why do we go from one crisis to another?

amosworks

I would personally define luck as something that is of benefit to you that happens in your favour. Lucky people have a higher frequency of such events occuring as compared to a mean average.

Therefore it is possible to create luck by making things of benefit happen to you more frequently.

Ordinary_Joe

pennylewren wrote:

Ok, to an extent it is down to perspective & yes broken boilers (I currently have no heating due to broken water pump) & car repairs etc are an eventuality of house owning & living in general. But for some people these things seem to happen all at once & on a constant cycle - you pay for one thing get it sorted for something else to go t**s up/need fixing etc. You never seem to get a break.

But, I don't belive positive thinking & being optimistic (as opposed to pessimistic) can generate luck. You can't say that someone who has a critical or terminal illness has so because they were not positivie thinking enough...Likewise whenever I've brought a lottery ticket, I've always believed it could be me with the winning ticket that week - but it never has been!

To some extent I'd agree and to another I'd disagree. I can't speak for your personal example so lets say it had happend to me.

If I thought about it I too would acknowledge that this stuff happens. Boilers always break down. Knowing that what I should have done I would have money set aside (as the experts so often recoomend) as a disaster fund. Money specifically ready in a bank account to pay for things like this. If that were the case my thinking might initially be angry but then knowing I'd got the money set aside for just this type of thinking I might relax and not make such a big deal of it. However I don't have something that fund so if it goes wrong I could get into a spiral of despair and might think myself unlucky. Because I've just made a big payout I'm on the back foot so if anything else breaks down I'm right up against it.

What I would disagree with is that the series of event only happens to some people. I'll bet it happens to everyone - it's how they react to it that detrmines other peoples perception of whether they are luck or unlucky. I suspect lucky people don't think of others as unlucky because they are dealing with their own lives. It's more likely that those who see themselves as constantly unlucky think everyone else is lucky.

On the terminal illness front I'd agree that their illness is not because they were pessimistic (although studies exist to prove the role of the mind in recovery from illness). I used that example to help put the flat tyres in our life into perspective.

Bothered!

I do think life is what you make it, and LUCK does play a big part in how ones life is made...

For instance if you are born into to money then you are more in a posistion to use that money to acquire 'luck' , racing , gambling, stock & shares etc you need a certain about of money to throw at these to 'up' your chances/ averages of wins etc.

With everyday things like the boiler breaking down etc, I think that is just part of lifes annoying hurdles but if you had the money to service these things more regularly then the chances of them breaking down would decrease and therefore so would the 'bad luck' IYKWIM.

So having Money to start with is the main source to 'Luck' in my eyes...unless all these lucky people don't go to bed at nights and just sit under trees to be covered in birds CRAP ! :rotfl: :rotfl:

MinnieSpender

"The harder I work, the luckier I get."
Samuel Goldwyn

Cheesy, but I suspect there's a grain of truth in here somewhere.

heppy23

Ceri wrote:

So my boiler breaking down, needing new glasses, new tyres in the last 3 months is down to me having a negatvie outlook? I don't think so!

I don't think those three things are bad luck as such. They are just things that all need doing at some point. It's a coincidence they have all happened at once.

Our washing machine needs looking at, the baby needs a bigger car seat and I've got a big gas bill. Bad luck? No. Bad timing maybe. It's not upset me though.
I've got money saved for the car seat, I can pay the washing machine bill out of my wages and the gas bill can wait until they send the reminder.

heppy23

amosworks wrote:

Did you too find your life was luckier when you did the exercises it suggests and stuff? I'm really keen to hear your thoughts on it!

I'm going to re-read it soon. Don't get a lot of reading time with a 9 month old baby in the house.

queenbee2006

They say esteem for yourself comes from doing hard things in life not the easy things(anthony Robbins)

dollindebt

Well, here's a bit of philosophy from my amazing mother (who is 62 today). I hope this is inspiring to those of us who are feeling down.

During the past three months, my parents have been beset with one knock after another. My mother fell and broke her leg in three places, requiring her to have major surgery. She is still using a zimmer frame to get around. Then, my parents had a serious car accident while going to one of my mother's hospital appointments. On Monday, my dad is having a quintuple-bypass heart operation, which was unexpected. On top of all of this, their beloved collie died, leaving them devastated.

My mother, in her infinite wisdom, still has somehow managed to retain a sense of humour. Her philosphy to life is this:

"Sh*t Happens".

donfanatico

A great book that will give a more positive outlook on life is "The Power of Kabbalah".

It made me think a lot about how I live my life etc...

Check it out!

Don

MinnieSpender

I would highly recommend two books by Richard Templar:

The Rules of Work

and

The Rules of Life

Very shrewd, very clever.