Hard work creates our own luck

?I wonder what it?s like to be the rainmaker. Wonder what it?s like to know that I made the rain.? ?Matchbox 20

?If something isn?t working for you, it isn?t friggin? luck. It?s you needing to do more.?

This is according to C. Hope Clark, a writing coach/blogger/novelist from South Carolina. She is excellent at writing editorials in her newsletters that leave me feeling much less productive than I know I should be, which is a good thing because in the end, it?s motivating.

Her newest feature was titled ?Luck.? A gift just for me, I have to say, because honestly I?ve been in a slump and getting pretty tired of feeling sorry for myself. Opening that newsletter was the kick in the butt I needed.

Who else has days when you feel like a cross between a trapped animal and a narcissist? Weird combination. But as a mentor of mine once said, continually doubting yourself is like a kick in the gut to God. Failing?or not?has nothing to do with it. It?s just a form of narcissism.

We all do it. Find ourselves in moments when we feel so low, when we?re sure that no matter what step we take, it?ll be the wrong one. No matter what decision we make, it will backfire. So we do nothing and wait. Wait for what? I don?t know. Luck?

It reminds me of a conversation at a recent staff meeting about a problem at our county?s reservoir: blue-green algae. If there is no rain and the water is stagnant, the algae can grow. But if enough rain falls and there is movement of some kind in the water, it doesn?t have the conditions that encourage it to build up.

Stagnant = bad. Movement = good.

In ?Luck,? Clark referenced J.K. Rowling, author of the super-selling Harry Potter book series. An aspiring writer told Clark he wished he had Rowling?s luck in his writing career. This would mean having the good luck of being a single mother on welfare, depressed, struggling to keep a roof over her daughter?s head, and then having her dream manuscript rejected twelve times.

Luckily, fate took pity on her and landed her a contract that made her one of the top 10 best selling authors of all time. In the end, she wrote for 17 years to finish the entire series. Yep, she lucked her way right into that history book.

What she did was serve as her own rainmaker. It only appears easy from the outside looking in.

I don?t always see the concept of hard work through, but I appreciate it. For the times I get tired and find more satisfaction in curling up into a ball, there are people like C. Hope Clark moving her fingers on her keyboard, laying it on the line for the slacker in me.

Everybody needs a stand-in rainmaker during the droughts.

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