Luck Is Where Opportunity Meets Preparation

In Ancient Rome, Seneca lived a life that defined luck. He was born into a low rank, but through his hard work and awareness, he moved up into the realm of the elite in Rome. His “luck” brought him a friendship with Roman emperors, including Claudius and Nero. He eventually became one of the wealthiest people of his day.

Was Seneca luckier than most people? He certainly wasn’t unlucky. But he also understood the workings of the world, which is clear throughout the philosophical texts he crafted in his lifetime. He embodied several of the traits that modern researchers and psychologists consider to be those of lucky people.

Some people may find that money falls in their lap or a lucky break comes from nowhere, and they find their fortunes turning with no input from them. But this kind of luck (“dumb” luck?) is by definition pretty uncommon, and since we can’t create t for ourselves, it’s not worth thinking about. But as we’ve seen, there are other, subtler grey areas between “100% dumb luck” and “hard work.” In that realm where our attitude, preparation, actions, and perceptions change how we maximize the random opportunities we’re given, we have more control than we think. We’ve seen that lucky people are optimistic and believe they’re lucky. Let’s look at a few more traits that the lucky have in common.

Lucky Traits

There are a handful of traits that are common in people who consider themselves to be lucky.

Richard Wiseman, the psychologist we encountered earlier, has extensively studied luck, and found that people who are lucky find themselves in a certain state of mind that makes them more aware of lucky occurrences. You can call it a lucky mindset, or simply the tendency to get themselves into situations many people would call lucky. Luck, then, is a complex mix of attribution, perception and deliberate positive action. In several experiments relating to luck, he found that those who achieve it tend to have three consistent personality traits.

Those three personality traits for luck include variations on the spectrums of extroversion, openness, and neuroticism. Wiseman found that people with those three traits weren’t exactly more blessed or fortunate (that would be quite the scientific finding!) but rather that their outlook made them available to opportunities that turned into lucky moments. The same opportunities that, ostensibly, we’re all exposed to in equal measure. These three traits seemed to give people a better chance at being in the right place at the right time and maximizing their opportunities for great outcomes.

Extroversion

Extroversion is the first trait Wiseman found to be highly correlated with luck.

According to the Big 5 Factors theory of personality, extroversion is defined by people being assertive, energetic, and talkative. Extroversion is associated with comfort with social interaction and a tendency to move towards other people and new situations. Someone who shows extroversion is likely to be lucky due to an enthusiastic involvement with the outside world. It’s easy to imagine why: extroverts have an easy time talking to anyone, so they often have opportunities to meet interesting people. How many times have you heard people describe a lucky encounter that essentially came down to them chatting up the right person by accident? These are opportunities that more shy or withdrawn people might never take advantage of.

Extroverts become highly energized when they are around other people. They are likely to become the life of any party. They are easy to notice in crowds because of their talkative and energetic personalities, which could explain why lucky things happen to them. If we take luck to be a quantity that increases with exposure and experience, extroverts are necessarily luckier because they crave that exposure, and tend to put themselves more frequently into varied situations. The more opportunities you come across, even bad ones, the more you increase your exposure to a lucky chance encounter. The more you try, the more you discover and experience. Simply, you’re going to have more lucky breaks when you meet ten people a day versus none.

Let’s be honest: luck very often comes from other people doing something for or with us. Our social connections can create our lucky breaks, our pivotal moments, and occasionally save our hides! It stands to reason then that those with more social connections will have more channels through which this kind of luck can flow to them.

If you find yourself the aloof or retiring type, you may discover more luck comes your way when you open up to other people. Tell others what you’re struggling with and what you need – you never know when or from where help may be spontaneously offered. Speak enthusiastically about your passions so that other people will help you connect to others who can help or join you on your mission. Most importantly, pay attention and be a good listener – luck often arrives simply because you knew a valuable piece of information you might have otherwise missed.

