“There's no such thing as luck. Luck is where preparation meets opportunity.”
Amy Hempel (1951) Short story writer
The Last Lecture (2007)
“There's no such thing as luck. Luck is where preparation meets opportunity.”
Amy Hempel (1951) Short story writer
“Luck is when opportunity meets preparation.”
Denzel Washington (1954) actor, screenwriter, director, producer
“Luck is a matter of preparation meeting opportunity.”
Oprah Winfrey (1954) American businesswoman, talk show host, actress, producer, and philanthropist
“Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.”
Seneca the Younger (-4–65 BC) Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, and dramatist
Has been attributed to Seneca since the 1990s (eg. Gregory K. Ericksen, (1999), Women entrepreneurs only: 12 women entrepreneurs tell the stories of their success, page ix.). Other books ascribe the saying to either Darrell K. Royal (former American football player, born 1924) or Elmer G. Letterman (Insurance salesman and writer, 1897-1982). However, it is unlikely either man originated the saying. A version that reads "He is lucky who realizes that luck is the point where preparation meets opportunity" can be found (unattributed) in the 1912 The Youth's Companion: Volume 86. The quote might be a distortion of the following passage by Seneca (who makes no mention of "luck" and is in fact quoting his friend Demetrius the Cynic):<blockquote>"The best wrestler," he would say, "is not he who has learned thoroughly all the tricks and twists of the art, which are seldom met with in actual wrestling, but he who has well and carefully trained himself in one or two of them, and watches keenly for an opportunity of practising them." — Seneca, On Benefits, vii. 1 http://thriceholy.net/Texts/Benefits4.html</blockquote> <br class="br">Disputed
“Success occurs when opportunity meets preparation.”
Zig Ziglar (1926–2012) American motivational speaker
See You at the Top (2000)
Luis Miguel (1970) Puerto Rican singer; music producer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aipyRne6dso
Interview in Mexico, 1995
Robert A. Heinlein book Have Space Suit—Will Travel
Source: Have Space Suit—Will Travel (1958), Chapter 2
“[Irene] hated trusting to luck. It was no substitute for good planning and careful preparation.”
Genevieve Cogman (1972) novelist and game designer
Source: The Masked City (2015), Chapter 11 (p. 141)
“There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;”
T.S. Eliot The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock (1915)
Context: There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands,
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.
