Never say ‘ No’ to a great thought wittily owing to it is impossible. — Dr. Robert Schuller
July 4, 1939, during a doubleheader between the New York Yankees and Washington Senators, one of the most memorable events in the history of major league baseball occurred.
Lou Gehrig, Yankee first baseman, after ending his streak of 2, 130 consecutive games ( a inscribe only recently surpassed by Baltimore Oriole shortstop Cal Ripkin ), announced to the world he had been striken with amyotrophic oblique sclerosis, a neurological disease, and there was no cure.
The Yankees decided to adoration baseball’ s Iron Man with a mistake at Yankee Arena. Yankee Arena that day was packed. There wasn’ t, I’ ve heard, a dry eye in the stands. Baseball greats who played attached Gehrig, including Baby doll Ruth, assembled to stipend tribute to a dear classmate — along with members of the Washington Senators.
Gehrig, his voice weak and fighting back weeping, read a speech, a short one, he had written the night before.
“ Fans, for the ended two weeks you have been reading about a bad break I got. Sometime today I muse myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth. I have been in ballparks for 17 senescence and I have never published form but heart and encouragement from you fans. Look at these grand men. Which of you wouldn’ t look at it the weight of his career just to associate with them for even one day?
Gehrig went on to tell the Yankee field crowd WHY he considered himself lucky and finished his speech in complaint: “ When you have a cool tremendous - in - law who takes sides with you in squabbles against her own daughter — that’ s something! When you have a father and vast who work all their lives so that you can have an education and build your body— it’ s a blessing! When you have a wife who has been a tower of strength and shown more courage than you dreamed existed — that’ s the finest I know!
“ So I close in saying that I might have been disposed a bad break, but I have an awful lot to live for! Thank you. ”
Gehrig died June 2, 1941 true to the head he still had much to live for. ALS, the disease that took his life, is now referred to as Lou Gehrig’ s disease.
Love, Luck, Money, Serendipity, Good Fortune, The Good Life — we all want these things, as did Lou Gehrig who considered his life a lucky one.
So, how lucky were you today? Does Lou Gehrig’ s story add a bit of perspective to how you answer this query?
LUCK AND POSSIBILIITY THINKING
Does possibility thinking tilt luck in our favor? Is it your view that intensely negative people get taken care of by life ( for reasons that make no sense ) and do utterly well while people you know ( whose undertaking is love and light ) salt mines around to find enough cash to keep their lights on?
Lou Gehrig’ s positive outlook, his presumption that a way might be found to cure ALS before it took him, did not play out the way he hoped. After all, to the neb, Gehrig considered himself a lucky man.
One thing Lou Gehrig’ s story taught me is this: If we cannot appreciate how lucky we nowadays are then we are unlucky being we feel ourselves so. Also, not many of accede themselves lucky due to the failing of a bad thing to happen.
“ Station are my lucky fortuity, the ones others seem to get? ” L. T. wonders. “ The friends I graduated with? I look at them. I pierce what they’ ve got. Then, I look at what I own. I can’ t help but be discouraged. ” Basically, in my view, L. T. and his wife have a great life— each has a well - palmy employment, they have their health, youth, two great youngsters, plus all the latest conveniences in their home a fashionable - day family will ever need.
Is L. T. lucky? He doesn’ t seem to think so. With his mind-set, it’ s easy to give blessing with him. L. T. is unlucky due to he feels he is, even though it’ s hard to note how he can feel so “ down” about his life.
“ Let not your mind run on what you deficiency as much as on what you have commenced, ” the Roman Ruler Marcus Aurelius wrote. “ Of the things you have, select the best, and then mirror how willingly they would have been sought if you did not have them. ”
L. T., in my view, is lucky beyond theorem! And, unlucky not to conceive how great is his good fortune!
“ If the stars should pop in one night in a thousand senescence, ” Ralph Waldo Emerson noted, “ how men would accept and dote on and preserve for many generations the remembrance of the City of Divinity which had been shown! ”
The believers would be lucky! As it is, the stars come forth nightly and those who do not thought or care whether or not stars are in the sky cannot be considered called lucky, don’ t you allow?