Open-Mindedness

When someone demonstrates a high level of openness, they are relaxed about life and ready to experience new circumstances. They are receptive and open to following emerging threads, rather than shutting themselves off to new possibilities or solutions. They are not as risk-averse as others and don’t make decisions through a perspective of fear and anxiety. When opportunity knocks on the door of someone with an open mind, that person will answer the door and investigate the challenge. They’ll not only open the door, but they’ll walk down that path and consider if they even want to return the way they came. Someone with a closed mind will not do any of these things. Simply give yourself more opportunities for luck to occur.

It is relatively easy to identify someone who has a high level of openness; this is the person who doesn’t say no to anything, whether you suggest it or they do. Let’s say you want to go skydiving, but you want to go with a friend. The friend who is open to new ideas is the one you will call.

Open people tend to land in the luckiest circumstances. They end up with the best jobs because they make themselves aware of opportunities. They’ll be the person who always seems to have a funny story of coincidence or chance encounters that lead to amazing adventures. They also seem to be the people who end up backstage at concerts, with the autographs at ballparks, and as winners in contests. These things happen to them because they are open to opportunities, and they jump on them. They may not readily identify everything as a positive opportunity, but just as importantly, they don’t rule anything out.

If this attitude is not your strong suit, you may find yourself feeling luckier if you can simply relax and include more spontaneity in your life. Shift your perspective from why to why not? Accept invitations, try something unexpected and be willing to see the upside in an outcome you didn’t quite plan for.

Low Neuroticism

Finally, neuroticism is technically a state of being neurotic, which often includes anxiety, nervousness, and jealousy. Essentially, this is the trait of being high-strung and perpetually on guard. Unlike the other two traits, Wiseman found that those at the opposite end, with low-levels of neuroticism, were likely to have more luck in their lives than those at the high-level end.

Why is this?

Someone who shows low levels of neuroticism will be calmer and more relaxed than someone at the high end of the spectrum. When people are calm and focused, they become highly aware of their surroundings without being anxious. They do not scan the environment looking for threats, and tend to interpret neutral situations favorably, rather than find them intimidating. Someone in a relaxed state of mind allows themselves to be open to opportunity and even happiness, whereas someone who is perpetually anxious will be endlessly preoccupied with perceived slights, insults, and alarms. It comes down to a sense of expectation – a neurotic person expects bad things to happen, while a relaxed and non-neurotic one is calm, comfortable and broadly faces life with curiosity.

Someone with low neuroticism also sees what is happening around them, and is therefore often lucky. For example, while many people walk down the street listening to music or focusing on their phones, the low neuroticism person will often walk down the street, taking in the ambiance and the view. They don’t feel threatened by letting their guards down. This is why people with low neuroticism become so lucky — because they are paying attention to the world and choosing not to become closed off to it. When their minds are not preoccupied with anxiety, they are able to be present and explore what’s in front of them.

One of Wiseman’s studies clearly showed how openness and awareness can play a major factor in what we consider “luck.” Remember the newspaper experiment? Wiseman asked volunteers to count the number of photographs in a newspaper. On page two of the newspaper, there was a headline that read “STOP COUNTING—THERE ARE 43 PHOTOGRAPHS IN THIS NEWSPAPER.” Further down the page was another headline that read, “STOP COUNTING, TELL THE EXPERIMENTER YOU HAVE SEEN THIS AND WIN $250.”

Everyone in the study missed the headlines, but they did count all 43 photographs. Wiseman concluded that people were too focused (too neurotic) on the goal. They failed to relax and see the opportunities that were right in front of their faces. This goes to show that sometimes, our preconceived notions about how things should play out, and our need to control and fixate on tasks and a particular interpretation shut us out to the magical possibility of something better happening. Often, being lucky is simply a question of getting gout of your own way, and allowing that luck to find you!

Even though these three personality traits contribute to lucky events, the real reason people tend to be lucky is that they are involved in the world around them. Like Seneca said, it takes work. But Wiseman found that along with work, relaxation helps too. People who try too hard to find opportunities miss them more often than not because they end up making themselves blind to anything else. So, when it comes luck, a balance between being relaxed and alert helps. This is the balance between being open, calm, and extroverted.

