Luck Happens When Preparation meets Opportunity.

Being in the right place at the right time is more intentional than you think.

Image Credit: Stux at Pixabay

The mysterious concept of luck has always intrigued me.

It is mysterious because the general idea about luck is that it happens to change your life in an instant, and it is considered as something that just happens. Whether it is good or bad does not matter.

A person winning the lottery or big cash out at the casino is all considered as having luck on their side. Finally getting that date with that hot person too.

However, when you do think of it, they got lucky because they made themselves available to that possibility.

As I write this, I am reminded of a story that has stuck with me and one that I read over and over again, about a crocodile and an alligator who shared a river.

The crocodile was just laying there, doing nothing whereas the alligator was putting in all effort possible to hunt.

Any time any small game came about to grab a sip of water, the alligator would leap out with most of its energy and grab it.

Arrogantly, the alligator said to the crocodile, you are going to die hungry if you just keep laying there.

The crocodile said nothing.

This went on for a bit, the alligator kept hunting because he kept getting hungry after eating anything that he could get his hands on.

The crocodile just laid there, with its eyes shut.

The alligator went at it again, this time it was a rabbit, however, as it leaped to catch the rabbit, a large deer came up to the river.

In one swift move, the crocodile leaped and caught on to the deer.

The alligator told the crocodile, “You Got Lucky”.

I did alter this story a bit to put it in context, but the crocodile got lucky because he wasn’t going after everything that came his way and was available to hunt the deer with all its might and energy when the opportunity presented itself.

I obviously am not advocating buying lottery tickets and gambling away your cash to win, or doing nothing and waiting for the opportunity to come by.

What I am saying is that luck is the result of concerted efforts being put in a particular direction.

When we put in efforts, small or big, towards any specific goal, we increase the probability of that happening for us and us being available to receive the fruits of that effort.

At different phases in my life, I have behaved as the alligator in the story and learned the hard way, that efforts tend to get wasted when we go after every opportunity that presents itself, because, we end up in a situation where we find ourselves unavailable to grab on to the right opportunity when it comes your way.

Luck is a mathematical calculation where you increase the probability of getting lucky if you play the game and play it right.

I may have used the wrong examples above, I don’t know if I did, but I could not think of any better ones to put my point forth.

We can all get lucky with whatever we are looking for, we just need to increase our chances, and the only way to do that is to keep our eye on the ball and stay in the game.

I know I did, ever since I started treating my time as mine, I have been able to start my agency Ting Tong Marketing, which I launched in 2020 when the pandemic struck and events (I used to run an event agency before) were out of the question and 2 years later launched Brandybuck, a product sampling and brand discovery platform, which has now been operational for 60 days.

I was able to do so because I did not go after everything coming my way. For a person in as desperate a situation as myself, my normal instinct would have been to do whatever was needed, whether it was virtual events or whether it was getting 100 Instagram posts made for like 100 USD or 10000 bucks.

But I didn’t.

And here is how it stands today

Brandybuck has 18 Brand Partners sampling with us and more are being added every week.

We have sent out more than 2000 samples.

We have delivered a minimum of 50 new users to our brand partners each month.

We have delivered genuine product ratings and reviews which are a reference point for other look-alike users looking for the same thing.

We have delivered on-ground exposure through carnivals and given these brands added visibility on social media through our influencer marketing campaigns.

And here is the best part, we are just getting started.

With Ting Tong, our projects have gotten bigger thanks to the reputation we built and we have started doing events again.

I saw an opportunity within the D2C space and started figuring out what I needed to do to exploit that opportunity and voila, I was in the right market at the right time.

That is how I got lucky, a long way to go still, but I believe I have been tremendously lucky with what I have been able to start.

It is true, Luck is indeed when preparation meets opportunity.

Do you have a story to share? I would love to hear what it is.

You might just end up being in the Right Place at the Right Time.