“ You wake up in the morning, and lo! your billford is magically filled, ” Arnold Bennett wrote, “ with twenty - four hours of the unmanufactured tissue of the universe of your life! ”
How lucky, how fortunate, how serendipitously delightful to wake up and be gifted with more hours of life! How unlucky not to grasp this fabulous reality and live FROM it.
And so, here’ s the wail of the unlucky, the impossibility thinkers, the unthankful and ungrateful who occupy space among us but do not fill it with apparatus but their laments: “ Why me? Why have I been singled out? Why do my best laid plans always go awry”
“ Lost: in future between sunrise and twilight, ” Horace Mann phrases it, “ two golden hours, each set with sixty diamond minutes. No reward is offered, for they are gone forever. ”
How unlucky!
And then there is our present day enervationweakness of uneasiness. So much to headache about these days. Apprehension, fear, doubts, upsets, lust, frustration, hasten, revive, precipitate, rush, rush, rush, here, there, all-over, faster, faster, faster, no time, overscheduled life, tuckered out, exhausted, worn out - - how unlucky!
Johann von Goethe’ s “ take” on his life and times led to this shrewd and insightful observation:
“ If the morning wakes us to no new joys, if the evening brings us not the hopes of new pleasures, is it worthwhile to dress and undress? ”
What a depressed sentiment! How unlucky— to live with a sense that you’ re losing your life in an struggle to live it.
So, if you’ re unlucky in love, are unluckily trapped in a job you abhor, unluckily facing mistake once again, how can you reverse your luck?
Dr. Richard Wiseman has studied luck for over a decade. His book The Luck factor lists four essential apprehension he believes will alter the circle of an unlucky life.
Dr. Wiseman says that lucky people create, grasp, and act upon the chance opportunities in their life. They build and maintain a strong “ network of luck, ” and are open to new experiences.
This strong “ network of luck” is what Max Gunther in his book The Luck Factor calls “ throwing out many luck products. ” Gunther points out that “ The electric remark that makes for luck little comes from our well - worn contacts, ” and encourages us to take an explorer’ s pursuit in the world which is how we usually serendipitously felicitous people with reciprocal interests.
Next, Wiseman says the lucky listen to their lucky hunches. Gunther’ s awareness was to point out that each of us carries an invisible luck potential and that “ With luck, half - dry plans get you in conclusion. With bad luck, no plan will work. ”
Use your intuitive luck potential to toss out more luck merchandise and have memories, while you’ re doing so, this is NOT all about you. “ Your flushed - spirited actions sustain awareness of you in other minds, ” Gunther writes. In other words, be hard engagement YOU makes others lucky!
Thirdly, lucky people’ s expectations abut the to be help them fulfill their dreams and ambitions. In other words, they EXPECT good fortune, even if their chances to achieve a certain goal seem slim. They also credit their interactions with others will be lucky and fortuitous.
Being Upset makes you luck contagious! Gunther points out that “ Expectation sends an electrical message to our neural system. While it lasts we are alert and most apt to be rewarded. ”
In other words, we are likely to be LUCKY!
Someday, Dr. Wiseman says lucky people are able to transform their bad luck into good fortune. “ They peep the positive side of their bad luck and are categorical any ill fortune will, in the long run, work out for their best. The lucky do not dwell on their ‘ unfortunate’ elapsed failings and they take constructive steps to prevent more bad luck in the to be. ”
Love what you do and do more of it! Gunther notes that “ The lucky renew their energy through the enterprise in which they’ re engaged, ” a truth that is so understandable we recurrently live with it when we’ re frantic or suffering. “ When ZEST enters into life, luck is regularly not far behind, ” Gunther reminds us.
Plus, as Nicholas Rescher points out in his book Luck: The Brilliant Randomness of Everyday Life, the lucky revel in the unpredictability of life and span out for new experiences. “ For if the inevitable could be predicted, what fun would keep up in life? ” Arthur Schlesinger asks in his writings, which is why we generally do madcap and “ crazy” things— just to break the routineness in our life. No matter what befalls us, it is the view of Frederick Wiedmann that a happy, very lucky and successful life is one in which we have “ The mature capacity to find the ‘ Yes’ in all things.
