So, today morning started very interestingly: first I damaged my shoe to the sharp edge of a foot of a table. Then I spilled coffee all over a coffeeshop floor (embarrassing) and then my computer crashed while I was writing a blog post resulting in losing a lot of paragraphs I had written. In addition to these, I had a few other mishaps as well.

Sometimes things like these happen to us - where we feel as if the Universe is against us. We start complaining and can’t but help to get mad and think thoughts like: “Why is this happening to me?”

But in reality, it’s not about us at all. We take it too personally. E.g., if someone cuts us off while we’re driving. We want to honk the horn and teach that person “a lesson.” We think that by letting him know that he did wrong, we get justice. However, all it does is just annoy the other driver. It doesn’t teach them a “lesson” at all.

The world does not revolve around us. The Universe doesn’t give the slightest fuck of us. Things just happen as they happen. Sometimes a lot of good things happen to us, sometimes a lot of “bad” things happen — nothing to take personally.

But we want to make ourselves so important as if things happen for “us” or because of “us.” It’s not about us at all. These kinds of things happen to everyone all the time.

Of course, that doesn’t mean we can’t control the general direction of our lives. While some random things we can’t control, we can control a lot.

Someone has said that luck = preparation + opportunity.

This means that the longer and harder we work towards something or the more effort we put in something, the more chances we have to achieve it.

Opportunities don’t grow on trees, but the longer we stick around (doing the work), the more chances we have of catching one.

Like the famous photographers who have captured amazing moments - it’s not because they were “lucky,” it’s because they did a lot of photos all the time, so after every once in a while a good opportunity presented itself to them.

The main point is that we are where we are in our life for a reason. Everything has a cause and an effect. Nothing happens out of pure randomness - there’s a cause in every effect. It’s the law of the Universe.

The coffee I spilled’ wasn’t a random event. The mug was slightly too full, and I was slightly careless. There’s a clear cause in the effect.

Even rolling a dice is not random. The force we use to throw the dice, the angle of our hand, the texture of the table, etc. determines the result.

So, some things we can’t control, but a lot we can. We need to make a distinction between the things we can’t control and not focus on them. Instead, we should focus on what we can do.

KRISTJAN