Get In the Game

Feels like nothing good ever happens to you? Why is it that “everyone else” gets a part of the good side of life but you? They’re just living their lives like everyone else and still good opportunities or cheerful events just seem to pop out of nowhere and gently blow fair wind in their sails. Things like that never seem to happen to you and thus you sulk over being the one that constantly happens to pick the shorter straw.

Stop it right there!

Take a look at these people that end up in these seemingly beneficial situations more often than others. What type of person are we talking about here? It has little to do with luck. Of course, there is such a thing as the right person at the right place on the right moment, but even then it is about catching that moment and making it one’s own.

Life is a gamble. There’s always a risk included in gambling. You can proceed in many different ways. You can read up, study the game, take recommendations from others and search for the safest way to win. You might not end up winning every time or end up as the most successful player out there, but at least you have a good chance of winning. Or you can be cautious, you don’t bet much, which of course means you won't win much when you do, but on the other hand, you won’t lose much. You’ll never get rich: you’ll never leave broke. Finally, we have the mad-mans way – no strategy, no fear of losing, betting high; being unpredictable and fearless opens up for extreme turns, for both good and bad. Going down that road will most likely make you either very rich, very quickly or make you lose everything in the blink of an eye.

There is of course an endless way of doing things, but you’ll never get away from the fact that there’s a certain risk involved in everything you do. You must know when to bet high and when to withdraw to gain the most out of your life. It’s a combination of being there when it happens, skill and the ability of calculating the risk involved to see if it is worth the potential back-fire a negative outcome brings. In addition to the latter comes another aspect of it all -- accepting the times you end up with nothing and the will to get back in the race. Being a terrible loser will hinder you from winning in the future. Nobody likes a bad loser and you’ll lessen your chances being invited to play again. We learn as we go and every time you lose, you win something else: Experience and knowledge which will help you in the future. Of course, that presupposes you don’t waste it on being grumpy. Quite often you need to expend merely half the energy that you use railing against your bad luck to achieve your actual goal.

If Michael Jordan couldn’t take missing a shot, he’d never even play basket ball to begin with.

I guess all I’m trying to say is this: Give the chance a chance!

Ps. I will not be held responsible if you go out and gamble all your money away in some casino after reading this. If you do, you missed the point. ;]

-Kaffe Myers for the March issue of Trend Magazine, 2008