I Need Some Simple Luck

Think of the luckiest person you know. Try to name your guy (or girl) before you start making judgments about what real luck is.

Finding it hard? Name three people you're jealous of. Go ahead, do it. [I'll wait :)]

According to Ken Robinson in The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything, you might be tempted to say those people-of-whom-you-are-jealous are just lucky; that's why they (not you) got to such a marvelous, lucky place. [Don't worry, I named three too, and I think they're lucky people indeed! :) ]

The truth is that you (and I) may never be able to accomplish the same things as those we envy, for a multitude of reasons (including going blind, which is a story you can read about in Robinson's book). Still, we can be lucky in our own right, if we just act a little more... like a lucky person.

Somebody even wrote a book about this stuff. It's called The Luck Factor: The Four Essential Principles. And to boil it down to its simplest components, this is what the author says lucky people tend to do:

1. create, notice, and act on opportunities

2. listen to intuition and do work to boost intuition (like meditation and mindfulness, right Camel? :)

3. expect to be lucky

4. believe they can turn bad luck to good


I'm not sure what contributes to such an approach to the world. (Maybe I should read the book :) But I know that if you (and I) are going to find a bit of simple luck, we might just need to go out and make it happen ourselves.