Everyone has a routine or a habit that they repeat in hopes they get the outcome they want. Whether this is the recipe for insanity or a plot to remain on luck’s good side, people hold forms of superstitions near and dear their sentimental hearts.
In wake of 2017’s first Friday the 13th, we at The Daily Eastern News celebrate the quirky routines and habits that revolve around the idea of superstition.
A superstition is simply an unjustifiable belief that an action, event or practice may cause or prevent a supernatural incident.
Superstitions deemed unjustifiable in the sense that science cannot explain the correlation between events believed to be a part of a superstition.
This includes things done to ensure good luck or good karma, as some call it.
Behaviors such avoiding black cats, throwing salt over one’s shoulder, searching aimlessly for a four-leaf clover, wearing a lucky pair of socks or piece of jewelry or not whistling in a newsroom are all common superstitions from various groups of people.
Whether or not luck is the result of these behaviors, it is the strong beliefs behind them that hold all the influence.
Humans have a way of trying to understand and change what they cannot control by finding a round-about way of “controlling” them.
These rituals and routines give a sense of comfort and a sense of security for an outcome that is unknown.
Superstitions cannot always be to blame for the series of bad luck someone may encounter, and it also cannot be the causation of all the good things that happen to people.
It is important to not put all of one’s faith in a superstitious belief, and it is also important to find a healthy balance between superstition and paranoia.
However, it is not horrible that people put a smidgen of faith in the idea of luck. Just look at every Cubs fan that believed in the curse of the billy goat being broken when they won their first World Series in over 100 years.
Of course, not all lucky things can be accredited to superstitious behavior. As the great comedian Bo Burnham said “if life hands you lemons, you probably just found lemons.”