Luck happens when you least expect it. Sometimes in 3s; both good and bad. So, while pottering around the kitchen, on Friday morning, as I do, I heard Fran Kelly on breakfast radio talking to her guest about a book called, The Luck of Politics: True Tales of Disaster and Outrageous Fortune. The guest was Federal MP and Shadow Assistant Treasurer Andrew Leigh, which sounds really dry and yawn-worthy, but bear with me.

I was intrigued by the title, in particular the reference to luck, but also because it borrows a phrase from a Shakespearean text that, during A’ Levels, I had to read 20+ times to please Hilary Quinn, my lovely English Lit teacher. The phrase in question is outrageous fortune, which is, of course, taken from Hamlet’s anguish-riddled soliloquy. But you knew that, didn’t you, being a literary lot!

Anyway, I love the concept of luck and how it plays such a significant role in our lives. Remember the movie, Sliding Doors in which Gwyneth Paltrow’s character either enters the lift, or doesn’t? If she’s lucky, she gets the guy.

As John Krumboltz, Professor of Education and Psychology, at Stanford University, says in his book, Luck is no Accident: Making the Most of Happenstance in your Life and Career,  “a chance meeting, a broken appointment…these are the kind of experiences – happenstances – that lead to unexpected life directions and career choices” (Krumboltz 2010).

Luck happens and can be both good and bad. Luck changes fortunes. MP Andrew Leigh refers to the “shafts of fate” that can hit any of us and that these can give people second chances. But it is by being, to coin a phrase from Jim Bright’s Chaos Theory of Careers, “Luck ready”, or open to the possibility of change, that brings opportunity.

Something happening out of the blue, unplanned and even shocking, can turn us on our heels and make us think seriously, sometimes for the first time, about how we are living our lives. So on Wednesday when I was having a spot of acupuncture (or should that be a sting of…?) I listened with fascination to my therapist (I’ll call her A) as she related a pivotal moment in her life, that led to a complete career change. Her story relates to her brother, who on September 11 2001, was meant to be at work in the World Trade Centre, but he had stayed home instead, to take care of his sick child. Had his wife not said to him that it was his turn to take the day off, so that she didn’t miss work, he would almost certainly been killed.

The serendipity, or fortunate happenstance, of this event was a sweet comfort for A because she did in fact loose 2 friends to the tragedy. The events of 9/11 for A, were such that, having spent years living and working in New York, in a high pressure corporate role, she decided to step off the treadmill and reconsider her path. Today A runs her own very successful business in holistic wellness, from her beautiful home that she shares with her darling dog, in Bayside, Victoria.

If a chance occurrence; be it outplacement, an injury, a lottery win or a random event, has sent you into a bit of a spin, I can work with you to help you to unearth a new direction, to allow you to feel “luck ready”.

I will listen to your life narrative and can assist you in finding the training or connections you need to follow your dream.

Luck happens, and what happens next depends on what you do with it.

Contact me now at [email protected] for an obligation free chat.