Bad Luck Is An Excuse, And Good Luck Can Be Created

“The less you understand about the way something is done or achieved, the more you think it happens by fate or magic.”

Why do others seem to do well while it’s so difficult for you? Why does life seem so easy for someone else while you struggle for everything you’ve got? Were you somehow destined to suffer while they were intended for success? Is it magic? Do successful people know some magical secret that they’re hiding from you?

If the answer were obvious, then we wouldn’t wonder about why we struggle with simple things like losing weight, being healthy, making more money, having a great relationship, or getting a job we like. It’s not that you wonder why you’re not a multi-millionaire while someone else is. You just can’t figure out the secret to living a happy life where you get to have all you need and you’re not stressed out all the time. It appears to be so easy for others but not for you.

Do You Believe in Fate?

When we don’t understand what’s required to achieve things, we can come up with fantastical reasons why others live and experience what we want. Maybe it’s fate or destiny. We think others are destined to succeed while we are destined to struggle.

Or maybe you believe that “life just has it in for you.” After all, your life is just one long story of struggle and pain, and no one in your family lived any differently. After a while, you start believing that when it comes to a happy life, “it just wasn’t meant to be.”

Meant to be? By whom? Life? The universe? God? Who determines what’s “meant to be” in your life? And if there is a destiny for your life, are you suggesting that there’s no way you can escape that fate? That no matter what you do, or how hard you work, you’re always going to struggle?

The Incredible Power of Belief

What I just described is the power of belief, and unless you change it, your life is going to end up fulfilling your own prophecy of failure. You predicted failure, and that’s what you got. And when failure happens, you say, “See, I told you so.”

Well, let me be the first one to tell you that that’s bullshit. Let me be the one to inform you that you determine most of the outcomes of your life, and that begins with your false beliefs about how life works. There is no fate. There is no destiny. There are only beliefs, decisions, and actions that create success, well-being, failure, or struggle.

Therefore, nothing will change in your life until your beliefs change, and the first belief to change is that of fate vs. determination.

Fate vs. Determination

You have one of two beliefs about you and life. You either believe in fate or destiny, or you believe in determination. If you believe in fate, you’ll work very hard to improve your life, but the whole time you’re striving to better your life, you still believe the universe is against you, and that things will never turn out as you want. Here’s the definition of fate:

Fate is “the development of events beyond a person’s control, regarded as determined by a supernatural power.”

Don’t you think this sort of belief system will work against you? Of course, it will. And what’s so insidious about it is that it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy, so with every failure you experience, you believe in fate even more. That’s a vicious cycle!

The opposite of fate is determination.

Determination is “the process of establishing something exactly by calculation and research. It means controlling or deciding the outcome of something.”

The real difference between the person who succeeds, and the person who struggles, is their belief regarding life. The successful person believes they determine the outcome of their lives while the person who struggles believes they are destined to fail.

Determination Means Creating Your Own Outcomes

Now, we have to differentiate the fact that some people are born into desperate circumstances. For example, they might have several illnesses or handicaps. They lived in extreme poverty. They might have a mental illness or a psychological struggle. Regardless, a determination to win can overcome all these issues in one way or another.

For example, my girlfriend has battled Lupus all her life, and Lupus is an evil disease in which the body attacks itself. Many people living with Lupus die early, and to date, there is no cure. However, a few years ago, she adopted the Ketogenic Diet (no sugar, low carb, high fats) and was recently informed by her doctor that her Lupus was in remission.

She has other illnesses—serious ones—but with determination, she overcame one of the more deadly ones by relentless research, testing, application, and revising her nutrition. She used to struggle with sleeping, and now she sleeps fine taking bone broth each day before she goes to bed. She is an example of determination. She’s creating outcomes despite her long history of struggle.

When Your Hatred for Where You Are Exceeds Your Fear of Work

Do you think it’s fate that electricity works 100% of the time? Do you think it’s fate that the laws of mathematics are always correct? Or do you believe that one day you’ll wake up and somehow 2 + 2 is going to equal 5? Do you worry that one day the sun will disappear? Of course not.

You see, you live in a world that is governed by laws and principles, and those laws and principles are so sure that we created a whole civilization based on them. I can assure you that we wouldn’t wire our houses with dangerous electricity if electricity only worked 75% of the time, and there was always a 25% chance it would blow your home up!

Therefore, no fate awaits you, and there is no destiny from which you cannot escape. All you really have is an ignorance of the laws and principles that govern success, achievement, or personal transformation and a lack of applying them. And until your hatred for the struggles you face exceeds your fear of the work involved to change them, you’re going to remain right where you are.