Arnie Skelton

Close friends and family refer to me as ‘Mr Bean’, because I share many of his characteristics - clumsy, careless, getting into ridiculous, often funny, scrapes….and out of them.  Examples include, guilloting off the end of my tie, leaving my computer on a train, leaving my (bright orange) anorak on the top of a lake district mountain, getting on the train going in the wrong direction…..

Here’s the latest.  On Wednesday Julie and I were training together in Coventry.  She drove back, and I paid by card to use the M6 toll.  She had a coffee at our house, then left, saying she might go to our local superstore to get fuel and buy some prizes - or being tired, just go home.  5 minutes after she left, I decided to get changed, lifted my suit jacket off the chair, and realised instantly I’d left my wallet in the car.  Julie lives in Keighley, and we weren’t due to meet again for a couple of weeks.  And I had to fly to London for a two day training session the following morning…..!  Without a word to my family, I grabbed some keys, shot off in the car, hoping she’d actually gone to the superstore.  I checked the fuel pumps - no luck.  I checked the superstore area where she might buy prizes - no luck.  Finally, with little hope left, I checked the checkouts - and there she was, just about to pick up the bags and leave…..

What always amazes me about these situations is the luck involved.  How lucky I was:

• to decide to get changed so soon after she left
• to know instantly I’d not got my walllet, and know where it was
• that she decided after all to go to the supermarket

Gary Player, one of the all-time great golfers, was asked why he was so lucky at golf.  He famously replied: “well, the harder I practice, the luckier I get.”  I guess maybe I make some of my own luck in these situations by practising them a lot!!  There’s a good book by Richard Wiseman, called ‘The Luck Factor’.  He believes people genuinely do make their own luck - and I think he might have a point!  There’s also something in NLP called ’secondary gain’ - where an apparent flaw actually helps develop a hidden skill.  For example, I am relatively clumsy, but have reasonably quick reactions - so that if I drop something, I often catch it before it hits the ground…..maybe my carelessness, etc, helps develop my problem solving, “now get out of that” skills…..