The Need to Keep Believing in Luck

We don’t anymore nowadays much believe in Luck – or what was, in earlier

ages, known as Fortune. We would think it extremely suspicious if someone
explained that they had been sacked, but added that this was simply the result
of ‘bad luck’. And we would think it equally strange if someone said they had
made a fortune, but ascribed their triumph to mere ‘good luck’. We resist the
notion that luck can play a significant role as much in our failures as in our
successes. Luck is a substantial offence against modern ideals of control,
strategy and foresight (thinking ahead, foreseeing the future). We understand
ourselves to be – for better and for worse – the authors of our own destinies.

Modern civilisation itself could be viewed as a gigantic protest against the

role of chance in human affairs. Science, insurance, medicine and public
education take up arms against luck, and have won enormous battles against
it, so many in fact, that it has grown devilishly tempting to believe that we
may have vanquished (defeated) it altogether.

However, luck is a fearsome enemy; its territory is fluid and its power
unpredictable and tempestuous. Wisdom requires us to accept that it will
never be entirely tamed. Within every success, however ardent our efforts,
there is sure to be a substantial degree of luck. And, more redemptively
(offering salvation), within every failure, there is sure to be much that cannot
be ascribed to our foolishness alone. We make small mistakes all the time; it
is only occasionally that a modest error turns out to have devastating
consequences.
There are some who already believe too much in luck; who are excessively
willing to assign all the outcomes of their lives to chance. They need to hear
more about responsibility and the capacity of individuals to transform their
circumstances. But, in many ways, these passive actors are ever less common
in the modern world. For the rest of us, those who operate with a daunting
(discouraging, intimidating) feeling of personal responsibility, who will
constantly push themselves to match their highest expectations and berate
(rebuke, reprimand, scold) themselves for failure, a reverential (deeply
respectful) belief in luck should be far more than a historical curiosity. It
remains a crucial concept to take the edge off (reduce the intensity) our
arrogance and, when fate has turned against us, to temper the violence of our
self-contempt (scorn, disdain, low regard).