.

So much of our lives are spent adjusting to the trials and tribulations that befall us. As we plunge headlong into this world, we change everything we touch. Every outcome in the world is subject to change, based on the presence (or absence) of each of us. At some point, though, each of us has endured a challenging spot in our lives that leave us wondering, “How did that happen the way it did?” The number of possible outcomes is so great in most situations that it is impossible for our modest minds to calculate the possibilities. Unable to fully explain many given outcomes logically, the most expedient alternative is to blame luck. Luck is promoted as an invisible, omnipresent force credited with the ability to alter every outcome. If it really does exist as a physical force of the universe, though, why are there so many varying versions of its work among the cultures of the world? How can some cultures and belief systems dismiss it completely? Through the course of life, we all run into people who just seem to be luckier than the rest of us. These are the people whose toast must always hit the floor peanut-butter-side-up. Each of us could probably name a person who seems to have very few redeeming qualities, yet seems to always land on his or her feet when faced with adversity. We also know people who live under the dark cloud of misfortune. If something bad could happen, it will likely happen to them. So, if we are all created equal, how do the lucky and the unlucky develop side-by-side within the same basic culture? Where does luck come from? How do we decide, in a complex set of daily developments, whether we were fortunate or very unfortunate? How much of every outcome hinges on the perspective we bring to the situation, and the lessons we take away?