Since there is lots of talk about “luck” this time of year, I thought I would repost this Wishful Thinking Works article I wrote in June, 2014. Enjoy!

“Several years ago, the psychologist Richard Wiseman recruited subjects who thought of themselves as either unusually lucky or unlucky.

• The self-described lucky ones, he discovered, shared a set of behavioral traits that maximized their good fortune.
  • They were receptive to new experiences, and
  • invested time in expanding their social and professional networks;
  • when things went wrong, they reminded themselves that things could have gone worse.

• By focusing less on their goals, they actually accomplished those goals more efficiently.

In one experiment, Wiseman asked participants to count the number of photographs in a newspaper.

• The unlucky people diligently plodded through.
• The lucky ones were far more likely to spot one of two messages Wiseman had inserted on the page.
  • The first [message] read ‘Stop counting—there are 43 photographs in this newspaper.’
  • The other offered a $250 reward if the reader just asked the experimenter for the cash.”

So, it appears that being lucky requires a belief that you are lucky, and the behavior to go with it!

Your luck is already improving; now that you read the story and know the secret, you can change your life accordingly!

Wishful Thinking Works Life Coaching

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