"You're so lucky!"

I have a few posts which I've labelled with the tag 'stupid things people say'. "You're so lucky" should be placed front and centre. Of course, there is such a thing as luck, and so there are times when "You're so lucky" is an entirely appropriate thing to say.

My lucky dip numbers came up on Lotto.
     "You're so lucky!"

I happen to have been born in a country where medical treatment is free at the point of delivery.
     "You're so lucky!"

I won a game of Snakes and ladders.
     "You're so lucky!"

All of the above are indeed examples of (good) luck, and "you're so lucky" is an appropriate and true thing to say; I have no complaints about events such as these being attributed to luck, as these are genuine examples of luck.

My gripe is when things happen in my (or someone else's) life which are not due to luck, but people say "you're so lucky" nonetheless.

For example, after I finished my undergrad degree, my then boyfriend and I decided we wanted to go travelling. I worked a rubbish job earning £5 an hour, and I took overtime whenever I could. We didn't go out at all for over a year, except for a curry once a fortnight costing £5 each. We seldom drank alcohol, we spent less than £20 on clothes during that year, we had one vehicle between the two of us, and we lived in a shared house which was cheap because it was skanky and in a rough area. I managed to save up £2500 in a year, and we went off to Australia, New Zealand and Thailand. And it's funny, the people who'd called us 'boring' and even 'weird' for really tightening our belts that year were the very same ones who said we were 'lucky' to be able to go travelling abroad. It made my blood boil. No one called us lucky when we were scrimping and saving.

And I get the very same things said to me now. (And I'm sure other hardworking people also get this said to them, and it's so offensive.) I don't have a job at the moment because I'm doing a PhD. So I stay home reading articles and writing stuff on the computer.

"You're so lucky!"

Well no, I'm not lucky. I've always worked hard at my studies and that's why I'm now able to do the PhD.
"Yes but you're lucky that you don't have to worry about money."

No it's not luck. All funded placements are funded on merit; they don't just roll the dice and fund people randomly.
"Yes but it's lucky that your mortgage and bills are low enough to allow you to survive on a £15k stipend."

No, I have a small mortgage because I bought this house with a big deposit of my own money which I'd saved up by working hard and spending little. I could have chosen a more expensive (and bigger) house with larger mortgage payments, but I chose not to. So it's not luck that I have low mortgage payments. And I still choose not to spend frivolously; I buy budget brands and I don't go out for expensive meals and nights/days out. That's not luck.

it's so offensive when people say that career success and academic success are down to luck; it's a way of saying "you don't really deserve your success - it's just luck that you're successful". If someone has got rich by winning the lottery or inheritance, then yes that is lucky, but most people are where they are in life because of what they've done with their lives. That goes for people at both ends of the spectrum. it is lucky that David Beckham had a successful football career or that Ed Sheeran is having a successful music career? Someone doesn't become an amazing footballer or a have albums selling tens of millions of copies because they're lucky. Equally, someone doesn't become a heroin addict or a murderer by chance/luck alone. People might genetically inherit a small amount of 'natural talent' or an 'addictive personality', but they make the choice to practice football, promote their singing, or to take heroin. There are a few exceptions to the rule: people who were injected with heroin against their wishes, or people whose family have had enough money to help them on their way to success, but these people are the exceptions rather than the rule.

In fact there are few things in life which are genuinely and completely down to luck. I concede that it was lucky for me to have been born in England in the late 20th century to hardworking parents who loved me and looked after me. I've also had the lucky privileges of being white-skinned, average-looking, and heterosexual. Whether these lucky privileges are cancelled put by the 'unlucky' facts that I'm female, working class and I've been disabled/in poor health for half of my life, I don't really know. But it seems to me that by and large, our lives are what we make them, and not a lot of luck is involved in repeated success or failure.

People should think twice before saying "you're so lucky" because much of what happens to us in life is not due to luck: attributing someone's success to mere luck is just another way of telling them they don't deserve to be where they are. It that's what you want to tell someone, then fine, go for it, as there are definitely cases of people who haven't worked for their success (or haven't worked to avoid their failure) but the lives of most of us regular people are affected far more by effort than luck.