... to feel my luck is rare?

[kokamid]

At a recent family gathering, something struck me I hadn't really thought of before. There were many relatives I hadn't seen for a really long time, and so we were catching up on each others' lives, outcomes, children etc.

What struck me was how lucky I seem to have been. Literally no-one else at this gathering had managed to avoid bad luck of some kind: ill-health, children with various ailments, psychological difficulties, relationship breakdown, etc., etc. Everyone had had some kind of misfortune to overcome, either themselves or with children or partners.

Of course many - most, indeed - had overcome their various misfortunes. (Some, sadly, hadn't.)

-- And, when I thought about it, the same seems to be true also of all my friends, acquaintances, neighbours: most of them live fine, happy lives; but literally none has avoided some kind of more-or-less severe misfortune, unhappiness, of one kind or another ...

... Except me. I have been married - once, and for a long time - to someone I still love. We are both in good health in our late seventies and live active, fulfilling lives. I once broke a bone, but have never spent a night in hospital, anywhere, ever (childbirth excepted). We are financially well-off, even though neither of us inherited a penny from our parents or anywhere else. We travelled the world together doing socially useful jobs we enjoyed thoroughly until we retired. Now we live in a comfortable home in a really nice place.

Our children are happy and successful, well-educated with loving partners and beautiful successful happy children themselves. They are all decent, socially and morally aware people. We see our children and grandchildren regularly (though they don't live close), spend time together and get on really well; we love them; they love us.

Yes things can go wrong at any time, of course I'm aware. But thinking over all my friends and relatives and their lives, it did seem - does seem - it's very rare to have lived such a good life as I have.

I'm fairly sure I've done nothing to deserve it ... it just feels I've been super lucky. Or - here's my question - is it really so rare: has everyone else in my extended family and friendship group just been unusually unlucky?

AIBU to feel I won life's lottery? Or are there lots of people out there with similarly lovely lives I just don't hear or read about?

.....some people do have more luck but it's also due to attitude. Eg...if you had a 4 legged chair and you break a leg off but you make a unique 3 legged chair that everyone admires rather than throw it away. Not sure I'm saying that right but it's making the best of the bad things that happen if you can.

I like this take a lot! Has anybody got any cheat codes for next time round because my current game is set to Expert and I'm not a fan :)

If you had one chair break and became 3 legged, that's great! But for some people, from the day they're born, every chair has 3 legs. Every chair breaks. It stops being unique and quirky if it's all the damn time and you just want to sit down.

Sadly not. I'll let you know when I find them. I was on profession mode until a few years ago (22 house rental moves, job loses, cancer and tbh everything else that can go wrong) and its on easy at the moment with occasional swing towards expert.....I'll let you know cheat when when I find it...

It's so hard to measure luck though. And while I think it's important to be grateful and recognise your 'luck' I would be wary of sharing this kind of opinion with those friends who you perceive to be less lucky.

I would be one of those 'unlucky' people you know, as my dad was diagnosed with a terminal illness when I was in my 20s and he died young. If my friends described me as unlucky or 'less lucky' than them because of this though they would only be seeing half the picture. We were unlucky that he developed a rare illness but I won the lottery in having my dad as my father. And him and my mam were the luckiest people I know to have had each other, even though they had 20+ years less than expected. He was a wonderful father and partner.

My friends may have their dads for 20 years longer but for a lot of them are simply 'ok' and do the bare minimum or frankly many are pretty rubbish fathers. And the same goes for them as partners.

So they may not have had an obvious tragedy in their life but I don't consider them to be luckier than me despite my loss.

Many of your friends may feel the same.

It sounds to me like you have had luck on your side but along with a positive mental attitude - which makes you feel lucky. Presumably you have lost loved ones along the way? Parents? Surely sad things have happened in your life at some point that have had an affect on you?

The light in me honours the light in you.

I'm not sure you can call it a "normal" life. Many families experience , accidents, either severe physical or mental illness, job loss, divorce, things going badly for their children, rows and fractures, become victim of crime or prejudice.
It's not necessarily average to have a good marriage, good health and no financial worries. Just read some of the posts on here. Bad luck can be random. Adverse experiences can sometimes lead to empathy and personal growth-it depends just how shit they are.
Most people also have fun and good times but some are extraordinarily unlucky and some have a largely happy life.

Yes, you're lucky. Enjoy it. And a lot of it is basically just random good fortune and nothing wrong with that. It's good to acknowledge it. Much better than than thinking that you have does something special to deserve it. But also think that good/bad fortune can happen to anyone at any time. You'll be going along perfectly happily than BAM! something happens out of the blue. There's no such thing as a naturally lucky/unlucky person.

I think I've been pretty lucky on the whole. I have a good life. But I don't think I'd qualify for your "rare luck" category as my mother died from cancer at 66 (having been a very young, health lucky 65 year old) and my father followed at 70. So that wasn't so great compared to average life expectancy, but you win some you lose some!

It's good to read your op.

I think you're right in thinking you've been lucky to avoid tragedy or serious hardship. At the same time, you've probably been the architect of this more than you've been aware. And stability builds on stability.

You are in a position to share a hopeful outlook on life and to share someone else's burdens for a little while without depleting yourself. You probably do already but perhaps you could share your good fortune by offering empathy and comfort to others who are lonely or struggling.

It’s great that you recognise your good fortune OP. I think a previous poster had it right though in terms of thinking about the ways you interpret good luck. For example when we watch a film we are often more interested in the character that experiences adversity. We want to see their highs & lows & experience the depths of human emotion. I know my experiences of adversity have helped me connect to others. So while I don’t consider myself to have been lucky in the conventional sense (I currently have advanced cancer) I do feel I have had an interesting & varied life & I have met some wonderful people with a range of different perspectives on the world.

