People hate to hear this but life runs on luck. Hard work helps, risk matters, opportunity shows up but luck decides the game you're playing.
You can be brilliant, disciplined, prayerful even, and still be stuck at 35. Then someone drops a 15-second video complaining about jollof rice and becomes an influencer in a few hours. Another person bought land in Lekki in 2001 when it was bush. Today, that same plot is over N500 million. You had money then too. You just didn't meet the moment.
That's luck. Quiet, unfair and always operating in the background.
Hard work still matters a lot, but only as preparation. It keeps you ready when luck finally walks through the door. But it doesn't guarantee the door will open. The cleaner in a bank 'physically' works harder than the manager. The manager's cousin, though? He knows the MD. That's how opportunity moves in Nigeria - through bloodline, through who-you-know, through luck disguised as connection.
Risk is what you take when waiting becomes unbearable. It's why someone puts their last N20,000 into a POS business or bets on Man United to win 3-0 even though Man United is Man United. It's not recklessness. It's risk. When every safe option leads nowhere, gambling starts to look like strategy. Sometimes, it actually works, and that’s luck.
But risk needs timing. One person trades crypto in 2020 and retires for life. Another starts in a few years and the coin dips overnight. Same hustle. Different luck.
You have to hustle hard. You actively increase your "Luck Surface Area" by taking many small educated swings. Hard work doesn't guarantee the door opens but it ensures you're already standing at the junction of ten different doors, not just one.
So here's the truth nobody wants to say out loud: Hard work without timing is just expensive sweat. Luck without preparation is a missed flight and opportunity without risk is a dream you never chase.
What do you do with that? You stay in motion. You keep learning, trying, failing small, recovering fast. You don't sit around waiting for your name to be called. You show up until something breaks your way, and when it does, you're awake enough to see it.
In this country, some people start life with connections and call it hard work. Others start with nothing but hope and are still told they’re lazy. That’s not fair. It’s not even close to fair. Life is simply not a meritocracy. You can't control the waves, but you can control your motion.
So keep moving. When luck finally decides to smile on you, let it meet you not sitting somewhere waiting for a miracle but maximizing your chances and being awake enough to see the lucky break when it finally comes.
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