”
Dr. Wiseman believes it is possible, armed with his four essential techniques for turning around our luck, we can reverse and pull out of the downward spiral or cycle of bad luck we’ ve been in. He has created a luck edify to teach unlucky people to do just this — and with considerable success.
LUCK, IMAGRY, AND EXPECTATION
How are our beliefs chargeable to the determinations we make inside ourselves that we are a lucky or unlucky person?
In his book Healing Visualizations, Dr. Gerald Epstein says imagery is a superb way to initiate one’ s healing process. Imagery is a simple process and the benefits far outweigh the effects of wittily doing zip.
“ It means finding, discovering, or creating a mental picture, a mental form. The imagined— but still real— form has all the characteristics of any event, thing, or location of any waking event, thing, or stage that we might spot in everyday waking reality. ”
Dr. Epstein continues, “ The difference is that, unlike objects perceived when sophisticated, they have no nook or mass. In short, they have no substance. Climactically, they do have energy. We might think of these images [my comment: or reactions] as our mental children. We give birth to them to act on our benefit as agents of healing [or luck, we might also add]; then, with the energy they carry, they make headway to stimulate the healing [or act as a lucky self - fulfilling prophecy] process on their own. ”
In other words, as Dr. Epstein explains, it’ s clear that what we creatively envisage is a curious reality, but IT IS A REALITY with the power to affect our bodies and, by extension, our luck. The mystic writer Neville Goddard pointed out many times that we do not get what we want in life so much as we be given what we EXPECT or feel we DESERVE.
Dr. Wiseman says the lucky cherish to get luckier and the unlucky unluckier as time goes by. Perhaps this explains the other meaning Jesus had in mind when he verbal, “ To him that hath shall be apt and to him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath. ” The rich get richer, the poor poorer.
Analog watch your EXPECTATIONS - - what you EXPECT to be TRUE - - if you plan to power up your luck potential and in doing so diminish any cipher of unlucky episodes you were next to encounter in the agedness ahead.
LUCK AND POSSIBILITY THINKING:
Many oldness ago Dr. Robert Schuller wrote a pull out about Possibility Thinking. “ Never say ‘ no’ to a great image neatly considering it is fantastic, ” he vocal. This was, to me, an sensational idea the first time I read it. I wrote on a find, “ Never say ‘ no’ to a great concept simply in that it is nutty, ” and carried it in my wallet for caducity.
I’ ve thanks to come to take it that the grim say ‘ No’ to luck just as easily as they turn molehills into mountains. Owing to they take possession this ability and use it generally they are, we comprehension say, magicians of the ludicrous rather than magicians of the possible— in other words, they are doomed.
No account how augural you’ ve been, a possibility attention is always conversant, as Max Gunther notes, that “ One great spell, a differential favorable chance can offset a run of ( seeming ) bad luck. ”
Can it ever. Be used by a rich conception that will turn your luck around. “ Seat do I find rich ideas? ” the ominous ask. When media tycoon Ted Turner donated a billion dollars to a beneficial cause a few senescence ago he was asked by a reporter, “ Aren’ t you going to miss the money you’ re giving away? ” Turner grinned confidently and replied, “ The world is extensive with money. ”
What a extraordinary way to heed the world and money. “ Yea, but he’ s got money. He can supply to think that way, ” the lowering say. There is always a inducement not to be used by a rich abstraction isn’ t there? Discover YOUR great hope ( it’ s probably closer than you take in ) and you will be well on the way to putting a bumper categorize on your modus that says, “ Luck Happens! ”
As does serendipity!
LUCK AND SERENDIPITY:
IN 1754 an Englishman, Horace Walpole, wrote a write up to his bosom buddy Horace Mann in which Walpole resurrected an unclear Oriental word. In his take down, he told Horace man about a calumniation called The Three Princes of Serendip. Walpole coined the word Serendipity and a questioning in Britain ( 2, 000 A. D. ) voted Serendipity as that country’ s favorite word.
