How To Become A Really Lucky Person — A Science-Backed Method To Increase Your Luck Today

Luck is attainable, and it involves a lot more than 4-leaf clovers.

Do you often find yourself wondering how “some people just have all the luck”? Through all of the ups and (a lot of) downs involved in getting to where I am now, I know that I sure have.

When desired results aren’t achieved we often attribute it to bad luck, and on the flip side, when something unexpectedly positive happens we attribute it to good luck. But how much control do we really have over our own “luck”? The answer - more than you think.

I’m not here to tell you to follow your gut, listen to your instinct or carry around a lucky rabbits foot. However, people who consider themselves lucky do tend to exhibit certain traits.

A recent study conducted by Psychologist Richard Wiseman, revealed that that an individual’s personality has a drastic impact on how lucky or unlucky they are in life. According to the research, “lucky” people tend to follow some basic principles.

These principles affirmed that “lucky” people are skilled at:

· Finding and creating opportunities.

· Creating self-fulfilling prophesies through positive expectations.

· Adopting a resilient attitude that helps to transform bad luck into good.

In fact, Dr. Wiseman found that nearly 40% of what we think is pure chance is actually defined by the way that we think.

What we can gather from this data is that it’s really all about attitude and perception. In other words, successful, or lucky, people make their own luck. Being lucky is a skill to be learned and an easy one at that.

Change your viewpoint, change your luck and change your life. So, how can you do just that?

1) Maximize opportunities

“Optimism is normal, but some fortunate people are more optimistic than the rest of us. If you are genetically endowed with an optimistic bias, you hardly need to be told that you are a lucky person — you already feel fortunate.”

― Daniel Kahneman

You’ll never experience exciting, serendipitous things if you don’t make yourself available to them.

In one of his studies, Wiseman gave people a newspaper and told them to count the amount of photos inside. The unlucky group of people took about 2 minutes to count the photos, while the lucky group took mere seconds.

Why?

Because the lucky people noticed the note on page two that said “Stop counting. There are 43 photographs in this newspaper.”

As Wiseman put it, “unlucky people miss chance opportunities because they are too focused on looking for something else. They go to parties intent on finding their perfect partner and so miss opportunities to make good friends. They look through newspapers determined to find certain types of job advertisements and as a result miss other types of jobs.”

To replicate that, put yourself out there, even if it makes you uncomfortable. Lucky people are skilled at not only noticing and acting upon chance opportunities, but also creating them.

Look through a wide lens and with a go-getter attitude rather than having a one-minded view on life. There’s always going to be opportunities all around you, and if you’re driven in only one direction, you’re going to miss the many others.

2) Expect to be lucky

Lucky people also expect to be lucky. Unlucky people expect just the opposite. Quite often, these odds seem to turn out to be true.

Extensive studies on positive thinking back this up.

A landmark paper by Barbara Fredrickson found that “positive emotions momentarily broaden people’s attention and thinking, enabling them to draw on higher-level connections and a wider-than-usual range of percepts or ideas.”

Besides becoming more skilled, positive people also became luckier.

Over time, those skills picked up with a positive attitude translated into “becoming successful, healthy, and happy in the months and years to come.”

Again, think back to the phrase, “some people just seem to have all the luck”. Unsurprisingly, optimism plays a key role in luckiness, as it greatly affects luck production and perception. So dare to think positive — it will snowball into even more positivity and success.

3) Learn from your mistakes and never expect to cross the finish line

“Remember that sometimes not getting what you want is a wonderful stroke of luck.”
― Dalai Lama XIV

Embrace failure and brush it off. Rather than giving up, view failure as an opportunity to learn and grow from mistakes.

Believe in yourself and know that you can always achieve more the harder you work. Most successful people are also flawed and failed. The difference is that they choose to go after fortuitous moments, and they’re not put off by a few failures that may come along the way.

In order to continue to create your own luck, you must constantly remind yourself that there is never a defined finish line or end goal. There’s always opportunity to continue learning and growing - never stop.

“I’m a greater believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it”
― Thomas Jefferson

If you consider yourself someone who has been “down on your luck”, stop saying that, pick up these traits and use them to your advantage to create more success.

Remember, luck only favors you when you make room for it. It’s also important to note that changing your attitude or outlook on life to incorporate such habits isn’t always an overnight thing, and you shouldn’t expect it to be. Be patient with yourself and take baby steps towards achieving your goal. As you progress, a bit of luck will be there to push you along the way.

If you enjoyed this article, you can read more of my thoughts in my column for Inc. Magazine as well as my latest project, Love The Hustle.