There are definitely days like that in life.

You spill coffee in the morning and discover a scratch on your car door that you didn't see in the parking lot.

In such cases, Koreans often say something peculiar.

"Today, I had some bad luck."

Interestingly, many older and more experienced people tend to believe in this concept of bad luck.

"Since I'm having bad luck with something small now, maybe it will be better later."

When you think about it, the concept of bad luck is quite Korean.

It interprets a small misfortune as having taken the place of a larger misfortune.

For example, if a car tire goes flat.

Americans usually say this.

"That was unlucky."

But Koreans are different.

"Let's be thankful that it wasn't a bigger accident."

It's the same situation, but the conclusions are completely different.

Koreans tend to view misfortune not as a loss but as an investment.

It's like saying that losing a hundred dollars has prevented losing over a thousand dollars.

Then one day, I suddenly thought.

Could it be that bad luck is similar to quantum mechanics?

Before physicists get angry, let me clarify.

This isn't a real physics discussion.

It's just the musings of a man in his fifties.

Quantum mechanics has the concept that multiple possibilities exist simultaneously.

It's that famous story about the cat being both alive and dead.

So, isn't our life similar?

There exists a world where I scratched my car and a world where I didn't scratch it at the same time.

But since I've entered the world where I scratched my car, it feels like the world where a bigger accident occurred has vanished.

This is where the Korean theory of bad luck is born.

"Okay, just a little scratch on the door, that's fine."

This statement may seem like a huge mental victory, but surprisingly, it helps in life.

Because humans are inherently creatures that manufacture regrets.

If you sell stocks, they go up,

if you don't sell, they go down,

if you buy a house, the price drops,

if you don't buy, the price goes up.

Our brains always find the worst comparison.

But the concept of bad luck breaks that flow.

Even if you suffer a loss, you feel at ease.

It's a very unique mental victory algorithm that only Koreans possess.

When you think about it, living in America is a continuous series of bad luck.

In the early days of immigration, you get a clunker of a car,

lose a lot of money on apartment deposits,

feel embarrassed because of language issues,

and get frustrated over credit scores.

But as time passes, most people say this.

"The struggles I went through back then were all helpful."

What was a disaster at that time is later reinterpreted as bad luck.

It seems that life is originally like that.

When you're young, it's misfortune, and when you get older, it becomes a memory.

In Pasadena, where I live, there are many old trees.

After a winter storm, thick branches break and fall.

But interestingly, the trees become stronger afterward.

They lose a branch, but the whole tree survives.

Perhaps bad luck is a similar concept.

A small wound plays a role in protecting the whole of life.

Of course, there's no scientific proof of this.

Just because there's a scratch on the door doesn't mean you win the lottery, and dropping your smartphone doesn't improve your health check results.

But people are not beings that live like calculators.

They are beings that create meaning in life.

So today, Korean men say.

"I had some bad luck."

And strangely enough, after saying that one phrase, they feel a little more at ease.

Men in their fifties, including myself, already know this.

In life, there are good days and bad days.

And sometimes, you need to be able to laugh off a small misfortune to endure the next day.

So today, I conclude this way.

Bad luck is not a superstition.

It's a quantum-mechanical psychological therapy logic that protects the mental health of Koreans.