BLUE TO YELLOW

I recently read a blog (Advice Fortune Cookie) where a reader asked of the blog writer, a 'wise fortune cookie', how do they win the lottery, find the perfect life partner, land that dream job? How can they increase the chances of these things happening? Why don't all these things 'come' to them? Especially when they purchase copious amounts of lottery tickets, go to all the places where the singles are and read all the wanted ads. 

The 'wise fortune cookie' responded to the enquirer that the dilemma that they faced was not one of luck but was in fact based in science. The reason why the enquirer felt that the lottery, a perfect match and the dream job eluded them was due to probability and that basically life is a numbers games. It is the size of the odds, in the scheme of things, that has the greatest impact on whether these things happen or not . 

I'm not going to write about probability. The author of Advice Fortune Cookie does a far better job of explaining probability (I recommend you read Money and love and landing that job: The role probability plays throughout our lives) than I ever could. But what I liked about this blog was the wonderful descriptive analogy used to explain why things don't happen just the way we want them too. Why sometimes no matter how many lottery tickets you buy, how many people you date, how many jobs you apply for, sometimes it feels like the odds are against you.

In the blog the reader is asked to compare life to a giant ball pit full of balls of two colours, blue and yellow. In order to get what you wanted from life; money, love, job, you merely need to dip your hand into the ball pit and pull out a ball. The trick, however, is to pull out the right colour ball. The problem, especially in the case of winning the lottery, is that the chances of picking the right colour ball is greatly reduced simply because of the sheer numbers of the wrong colour ball. Or to put it more simply, in order to became rich from winning the lottery you need to find the one yellow ball buried in a sea of millions and millions and millions of blue ones.

That's life. It's not easy to grab that one yellow ball amidst the sea of blue ones. Sometimes we get lucky and the odds come up really good but more often than not we are faced with a sea of blue. 

Which brings me to why I am writing this. Not that long ago I faced my own sea of blue. I was lucky enough to be short listed for the role of Creative Consultant on a Landscape Project. I won’t bore you with the details, but I have to say I was surprised when I got the call to advise me that I had been short listed. The project was interstate and I thought my chances where, at best, a long shot. Although I did work really hard on my proposal, and I suppose in doing so reduced the odds somewhat. In fact I had reduced the odds to the point where there were only three balls in the ball pit and I only had to pick out the one I needed. The yellow one. But even when there is only three balls the odds are still three to one and after all my effort I still ended up with a blue one.

Yes, I was disappointed that I had missed out on getting the yellow ball. It was frustrating knowing that it was right there, staring me in the face. I had done a lot of work and had jumped on a plane and flown interstate to get it. But someone else was better, closer, had a greater chance at snatching it out of the pit. And snatch it they did, at the last moment, out of from under my hand just as I was reaching for it.

As I flew home I reflected on being so close to having the prized yellow ball. But rather than dwell on the fact that someone else now had it I decided to have a look at what I had been left with, the wrong coloured ball. I began to think "what if I can make this ball different, it's still a ball, it's still round, it just isn't yellow. What if I can make this ball yellow? How can I make this ball yellow?" And before I had even got off the plane I had forgotten that I had missed out of this job and was well into planning the next and all the others that would come after. Instead of worrying about the yellow ball that had got away, I was now focused getting the next one. I just have to get that yellow ball.

Probability, the odds, the numbers game, they can often feel like they are stacked against you. But changing your perception of a situation is a powerful thing. I had a one in three chance of a yellow ball. I got so close to this one that I got to see it, understand it, examine it but it was not to be. Instead I got something else, a different colour, the same shape, but still a ball. I figure though, now I know what that yellow ball looks like I have a better idea of how to get it. It shouldn't take too much to change the colour. To increase the odds of getting a yellow one next time.