I'd say I've been lucky too. I don't think anyone can avoid normal life events like dealing with an ill or dying parent but if it's just your immediate family you're talking about then yes, I am still expecting at some point that I will experience a real tragedy that will floor me and end life as I know it. A couple of things that have happened to people I know recently have shocked me. It can happy to any of us at any time. So yes, while we can be lucky that they haven't happened to us yet, you can never assume it won't happen to you.

This is an interesting one. I am early 40’s and every day I consider myself incredibly lucky. Two beautiful healthy girls, strong relationship, lots of friends, plenty of money, always manages to find a job I enjoy, good health. In fact I often think I don’t want to jinx it! However, I also lost my mum at a young age, brother with serious mental health issues..miscarriages between 1st and 2nd child. So maybe I have had my share of bad luck. I don’t feel unlucky though, just lucky! I also look at family members and friends and if I’m honest 50% of bad luck is pure chance, and 50% is bad or unwise decisions. Close family members are going through a period of bad luck at the moment but if I’m honest it’s been exacerbated by poor decisions in terms of finances and where they are living, unwillingness to take onboard advice etc. I don’t know what I’m saying really…maybe luck is how you interpret things, and also you can ‘make your own luck’ or vice versa

I've been very lucky too, although I'm mid 40s so not made it as far as you!
I have had some periods of bad luck (miscarriage, eviction, depression, pnd) but all have worked out fine in the end and the main parts of life have (so far) worked out brilliantly.

I disagree with pps who said that you should watch out, your time will come etc. yes, your luck might change but there's no point stressing about some indefinable bad thing that might happen! Enjoy the good times!

Luck is a funny thing - I'm a peripheral (these days) part of a mostly online group of mums who met on a now defunct website when we were all getting married around 17 years ago and I sometimes think the group has been unusually unfortunate.

There's only a few dozen of us, but two of the group have tragically died of cancer when they still had very young children - it was heartbreaking. One woman's husband died a few years ago (albeit they were separated by then), one woman's husband experienced a traumatic brain injury when their child was still tiny and was left quite disabled and with his whole personality changed. She left the group, so really hope they are all doing well now.

One of the original group had her fiance call off the wedding 6 weeks beforehand and to add insult to injury, he was expecting a child with another woman less than a year later. I do hope she is OK and found happiness.

So I've been relatively lucky. We've definitely had some hard times, we're having a hard time now with DH and jobs, and we are not a bump-free blissful partnership, but overall we have been very lucky.

Universe listens you know OP. Never say it out loud.

I'm properly unlucky. Husband didn't believe me for years. Now he does especially around electricals. They hate me with passions I think.

If it's going to fuck up, it'll happen to me. You have to laugh though.

It's great that you're lucky, or a combination of luck and choices I'm sure. I do wish you well and hope it continues.

Just don't judge others who haven't been quite so fortunate is all I would say. And do realise that sometimes for those less fortunate it's better if you don't go on extensively about your luck, family, financial security etc

I say that as it often seems to me that other people have these perfect lives/families and TBH it makes me feel crap about my life sometimes even though I'm trying my best.

I think everyone takes a turn at misfortune, grief and bad luck. Things can change in an instant. It's good to recognize and notice when things are going well and feel blessed and appreciative in that moment.

My grandparents were like this. Lived to mid-80's with no big health issues until the very last year of their lives, very wealthy (my grandmother was a self-made millionaire), healthy children and grandchildren, all well-educated and settled with families. They have been together since school and married for 67 years very happily.

They died within less than a year of each other very suddenly because one couldn't live without the other.

If you don't believe in luck, what do you think is the reason why some people are born into wealthy (by global standards) lives in the developed world, while others are born into famine or war situations? Or people born into abusive familes vs loving ones. Do you think that's karma, or that it's for a reason?

Fucked up if so.

It's interesting that you differentiate between 'luck' and 'random', as to me they are essentially they are the same thing.

Random events happen - they can be positive (good luck), negative (bad luck), or neutral. Some things have a definable cause, but many do not and are entirely beyond our control. It's just a question of random luck as to what events happen to us during our life.

Even our ability to respond to those events is significantly impacted by our prior life and experiences, and can therefore be seen as random/beyond our control to a certain extent. (E.g. someone who has experienced a lifetime of abuse and rejection is not going to be as resilient as someone from a supportive home.)

The same event can also be viewed differently depending on circumstances. E.g. everybody expects to lose their parents, so a parent dying after living a normal-length life is not bad luck - it's just the natural way of things. But a parent dying young would be different.

Far from a flaming - I think this is a lovely post because the OP genuinely appreciates her life and sounds actually quite humble and a little bemused by her good fortune.

I would simply say that it's almost certainly because OP is a decent human being who appears to care about others - not just her immediate family - in the type of work she chose . .. and the universe is repaying her . (I sound a bit Woo - but honestly I'm a stony hearted investigator in organised crime - so not usually given to hearts and flowers !)

Yes it's a very sweet post! Hope OP continues to have a lovely life.

I'm glad you find this post uplifting but the last bit is what people are going on about.
There's no correlation between good/bad fortune and actions. In fact, most people in real 'socially useful' jobs suffer from ill health at a higher rate than the rest of the population, early, as it's very physical work.

Maybe you're just so burnt out from your criminal investigator day job and want to believe that one day, the universe will reward you too?

I wish it worked like that. Sadly, it doesn't. It's not the good but those who take, take, take that get ahead.

It sounds like life has been very kind to you and long may this continue.