The Odds of Getting Into Lakeside
In 1968, the UN reported around 303 million high-school-aged people across the world. Only around 300 of them attended Lakeside School in the US. According to reports, Lakeside was one of the few high schools in the world that had access to a computer at the time. Guess what? Bill Gates happened to be one of those 300. One in a million. That is luck. Even Bill Gates said: “If there had been no Lakeside, there would have been no Microsoft.”
The Classmate Who Never Made It
Again, Bill Gates and his classmate Paul Allen went on to found Microsoft. But there was a third classmate Kent Evans, who is mostly not talked about so much. But I love the fact that Gates acknowledged him a couple of times. According to Gates, Kent was the best student in their class. Gates also said he talked with Kent more than Allen about their plans to become CEOs of computer companies.
Meaning, if circumstances had been different, it is possible Bill Gates could have founded Microsoft with Kent instead of Paul Allen. Maybe all three of them would have done it anyway. But unfortunately, Kent died in a mountaineering accident before they completed high school.
The odds of being killed on a mountain in high school were roughly one in a million. Both Gates and Kent were picked one in a million, but on opposite sides.
They were both smart, hardworking and visionary. But one happened to be on the winning side of luck…
Zuckerberg’s Genius and Yahoo’s Mistake
In the same way, we call Mark Zuckerberg a genius for turning down Yahoo!’s $1 billion offer to buy Facebook in 2006. Today, Meta is worth around $1.4 trillion. But people still criticize Yahoo for also turning down Microsoft’s big buyout offer in 2008. Microsoft offered Yahoo $44.6 billion. Yahoo rejected it, believing the company was worth more. Microsoft later increased its bid before eventually walking away. Today, Yahoo is no longer the company it once was.
Why We Should Be Careful Who We Praise or Judge
Bottom line, be careful who you praise and admire. Also, be careful who you look down upon and wish to avoid becoming. Luck may have played out for some people in some instances. And because luck is difficult to quantify and even more difficult to emulate, you may not necessarily know who actually played their cards right. Sometimes, we judge the decision by the only outcome and I mean, that’s normal human behaviour, we are naturally wired to tilt towards the side of results. But sometimes the full outcome was not entirely in the hands of those who have those results.
Conclusion: What the World Calls Luck, I Call God Leading Me
Maybe this should be one of the greatest advantages of having the Holy Spirit. Because there are opportunities I cannot see coming, people I don’t know I need to meet, places I don’t know I need to be, and decisions I don’t know I need to make. But He knows. He can lead you. He can redirect you. He can connect you. He can position you.
John 16:13 “However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.”
So while the world calls it luck, I want to be sensitive enough to recognize when God is leading me.
