We hear a lot about “self-made” billionaires. You know, the ones topping the annual Forbes’ lists. The ones who supposedly pulled themselves up by their own bootstraps, earned that cash through their own talent, drive, struggle, courage, hard work, and hence deserve every cent of it. Meritocracy – the basis of free market capitalism – dictates you get what you earn and only the best rise to the top.

How about something a bit closer to reality. As Virginia Woolf once put it in when writing of the necessary requirements for women authors, all you need is “money and a room of [your] own.”

Leaving aside yesterday’s multi-millionaires and today’s billionaires for a moment, consider something quite a bit harder to come by: Greatness – those individuals who become known and idolized by millions, often for generations, who become symbolic of particular outstanding human qualities, even of particular eras in human history – the likes of Albert Einstein, Mozart, Marie Curie, Picasso, Frida Kahlo, Charles Darwin. No shortage of resources here.

Still, there are artists like Berthe Morisot, who started out with full cash and room in hand, yet even today are barely visible outside the galleries. Or look at San Francisco’s 70-plus musical prodigies of the 1920s-30s – only six had successful careers as adults.

Compare them with the likes of Elvis, Marilyn, and Ali – icons who started off with barely a loose nickel between them. How did they make it? Was it down to talent, struggle, like those ‘self-made’ billionaires – blood, sweat, and tears? Or maybe, just maybe, it was down to something else.

In my book, Greatness, I consider a wide range of Western icons. Mozart or Marilyn, Einstein or Elvis – it makes no difference. Talent and effort are merely the givens. Millions have them in every generation. Chance is the decider, over and over again.

Let’s take a look, for example, at the man whose name has become a synonym for genius. How exactly did Einstein, considered the greatest mind of the 20th century, get from the family’s lavish villa in Munich in 1879 to the Theory of Special Relativity in 1905? A few highlights show this progression wasn’t down to Einstein. It was down to Einstein in a series of changing contexts which over and over again worked to his advantage, often not only without his knowledge, but in spite his own best efforts to the contrary.