Just because you worked your ass off doesn't mean that you weren't lucky. It just means you worked your ass off.
But so far, you probably either never experienced poverty or was lucky enough to get out. Lots of folks work their ass off and never are able to lift themselves out of poverty.
Chances are, you didn't get really sick in school and had to hold off on your studies. And you didn't lose a job because you wound up with an autoimmune disorder and weren't at the job long enough to qualify for FMLA, which was unpaid anyway. If you went to higher education, especially if you went for a Masters or higher - or had any degree that requires unpaid internship - you had someone to help support you during that time - parents, partner, etc.
And the list goes on. So many things in everyone's life are the result of just getting lucky and people have no control over this. Sometimes it is just luck avoiding things and sometimes it is just that some folks have a much better starting hand than other folks. Not everyone can get the good cards because the really good cards need to be unlocked with good cards. They still work their asses off, though.
And plenty of people get lucky, but don't work hard enough to turn that into success, and get nowhere and die.
Which is a more important factor of AB, A or B? You can't disentangle them. And since you have control of A, and no control of B, people should be praised for and incentivized to increase A.
Lord, grant me the courage to increase A, the serenity to accept B, and the wisdom to tell them apart.
Nothing I've said contradicts your statement. I agree wholeheartedly. But that is precisely why process-oriented thinking is important.
I think everyone (with the free time) should invest in learning Poker or card games. Lessons there can be applied elsewhere while still remaining intuitive and easy to understand!
Oddly enough, I doubt you'd think that it sounds dismissive when you turn it around:
"I worked really hard on this, and then I got sick and everything fell through"
"Really sorry you had some bad luck, I know you worked hard on that"
Simply bringing up - in a public forum - that luck and hard work goes hand in hand isn't dismissive. It is just pointing out how things simply are. No one is dismissing that folks work hard on things. Working hard simply isn't enough for success.
Yeah it just seems to chalk it up to chance, as in you can't take ownership of your deeds because it was just "luck". To me luck is buying a lottery ticket. A rocket doesn't fly on luck, it's planning, calculations, it's not "bad luck" something went wrong and they figure out what it was.
I will "concede" to this that yes I was a lucky person, some random people (they were blood relatives but might as well be random) decided to adopt me from a 3rd world country, idk why. Even though I failed college I still found a way out.
You shouldn't be praising that the company sold. Of course, a congratulations, etc. is in order (as you would if someone won the lottery!).
What you should praise is the _input_. Their hard work. The effort. I believe there are studies reinforcing this difference being crucial wrt education of children but I don't have any on hand. :)
And you should not expect to be good friends or acquaintances with someone who has worked hard to overcome something because you need to remind them that part of their success is luck based.
Everybody already knows that. Determination, skill/natural ability, and luck are essentially how we get anything done in our lives. Usually a combination of all three, and you’re focusing on the one that an individual has no control over. It’s unproductive.
> And you should not expect to be good friends or acquaintances with someone who has worked hard to overcome something because you need to remind them that part of their success is luck based.
There are entire cultures out there that acknowledge and respect that where they are today is built, partly, on random chance. Saying that you are where you are entirely on your own individual merits is just /rude/ to many. Just because yours likes to pretend otherwise doesn't make that pretense universal.
"And you should not expect to be good friends or acquaintances with someone who has worked hard to overcome something because you need to remind them that part of their success is luck based."
Why not? A reasonable person can easily see that things are part luck and part work and will admit it outright. Sometimes 70% work, sometimes 70% luck.
Right, so if reasonable people are all aware that part of success is luck based (success = luck/opportunity + skill), then there's no reason to point it out unless it's critical to the conversation.
But so far, you probably either never experienced poverty or was lucky enough to get out. Lots of folks work their ass off and never are able to lift themselves out of poverty.
Chances are, you didn't get really sick in school and had to hold off on your studies. And you didn't lose a job because you wound up with an autoimmune disorder and weren't at the job long enough to qualify for FMLA, which was unpaid anyway. If you went to higher education, especially if you went for a Masters or higher - or had any degree that requires unpaid internship - you had someone to help support you during that time - parents, partner, etc.
And the list goes on. So many things in everyone's life are the result of just getting lucky and people have no control over this. Sometimes it is just luck avoiding things and sometimes it is just that some folks have a much better starting hand than other folks. Not everyone can get the good cards because the really good cards need to be unlocked with good cards. They still work their asses off, though.