What is the English idiom for eventually getting it right after many mindless attempts
Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while.
A blind squirrel has no practical option but to keep searching for nuts in spite of its natural limitations. The phrase is often used by the skillful to disparage the lucky breaks of others, but it is also used by the skillful to point out that luck played into their success. Just as persistence and luck intersect in real life, the blind squirrel proverb intersects with the motivational mantras:
Persistence overcomes resistance!
or
If at first you don't succeed, try, try again!
The blind squirrel proverb lands closer to the expression of:
sheer luck
The motivational mantras land closer to the expression of:
try your luck
or
ride your luck
The following are not idioms per se, but they turn a good phrase for the intersection of luck and persistence:
“Diligence is the mother of good fortune.” Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
"Luck comes and goes; you have to seize it." Jean Van Hamme
“I didn't wait for Luck. I tore after it with a truck.” A.A. Bell
“While persistence offers no guarantees, it does give 'luck' a chance to operate.” Tom Shippey
“Trust your luck, Taran Wanderer. But don't forget to put out your nets!” Lloyd Alexander
“Luck is distributed at six in the morning” Luis Zamarro Fraile
“A trifle can be enough when luck is on your side.” Margi Preus
“As regards the extraordinary prizes, the element of luck is the determining factor.” Theodore Roosevelt
And the following quotes turn a good phrase for the intersection of persistence and success:
“Eighty percent of success is showing up.” Woody Allen
“Fortune sides with him who dares.” Virgil
“Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.”
“Kites rise highest against the wind...” Winston Churchill“People who avoid failure also avoid success.” Robert T. Kiyosaki
“It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried...” Theodore Roosevelt
“There is no failure except in no longer trying.” Elbert Hubbard
“The road to success is dotted with many tempting parking spaces.” Will Rogers
“Develop success from failures. Discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success.” - Dale Carnegie
“Don't be afraid of failure. This is the way to succeed.” LeBron James
“Our business in life is not to succeed, but to continue to fail in good spirits.” Robert Lois Stevenson
The intersection of these ideas seems to be a popular theme, so if you persist in your archery word picture, you may have stumbled blindly onto an idiom for the future.
Shoot enough arrows, and you may hit a blind squirrel.
or
Even a nut might hit the bullseye.
Or some combination of the two ;) I'll give you a one week head start to register a trademark!
"You've got to kiss a lot of frogs" (before you find your prince - from the fairy story The Frog Prince, where a prince has been turned by magic into a frog and can only be restored by a kiss from a princess).
Alternatively there's the infinite monkey theorem:
The infinite monkey theorem states that a monkey hitting keys at random on a typewriter keyboard for an infinite amount of time will almost surely type a given text, such as the complete works of William Shakespeare.
Also a (lucky)shot in the dark
- an attempt to guess something when you have no information or knowledge about it
- an attempt to do something without knowing much about it
"Even a broken clock is correct twice a day"