Luck and the Shooter's Bounce

Ever know those people? You know, THOSE people. The ones who seem to get all the breaks, the people for whom Lady Luck seems to have a soft spot in her fickle heart? Seemingly, they waltz through life, carelessly exploring exciting professional opportunity after another, dating one incredibly beautiful, intelligent, and caring person after another, having amazing kids with few problems of any consequence, and connecting with outstanding people in all walks of life, left and right.

It got me to thinking, and thinking about basketball of all things. Considering those people, who get all the bounces, if you will, and how the effect of a 'shooter's bounce' works.

In basketball, if there are those unfamiliar with the sport, the idea is to throw (shoot) the ball through an iron ring from which a net is suspended (the hoop) in order to score points. This can be a modestly challenging endeavor, particularly when similarly or greater vertically-blessed individuals are striving to keep one from accomplishing the aforementioned goal. (Pedantic? Yes. Fun to write? Definitely.)

A shooter's bounce is what players refer to the ball bouncing around the rim, or taking what appears to be an unlikely bounce, only to softly fall in. Spectators and neophyte players often call such shots "lucky," but in truth they are the result of a player taking a shot that he or she has worked on, repeatedly in practice and battle tested in heated games, a shot in which the player has so much confidence, and such innate and acute awareness that he or she knows just how much pressure to apply to his or her fingertips so that even if they are slightly off the mark, the ball will still fall.

This same principle applies in life. The good things happen to the people who have the diligence to work on those things in which they believe passionately, the tools, skills and talents that kept them sane through their most brutal conflicts, and the confidence that they have "put in the work" and paid the necessary price to perform, even when all around them crumbles like pillars of sand in heavy tides.

And while no life goes unmarred, nor is devoid of toil and hardship, those people, the "Golden Children" in the family escape unscathed because of their faith in themselves and their efforts to be prepared, awake, aware, and alert.Mayhap luck is happenstance, but I believe it far more often earned.