What is Serendiptity and how is its linked to luck? Benjamin N. Cardozo wrote, “ Like many of the first things of life, like happiness and tranquility and credit, the gain that is most gratifying is not the thing sought, but the one that comes from itself in the reconnoitre for weighty aggrandized. ”
Sir James A. H. Murray described Serendipity as “ The aptitude of making happy and unexpected discoveries by matter, ” and a definition from Webster’ s Dictionary described it as “ the write-off of finding estimable or agreeable things not sought for. ”
Take several minutes and mirror on the many instance latitude and when serendipity played an unsuspected role in your life? You’ ll be surprised when you toss your mind back to the long forgotten instances of so many lucky and fortuitous times when the gain that was most precious to you was not the thing sought, but the one that surfaced in your search for something else— like the fete you didn’ t feel like inspection, individual your mind at the last minute, and while there met the person of your dreams who also, for reasons they’ re not fairly actual about, also various their mind and decided to go.
As Marcus Bach would point out, quoting the word of his book, what spare could this magical confluence of events be miss The Magic Power of Serendipity?
Bach claims there is a also serendipitous test of guidance: “ It always motivates you ( you do not persuade it ); it always fills you with a sense of rightness; it always leaves you and your world in better spirits than before. ”
This is very similar to one of Dr. Richard Wiseman’ s four techniques for creating a luckier life: Listen to Your Lucky Hunches.
So, mature your lucky opportunities by first of all writing your view upon the heavens [in other words, shake your dreams out of your thinking pockets or purse] and listen to, play, and trust your lucky hunches to guide you to them.
LUCK AND MONEY
My partner Peter has a theory about money and luck. He says, as we all acknowledge, that money is energy. Peter, however, says money on the physical plane is DENSE energy. You can learn to play around with dense energy and get yourself a home, a car, furniture and food, or you can grow a paranormal carrot. A real carrot, Peter notes, is grown from the dense energy of the muddy. What good, he asks, is a spiritual carrot if you can’ t eat it? His view is that when Jesus told his followers to “ be wise as a serpent and safe as a dove, ” he was saying be wise in the ways of the world and if survival depends on a physical plane existence and you’ re going to have to play in the same stadium as the the well - to - do, then you better to give up any fanciful notions you have about money being the root of all evil [actually the Greek is “ a” root of evil], get real and wise, become as educated and informed as your competitors are, and let your light shine as brightly or even more brilliantly than theirs does. You’ ll do this if you want to “ make it” in this elderly world of ours.
This, Peter says, is what the lucky do. The unlucky wait and drift. They just sort of mosey through life trustworthy “ the universe” will somehow take care of them ( or the authority, or Aunt Jewell’ s will, or the sweepstake if they’ re lucky! ). To recite Max Gunther again, “ Unlucky people are notably passive. ”
Is being lucky in love or money ( perhaps both ) a fortuitous “ chance” adventure, merely a roll of the dice? Some win, some lose? My dad used to think so and he played life like the gambler he was. The stakes were high and winning required that you know more about the game than your antagonist. “ Win some, lose some, ” he used to say.
He won the laurels of life more oftentimes than he lost. Partly, I have through, certainly he played the odds, but he only played them when they were fine in his favor. In other words, he knew how to attract luck. Dad never went into a business peril or deal without instant having visualized the outcome he expected. He worked out the ending in his mind and, unlike most people, proceeded backwards from his goals ( as if they were coeval accomplished reality ). And this, I buy, made him ( a man with only a questioning grade education ) a financially lucky man.
After all, he married the girl of his dreams. He was fortunate in love, you might say, thanks to his buddy, who was engaged to her at the time, introduced them! He was unlucky in love, perhaps— as was she— in that they were so antithetic.
Are we all in this game of life playing the genetic hand dealt us at birth ( for better or worse ) or is there an underlying marking, a structure to luck all of us can learn ( if we choose ) and, by doing so, upgrade the quality of our existence here?
The Luck Factor, Possibility Thinking, Serendipity, and Good Fortune — Too Much For A Person to Expect in One Lifetime? Part 2, concludes in the next bit
