I sincerely hope that's not the takeaway. I would hope the takeaway would be that determination + skill can replace luck entirely, and that luck itself is not something that should be sought after at all.
Misappropriating success as good luck is dangerous, because it also misappropriates failure as bad luck.
I disagree that success is simply good luck, and that input doesn't matter. I think you're biased because your attempt failed (which I sympathize with and I wish it didn't fail), but success is never promised. Sure, you were unlucky, but 99% of us are too. You didn't fail because of that. There was likely another reason, like a lack of product-market-fit. Misattributing failure to a lack of good luck, or bad luck, softens the failure by detaching it from you, but it also misattributes success as "good luck" when it shouldn't. I'll admit that I'm also biased, because my attempt didn't fail, but that doesn't change the fact that I'm perpetually unlucky yet still successful. Sometimes what we choose to spend our time on wasn't the right thing, and that's fine, but that doesn't mean spending your time on the right thing is always pure luck. We shouldn't collapse all uncertainty into a game of luck. If you asked the casting director exactly why they chose Day-Lewis over Denzel, you'd probably see that what looked like good luck from the outside actually wasn't luck at all.
I recently unpacked this idea a bit and wrote about it, so it's fresh on my mind. I definitely think that success in business can be a game that is a combination of luck and of skill, and most people will say that you need the former more than the latter. Without a little bit of luck, your skill means nothing, because you will perpetually put it to use in a way that never results in success. But I think that's not the full picture, and success can also be a game of skill and determination.
Personally, I've been very unlucky in business. If you asked me if there was a catapult for my success, I would say there was none, though I tried to build multiple, and still do. They all failed, because like I said, I'm perpetually unlucky. But I've been very determined -- hardheaded, even -- and after nearly 10 years, I'm quite successful. Not quite above 7 figures yet, but that's really just a function of time -- and determination, of course.
Sometimes you may even feel unskilled simply because you feel unlucky, but time has usually shown that to be a false assumption. Waiting on luck would've made me give up a long time ago, while skill with relentlessness determination has paid off for me.
However, a hunger is not enough. You do need some skill, or at least some luck.
Good read. I had an offer for a mere 7 figures and that was hard enough to turn down. I couldn't imagine 9 figures! But I think I do get it, at least as much as I can get it at my level. It's hard to give up something you've poured so much of your life into -- "your baby." You lose the autonomy to continue shaping what independence looks like for yourself, or at least it felt that way to me.
I spent a considerable amount of time trying to figure out what this says in what I assumed was Braille, only to realize it's a badly formatted ASCII Christmas tree. :)
reply