Luck is a factor in success, but you have to put yourself where it will find you.

I’ve mentioned before that my daughter is an amazingly talented musician. She has a rare gift and that’s been evident since she was about 5 years old.

When we brought her home with us at age 8 months, her world was turned upside down. She was at an age when babies start to recognize strangers from those they know. We were strangers to her. We looked different, we smelled different, we ate different foods and spoke a different language. Nothing about us was familiar to her and she was terrified of us. The day we arrived at the Chinese Center for Adoption affairs, she was walked in by a caretaker, along with a handful of other children, all badges were matched to make sure each set of parents was given the correct baby and handed off to us. Instant family although we were complete strangers.

She cried for hours. When I say cried, I mean sobbed in a way that is inconsolable. It wasn’t the typical cry of a baby who needs to eat or sleep; it was a cry of deep, deep fear and sadness. She had no idea who we were and why she was with us. After literally an entire day of her crying, we set her in the bathtub and played some music. Information we had received from her caretakers was that she loved the bath and loved to listen to music. They were right.

As we worked through the first year together, the one constant that made Scarlett calm was listening to music. We played music for her in some fashion throughout the day and she always fell to sleep at night listening to music as well. We bought her a play piano for Christmas when she was three and she played that thing endlessly.

At age five, she started asking to play the piano “for real.” Pianos aren’t cheap but we told her we would agree to buy her one if she made the commitment to lessons and limiting other activities she wasn’t as interested in. She made a promise whole heartedly and she’s hasn’t stopped playing since.

Now at age 15, she plays the violin, of which she earned first chair without having taken a lesson. She plays the keyboard and can whip out a mean mix inspired by Alan Walker. She’s taken two semesters of college music courses at Berklee College of Music and a few months ago started playing the saxophone. She plays music every second of the day she is not at school or work.

As a freshman this year, while in orchestra, she sat down at the piano before class and cranked out one of the pieces she had been working on. Her teacher heard her and asked how long she has been playing. When she told him 10 years, he invited her to join them for Jazz One, which is a class reserved for juniors and seniors who are required to try out for a place in this band. She was so excited to be asked, that she cried when she got in the car to tell me. She was overwhelmed and nervous though because this class is reserved for older students and they had already been playing together since the start of the year. They also meet before school at 6:30am so none of us were excited about getting up at 5am to get her there. We went back and forth for days, her saying it was nice to be asked but she really didn’t want to commit to it. What she really meant was she was scared and also wasn’t excited about feeling uncomfortable. I told her opportunities like this shouldn’t be taken for granted and when they come along, we have to set our fears aside and jump in with both feet. She went and has been part of this Jazz class for several months.

This week she performed with them at the local college for several music critics. One of the critics who is a jazz piano instructor came up and introduced himself to her, shook her hand and gave her his contact information. He told her she is very good and if she’d like, he would love to work with her. She was beside herself with pride. Her words to me were this…

“Today happened because I was willing to do that one little thing; getting over my fear and discomfort of joining jazz. I never would have met this guy had I given in to my excuses of it being too much work and too early to be at school everyday.”

You can say that luck has been a key aspect of Scarlett’s life and maybe you’re right. She was “lucky” to get out of a poor environment in a communist country. She was “lucky” to have parents who support her talents. She was “lucky” to be born with natural musical talent.

But, a lot of people did a lot of hard work to help create her luck. Her birth mother gave her life instead of aborting an unwanted girl. We chose adoption and all of the unknowns it entails. She works insanely hard and never takes her natural gifts for granted.

You create your luck, through hard work. You do the work, with no guarantee of the outcome. You do the work knowing that if you show up, eventually luck will find you. It’s not going to find you if you’re sitting at home waiting for it.