The Win Wasn’t the Moment

I have always talked and written about celebrating the wins. I keep a gratitude journal and write down three wins every day. Three things I’m grateful for.

Some days the list is much longer than three, and other days, I struggle and list items like nice weather or light traffic.

The gratitude journal reminds us that we have much to be grateful for. But how often do we stop and pause and question if the win is repeatable?

What did we do differently to create the win? How much of the win was something we had control over, even mild control?

We may even think that we just happened to be in the right place at the right time. What if I had turned left rather than right at that one important intersection of our lives?

Unless we write a book and imagine two different lives for our made-up characters, we will never know.

What we can do is pause long enough to consider how the wins became wins. What decision did we make? What questions did we ask?

I started this blog before I listened to Dr. Tina Seelig’s interview with Mel Robbins. She recently published a book on luck and the idea that we all have the capability of generating it, maybe even storing it for future use. One quote that stood out to me was, “The choices you make today will determine the choices you will have in the future.”

Just this week, I attended an event where the speaker worked for a company where I needed a connection. Two different people had encouraged me to attend, and one even helped reduce the cost, removing a barrier that could have easily kept me from going.

When the speaker was introduced, I realized she was exactly the connection I had been looking for. Before the talk ended, I already had a plan to meet her. I introduced myself afterward, and she offered to connect me with the right person.

That moment was not the win. The behaviors that created the moment were.

• Could I repeat the moment? Yes. 

• Can I control the outcome? No. 

• Can I recreate the conditions? Absolutely.

I do not know if anything will come from this connection, but I do know it was not accidental.

I often have “sliding door” moments, when I think about what would have happened if things had gone differently. It can be a fun exercise, but it can also lead down a path that pulls me away from the present.

When I bring myself back, I remind myself that wins are not always the outcomes. Sometimes, they are the conditions we create before anything happens.

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