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0 pointstert45ty54wy7y ago0 comments

I have to read your essay in more detail. I see a lot i disagree with. But if the gist of what your saying is is "ignoring luck will help you persevere" I can see the logic.

However, I'm not advocating a cynical mindset. I'm advocating a compassionate one, and a realistic one. If you don't think luck matters, you can delude yourself into thinking the people below you didn't work hard enough, or that you must be especially talented and driven to have gotten where you are.

I've also seen people hurt themselves with that mindset. The guy who risks everything on some business venture that's doomed to fail, yet he thinks he can beat the odds because he's smarter or more hard-working.

How about having an absurdist approach towards luck. "I'm probably going to fail, and I'm going to do it anyway." It's honest, it's compassionate, and it doesn't discourage you from trying the impossible. That's how I think, and it's worked well for me.

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mercer7y ago

I think the distinction between how you see yourself and how you see others is particularly important, and I find that it's often conflated when I have arguments about things like poverty.

Attributing things too much to luck in your own endeavours might lead to learned helplessness, among other things. Whereas assuming that the bum on the streets quite possibly got into his predicament because of bad luck seems like a safer and more compassionate assumption to make.

But factually speaking, I'd say much more than we'd like to admit is out of our control, which is one of the reasons why I am in favor of societies with strong safety nets and hefty base-line of compassion.

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