The Luck Factor by Richard Wiseman, Summary (How Lucky Are You?)

Do you consider yourself to be lucky? What does it mean to be lucky? I've heard it said countless times that you get lucky when opportunity meets preparedness? Do you agree?

Psychologist, Richard Wiseman explores the nature of luck in a groundbreaking scientific study. Loaded with exercises, The Luck Factor tells you that you can learn to be lucky. One factor is that you have to become keenly aware of your surroundings.

Introduction to The Luck Factor: How Lucky Are You?

Do you create your own luck? Professor Richard Wiseman from University of Hertfordshire in Britain, conducted a 10-year study to determine the nature of luck. He published his findings in a book called The Luck Factor: The Scientific Study of the Lucky Mind. Professor Wiseman has outlined four principles to help one increase their good fortune.

4 Principles to Increase Your Good Fortune

1.  One: Maximise Chance Opportunities

   Lucky people create, notice and act upon chance opportunities. How do they do this? They network, adopt a relaxed attitude to life and are open to new experiences.

2. Two: Listening to Lucky Hunches

   Lucky people make successful decisions by using their intuition and gut feelings. In addition, they take steps to actively boost their intuition, for example, by meditating and clearing their mind of other thoughts.

3. Three: Expect Good Fortune

   Lucky people's expectations about the future help them fulfill their dreams and ambitions because these expectations become self-fulfilling prophecies by helping them to persist in the face of failure, and shape their interactions with others in a positive way.

4. Four: Turn Bad Luck to Good

   Lucky people are able to transform their bad luck into good fortune by seeing the positive side of the bad luck. For example, they spontaneously imagine how things could have been worse, do not dwell on the ill fortune, and take control of the situation.

What are your thoughts on the four principles?  How can you use the four principles outlined above to improve your personal and professional situation?

The Luck Factor: My Related Reflections

• Accomplished people are self-motivated. Most spot opportunities, which they act on. And that's why they are successful, and appear lucky. Many also work harder, and some have workaholic tendencies. According to a quote attributed to Thomas Jefferson, “I'm a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it.”
• Are you in a job which feeds your soul? When you arise in the morning, are you ready to start your day ? Does your job feel like work? Would you be doing what you're doing if you weren't getting paid?
• Do you take time each day to reflect? You know all the answers. But you have to shut down the chatter to hear the answers within you. What techniques do you use to focus, to go into alpha? Do you know how to go into Alpha, to quiet your mind?
• What is your outlook on life? Is the glass full or empty?
• In every disaster there is a related opportunity. When disaster strikes, do you throw up your hands in the air and ask, “Why me?” Or, do you seek the opportunity to win?

Here is a simple technique that I use to go into Alpha:

1. Close your eyes.
2. Take a few deep breaths, breathing deeply into your lungs by flexing your diaphragm (you know that you are breathing deeply when your stomach pushes out when you are inhaling).
3. With your eyes still closed, look upwards, and focus on the point between your eyebrows.
4. When you feel a slight pressure, start counting down slowly from ten to one. When you reach one, you are now in the alpha state.

The Alpha Brainwave State is where creativity occurs. Whenever you are in alpha – there are four known brainwave states – you never worry. If you have to study for a test, or want to remember large amounts of data, be sure to go into the alpha state before you begin. When you are ready to use the information, go into alpha again and you will retrieve/remember all the information that you studied.

Since first writing this blog post, I listen to binaural beats audio to quickly get into alpha. I listen to the audio all day while I work.

Next Steps

Wondering what to do next, you can do all of:

1. Buy my new book, Leadership Reading: Spilling the Tea on How Top Leaders Read

2. If you want to Consult 1:1 about Effective Reading Strategies

3. Subscribe to my YouTube Channel

4. Join the Art of Learning Membership Site

5. Download Unlock Your Genius Power Reading Tips Sheet

6. Buy me a cup of coffee!

If you want access to my Bookish Notes, please consider joining my membership site, the Art of Learning.

This post contains affiliate links and The Invisible Mentor® may earn commissions for purchases made through links in this post. For more details see here. Thank you so much for your support!