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  • From: Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com>
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] Luck does not exist
  • Date: Wed, 22 Nov 2006 12:31:52 -0600


Do you not believe in chance?

I use "chance" as in a chance happening, something unexpected, unpredictable and presumably uninfluenced by human behavior.

The fully alive person expects chance to appear from time to time. If it is a desired chance and one has prepared for it, then it is opportunity taken; if one is not prepared then it is opportunity lost. If the chance happening is considered negative, the same preparedness condition will determine the outcome.

Tornadoes are acts of Nature as are all factors of weather including floods, droughts, hurricanes, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and tsunamis. All of these are known to occur from time to time in certain places so they are predictable and therefore not chance happenings. It is unreasonable to live in Tornado Alley and to be surprised by a funnel-shaped cloud containing high-speed winds whirling like an atomic dervish. If a tornado flattens your neighbor's house but not yours it may be that yours was properly built for predictable high winds but your neighbor's house was not. A tornado today may touch down five miles away; next year one may touch your house. The fully alive person will be neither surprised nor unprepared.

You ponder the place of birth. Take it further and ponder the choice of parents. The Soul's Code, by James Hillman, posits that our soul/guardian angel/daimon chooses our parents for its own selfish purposes. A provocative theory that changed how I muse on life. I put factors of birth into my bucket of Interesting Stuff Not Presently Known. I am comfortable with that bucket. The sovereign thrill of life allows us each to choose our answers to these things. Some choose spiritual or religious answers. Others of us choose to merrily focus on what is known, have a beer and await further developments.






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