"The only good luck many great men ever had was being born with the ability and determination to overcome bad luck"
About this Quote
Luck is the great alibi and the great insult: it can dismiss real effort as accident, or blame failure on fate. Channing Pollock flips that script with a line that looks like a pep talk but carries a sharper edge. His “only good luck” isn’t a winning lottery ticket or a friendly universe; it’s a temperament. He reframes fortune as an internal resource, not an external event, which is both empowering and quietly ruthless.
The phrasing matters. “Many great men” smuggles in a cultural myth - we crave clean origin stories, the kind where success arrives like a plot twist. Pollock insists greatness is less twist than grind: you don’t evade bad luck, you metabolize it. “Born with the ability and determination” nods to the uncomfortable mix we’d rather not admit: talent and willpower are partly inheritances. The quote celebrates grit, but it also suggests an inequity - some people are “lucky” to be born with the psychological hardware to endure what would crush others.
As an actor and popular figure, Pollock is also speaking from inside an industry built on rejection, randomness, and gatekeepers. In show business, “bad luck” is often just the default setting. The subtext reads like advice to the ambitious: stop waiting for a break; treat adversity as the audition. The line works because it offers comfort without sentimentality, turning luck from a cosmic mood into a personal discipline.
The phrasing matters. “Many great men” smuggles in a cultural myth - we crave clean origin stories, the kind where success arrives like a plot twist. Pollock insists greatness is less twist than grind: you don’t evade bad luck, you metabolize it. “Born with the ability and determination” nods to the uncomfortable mix we’d rather not admit: talent and willpower are partly inheritances. The quote celebrates grit, but it also suggests an inequity - some people are “lucky” to be born with the psychological hardware to endure what would crush others.
As an actor and popular figure, Pollock is also speaking from inside an industry built on rejection, randomness, and gatekeepers. In show business, “bad luck” is often just the default setting. The subtext reads like advice to the ambitious: stop waiting for a break; treat adversity as the audition. The line works because it offers comfort without sentimentality, turning luck from a cosmic mood into a personal discipline.
Quote Details
| Topic | Overcoming Obstacles |
|---|
More Quotes by Channing
Add to List