Recall that luck is mostly random and is only somewhat self-generated. No one can predict what will happen to them, but a person can manage their reactions to those events. Being calm and relaxed, open to opportunities, and involved in life makes it easier to jump on those random events and become “lucky.” We cannot create good fortune, but we can invite it in.

In addition to these traits, optimism is a driver of good fortune. Optimists look at the bright side of life, seeking the bright side and anticipating that good things will happen. Lucky people tend to be optimists because they act like they are going to succeed. For instance, you will prepare for a long car ride far differently than you would prepare for a 10-minute ride. The way you view something drastically changes your actions.

Along with adding optimism to your daily routine, it is helpful to develop a sense of humility. If you are not afraid of being embarrassed in unexpected situations, then you will be open and free to try new things. By being calm and accepting that you might fail, you will be surprised by the good things that come your way. If you are instead defensiveness and afraid of judgment and rejection, you will probably close yourself off from most chances for luck because the cost (embarrassment) simply won’t be worth the benefit (an opportunity). A little bit of vulnerability can make you far luckier if you are just willing to take a leap of faith more frequently.

Take, for example, the professional baseball player. Every time a professional baseball player goes up to bat, he has a roughly 72% chance of failing in front of hundreds of thousands of people on TV and in the stadium. But he expects it and is okay with the potential for failure. If the baseball player did not take that chance of failure, he could never become the hero who hits the big home run to win the game. At the plate, the batter has to be calm, optimistic, vulnerable, and completely ready to accept failure. This also underlies openness.

Optimism means you resist labelling outcomes as failures simply because they weren’t what you wanted, and instead see how every change in your circumstances could be welcomed as a positive opportunity for something new. Sometimes, we are so focused on what has gone wrong that we don’t see a great chance sitting right in front of us!

Finally, you can change your luck by being proactive. Being lucky involves more than just showing up; you actually have to get engaged in life. You have to search for opportunities, because they will not land in your lap if you are not out there seeking them (well, they might, but waiting for them alone is not going to make them happen any faster than they were going to!).

Along with Seneca and Machiavelli’s words of wisdom, the Latin aphorism “Carpe Diem” is another excellent way to live a lucky life. This aphorism is a proclamation to live life to the fullest, grasping the present moment in front of you while you can. Instead of shying away for fear of looking silly or the possibility of failing, lucky people try new things and give it their best shot. They act where others are hesitant, or unprepared, fearful, or still ruminating over the past.

When you get involved with life, sometimes you win, and sometimes you lose. But do you skip taking a vacation because you are afraid of the small chance the plane could crash with you on it? If you don’t get on the plane, then you do not get to see the world. If you do not buy the lottery card, then you cannot win the $1 million prize. If we let fear keep us back, then we miss out on all of the wonderful things that could happen. The old “shoulda-coulda-woulda” syndrome.

Luck doesn’t come to those people who said, “I wish I would have taken that job,” or “I should have gone on that date,” or “If only I could have another chance, I would do it differently.” How could it? No lucky break is so powerful that it will barge into your life even though you’re doing your best to shut it out.

No, luck comes to people who take the job, go on the date, and do it the first time. Luck presents itself in random ways, and it is up to you to recognize it and accept the opportunity. The universe speaks in mysterious ways, and we cannot open our eyes to it if we are always worried about the plane crashing.

Richard Wiseman saw the power of mindset in the very different people in his research. In his psychological studies to understand why some people are luckier than others, he has presented strangers with opportunities that many would consider lucky. He has literally placed luck right in front of them in many situations. Some completely miss it. But others immediately spot the opportunity. It has nothing to do with “luck” but everything to do with being receptive to opportunity.

Lucky thought patterns

Being extroverted, open-minded, relaxed and positive will mean you are luckier. But lucky people don’t just possess certain traits, they also demonstrate specific patterns of thinking and ways of looking at the world. Remember, though, that this is not quite the same as practicing the law of attraction or indulging in wishful thinking. Rather, your attitudes and beliefs are what cause particular kinds of behaviors in you, and it’s these behaviors that lead to an optimal relationship with randomness and chance in the world around you.

