I Bought a Lottery Ticket and Never Checked the Numbers
I recently bought my first lottery ticket in something like 15 years.
The purchase happened on a whim, as I was walking down the street in California. When I passed a convenience store, I thought, “I should go inside and buy a lottery ticket.” And so I did.
To a lottery novice such as myself, the process was a little confusing. Apparently there’s not just one lottery…there are many! Not being familiar with the pros and cons of various options, I asked the clerk for the cheapest one.
For a single dollar, I was handed a slip of paper containing a series of numbers.
I understood that this slip of paper had a value that was yet to be determined. Most likely it was worth $0, but there was a chance—however slim—that it could be worth much more.
Before I left the store, I knew what I would do next: nothing at all.
I’d hold on to the ticket, but never check the numbers to see if I’d won.
What are you buying when you buy a lottery ticket?
When most people buy lottery tickets, they aren’t doing so because they are compulsive gamblers. They aren’t investing their life savings. Most have no real expectation of winning, and only a vague hope that they’ll ever stand on a stage with an oversized check for millions of dollars.
What they’re buying is a fantasy—a brief period of thinking, What if? What would I do if I suddenly had more money than I’d ever imagined?
And when you think about it like that, you realize that buying lottery tickets can be a rational choice. You're spending a dollar on a dream!
Consider what we spend on streaming services, concert tickets, or admission to Disneyland. There’s nothing wrong with any of that—choose your own entertainment without judgment.
But when I bought my first ticket in 15 years, I wasn’t thinking about the lottery fantasy.
There’s an old expression about contests of all kinds: You can’t win if you don’t play.
Well, I bought my ticket and got in the game. But then I quit before completing the critical, unstated second step: You can't win if you don't check the winning numbers. (I know, it's not as catchy.)
Which was just fine with me! I wanted to opt out, on purpose. I spent the dollar not for a dream, but for a reminder that I didn’t need one.
Winning the lottery would be an incredible, against-the-odds coincidence. Sure, statistically speaking, someone has to win, but for the winner, it has to feel like a miracle.
And that's what I didn't want to wait for—the possibility of fate showing up to win the game for me.
I want the anti-miracle
I don’t want to depend on external forces to change my life, even for good. I want to trust myself. I want to use the agency I have and figure things out.
That’s why, for a long time after I bought that lottery ticket, I carried it around in my journal. Not out of a faint hope that my number would come up, but as a reminder to create my own future.
I know that not all of it is up to me. Even without playing the lottery, luck and circumstance affect all of us every day. Privilege—or the lack of it—plays a role, too.
Still, because we can’t control everything, all the more important to assert our freedom of choice over the few things we can.
As for me, the lottery gods can bestow their winnings elsewhere. I’m tired of waiting for something to happen. I want to make something happen.
So all things considered, I’d like to think it was a dollar well spent.
Something to ponder this week:
What are you waiting for luck to solve that might be better handled with a decision?
Think of something in your life that you’re hoping will somehow work itself out. What could you do to move it forward instead?
P.S. I do sometimes wonder if the lottery ticket I bought ended up being a big winner. Almost definitely not, of course, but there's a chance. And I'll never know one way or another! And I like that. 🙂