Lucky at cards, lucky in love. Wait a minute, we learned that sentence differently, right? I don’t care. I like the belief in double luck much better than winning something and thereby automatically losing in another area.
Speaking of double luck: Anke and I were at the wonderful Kesselfestival two weeks ago, which our friend Christian organizes every year. “Hey, good morning,” I hear and turn around. There stands a nice young man with an iPad, grinning at us. “Do you smoke e-cigarettes?” While Anke nods, I shake my head slightly annoyed. “If you register, you can win something at our booth. The main prize is JBL speakers.” Aha, why didn’t you say so right away… of course, I smoke too… The Swabian in me comes out immediately, and suddenly I officially smoke (for their database) too. With a round token in our possession, we head to the wheel of fortune, which is only 10 meters away from us. Three fields say, “main prize” and many others say nothing. “I’m going to win the speakers,” I tell myself, spin… and… black field. Oh great. Consolation prize. A lanyard. Anke goes to the wheel of fortune, spins, and the little flipper lands on one of the main prizes. Jackpot. We have new speakers.
A little later, I see a couple with blue baseball caps. “Optimist” and “Optimistin” are embroidered on the front. Since I’m busy, I whisper to Anke: “Ask them where they got the caps from…” Said and done. “From the alwa mineral water stand,” they said. So, we head to alwa during the next break. Same game. Wheel of fortune. Since we don’t have much time, I walk purposefully towards the alwa’s wheel-of-fortune-Peter-Bond, who is just walking behind the tent, and explain to him that we are basically Kesselfestival colleagues and what is necessary to get one of the caps each. “Well, come with me.” He walks back to the wheel of fortune. Ten people are already waiting for their turn. “Excuse me, madam, we need to let these two go ahead for a moment,” he says to the lady at the front. Anke spins… main prize. She gets her cap. I spin… blank. I spin again… blank. Damn… The woman behind me feels sorry and secretly spins the wheel one field further to the main prize. “No, no, no. That’s not how it works,” says the alwa-Peter-Bond. Oh Jesus Christ. This is going to be fun. I spin a third time… blank. He shakes his head and waves me to a sample stand for alwa drinks. “What is your favorite color?” I look at the bottles, thinking I can now try something. “Still water.” “No, not the drink. The color.” Now I see that the bottles have different cap colors. However, I see no still water. So, I choose medium water with the green cap. “Green.” He raises his arms. “Yes… that’s correct. You won…” he shouts joyfully. He grins and hands me the cap.
When I tell the story to our Caribbean rebels on the following Monday, Anke adds something important: “You know; Norman wanted to win. I just wanted to spin the wheel of fortune.” And in that moment, it becomes clear to me why Anke won both games and I gained experience. I approached it with a sense of lack because I didn’t have the main prize yet. Spinning the wheel was only a means to an end to get to the prize. This means – lack in = lack out. Anke spun because she had a childlike joy in spinning. And in the end, the result didn’t matter to her. It was all about the spinning at that moment. For me, it wasn’t about the spinning but about winning, which is only the consequence of the “right” spinning. And what you give in is what you will get out.
Did I learn something from this? Definitely. Namely, to pay even more attention to making sure that what I do NOW, I do only because I want to do it now. And not because it is a means to an end and annoys me because I actually want something completely different. Just like in sales, where the order is often more important than the conversation with the customer, for example. A nice saying that I heard years ago fits this: “The customer is the center of attention… and thus in everyone’s way.” Well, if you see it that way and only use the customer to achieve your goals, it will energetically bite you in the ass. Be nice to the customer and enjoy the journey. Forget the order and be fully present with your counterpart. Then look forward to even better results. That’s why I love double luck. Lucky at cards, lucky in love.
All the best and have a wonderful week,
