Dr. Claude Needham: When Somebody Has Your Back

Dr. Claude Needham talks about how a little bit of luck can make all the difference in the world when you're in a situation where there's no apparent clear path through. It's good to have somebody or something that's got your back, especially when you're trying to navigate a labyrinth … and you need a guide.

“I think that people will just plain out want some luck. There's too many situations in which the clear path through is not apparent.

“Now some things, you go, ‘well, if I just do A, B, and C, I'll get 'er done,’ but there's so many things that there's no A, B, and C. There's no steps that you can take to bring it back into your power so you can get 'er done.

“There's elements of GKW. God knows what. There's God knows what required to fall in the right way.

“If you call any civil service bureau of any sort, you're never talking to that civil service organization. That's not who you're talking to. Who you're talking to is an individual, and a little bit of luck, maybe luck in terms of who picks up the phone, luck in terms of what you say and how you say it, that somehow you're sympatico with them and you don't put your foot in your mouth, can make all the difference in the world. They happen to mention that you need the form 204-C in order to get the job done.

“When I had my surgery, I was so lucky that the person I talked to happened to be friendly because there was this string of questions that you had to answer for your application, my application, for medical assistance, and this string of questions could have been answered one way or the other. Both answers were equally possible, and this gal, who no longer works there, she was of a mind to ask the questions in such a way that it became obvious to me which way the answer was supposed to go to get me through the labyrinth, because it was a labyrinth, and she was there as a guide, helping me through it.

“That was pure luck. There were other people in that job, that if I'd gotten them, I wouldn't have gotten the medical assistance.

“There's so many things like that. So I think people are going to be in the mood for having a hedge against the vagaries of the world, something that gives them a sense that there's somebody, something, on their side, that's got their corner, that's got their back.

“There's a lot of expressions that speak to that issue of not being alone in your struggle, because people naturally understand that if you've got somebody that has your back, you have a better chance of getting through it, whatever ‘it’ happens to be.”