Here are two examples of how luck has played a quiet but enormous role in my success.

1. Studying abroad in London

In the winter of 2019, I applied to do an intensive subject abroad at University College London (UCL). I thought this would be a great way to travel the world and get credits for my degree at the same time. The problem was, studying abroad is expensive. $8000 more expensive than I had in savings.

I expressed my disappointment at being unable to study abroad to my older sister. After she listened for a while, my sister proposed me an offer: if I could earn a bursary for $4000, she would fund the rest of it. I quickly applied to all the scholarships available and began to wait. After a few weeks, I found that I was accepted for one: the Lin Martin Melbourne Global Scholarship. The amount: $3000. I was happy, but my heart still sank. I still needed $1000 to head to London, and I was sure that all of the others had rejected me. I was devastated and quietly resigned that I was going to spend my winter in Melbourne.

But the day before my study abroad application closed, I received an email.

The day before my application closed, I received a $1000 scholarship for a grant I never even knew about. Anyone applying to study abroad is automatically considered for the Melbourne Global Scholars Award and I happened to be a recipient. This last-minute miracle led to one of the best winters of my life where I travelled around London, Amsterdam and Paris.

The experience from this winter secured me a one-year undergraduate internship at CSL, one of the largest biotechnology companies in Australia. Here, I gained research skills and met some incredible teachers. Easily one of the best jobs I’ve ever had. To top it off, I talked about this CSL experience in my interview for Melbourne Medical School, which got me into medicine.

I can’t control who my siblings are and what scholarships exist. But if I didn’t have a great sister and didn’t automatically apply for the Melbourne Global Scholars Award, I wouldn’t have studied abroad in London, wouldn’t have worked at CSL, and might not have gotten into medicine.

Pure luck.

2. Meeting my partner

The first week of medical school, like most new courses, started off with an orientation week. Over these few days there’s a lot of meeting new people, ice-breakers and administrative lectures.

On the fourth day of orientation, I was chatting to one of my new tutorial classmates for the semester when a voice caught my attention.

“Excuse me?”

I turned around to face a well-dressed Asian girl with glasses and the shiniest eyes I’d ever seen. She told me she couldn’t find her group and was wondering if I knew where they were. After some discussion, I realised I knew some students of her group, called them and got their location. As I passed this information to her, she asked for my name.

“I’m Eric.”
“Nice to meet you. I’m Lynn.”

We shook hands and I added her on Facebook the next day.

A few weeks later, I decided to post my first YouTube video on Books I’ve Loved. The video is terrible, but Lynn liked it enough to comment on my Facebook post. I thought this was encouraging enough to message her where we started talking about books. Turns out, she’s an avid reader as well. Soon, we met up in person. A few months later, she became my girlfriend.

It was entirely a stroke of luck that Lynn asked directions from me. But if she never did, we wouldn’t be Facebook friends and she never would’ve seen my video, given we had no classes together. And I wouldn’t have met the most extraordinary girl in my life.

Pure luck.

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I read somewhere that all success dialled back enough can be attributed entirely to luck. I’m still wrestling with that idea but in many ways, it’s very true.

If I was born into a different socioeconomic status and culture, I’d be a very different person. If I had a less caring family, I wouldn’t have half the opportunities that I do now. Same goes for anyone I’ve met, really. There’s an infinite number of variables that could’ve completely changed the reality I live in. But it so happens that this is the one that played out.

Luck is a funny thing.