The first thought pattern that we’ll consider may seem counterintuitive: karma.

Luck and karma

In Buddhist and Hindu thought, karma is a belief that people’s “fortunes” are, in sum, a total of their previous actions and deeds, typically actions that occurred in a previous incarnation. Karma is the law of cause and effect, and the word literally means action or deed. While the Western interpretation of this concept tends towards the moralistic, and sees outcomes as either rewards or punishments, the karmic conception sees results as neither good nor bad. Instead, the law is seen neutrally, a little like the law of gravity. If we act in certain ways, we set external events in motion. Who we are today rests entirely on the decisions and actions we have made in the past.

You might be wondering – doesn’t this idea directly contradict the idea of random chance and luck?

Well, yes. But recall that we are examining certain outlooks and mental mindsets that are functional, not considering their truth or accuracy. Just as we saw that believing you are lucky tends to make you so (without magically changing the material facts of the universe), believing in karma may be a way to prime yourself mentally for a more serendipitous life.

How? Recall that people who have an extrinsic locus of control, and especially those that see luck as fleeting, will adopt a passive, apathetic and resigned orientation to life. They will not take action because, well, there’s no point. Effort is not rewarded, and benefits are bestowed randomly. However, this mindset leads to us forfeiting our ability to act and change our worlds.

If you believe in karma, though, you will take action very seriously. If, to you, the universe seems ordered on consistent and logical principles of cause and effect, you will take care of the causes you are creating, lest you get an unwanted effect. In other words, you will behave in the best possible way to bring about good things in your life.

If someone believes, “If I do good deeds, more good luck will come my way,” then how will they act? They’ll likely do good deeds. They may help those in need, speak with kindness, and forgive wrongs. They’ll try to bravely endure adversity and do their best in every situation. They’ll try to redeem negative patterns from the past, learn from mistakes and overcome their limitations. You can see where this is going!

Around: 2004

While luck and karma seem like opposites, the Buddhists do recognize the power of chance events – but they also know that we always have agency, and that our conditioning, our imprints from the past, and the momentum from the actions we’ve taken also play a massive role.

When you act from a belief that everything you do either takes you closer to or further from an enlightened state, you adopt an internal locus of control and behave with extreme optimism. You choose those behaviors that are most likely to win you the cooperation, respect and help of those around you – i.e., being kind, compassionate and generous. More than that, you will take responsibility for your action, and not grow apathetic or lose hope.

One day you forgive a colleague for an insult, telling yourself that everyone gets what they deserve in the end. Two years later, that colleague is in another job and now in the perfect position to help you in your career – and they remember your kindness and want to pay it back. Now, was it the law of karma that got this lucky result, or was it the belief in the law of karma, and your subsequent choice to act with forgiveness?

Luck and resilience

If you keep showing up and don’t get discouraged, you will encounter more opportunities, and it’s more likely that one of those opportunities will develop into success. Someone may go to 10 auditions and get nowhere, and decide to quit completely. Another person may also go to 10 auditions, and find their lucky break on the 11th. They are not luckier than the first person; they just held out for longer.

The saying goes that the master has failed more times than the beginner has even tried. The only difference between them is determination. While someone might envy the person who was lucky enough to have their book snatched up by a publisher, they may not notice that that person has been sending their manuscripts to publishers for years, and getting mountains of rejection letters. They carried on submitting manuscripts long after most people gave up because they had “no luck.”

To stay dedicated in the face of adversity of challenge requires resilience. And while this seems on the surface like a character trait, it’s more of a belief that goes something like, “I can handle this. Better things are coming.” Like the belief in karma, believing that our actions will eventually be rewarded is also a key part of staying dedicated.

It comes down to action. We cannot control random chance events, but what we can control, we can do so via our concrete actions in the real world. It follows then that the person who can sustain useful action for as long as possible will see more luck come their way than the person who acts a little, but gives up. Many successful people will bristle slightly at the suggestion that they’ve been lucky, because they know that the person saying so has not seen the sleepless nights, the hard work, the failures, and the persistence behind the “luck.”

Resilience does not mean that someone is better able to cope with adversity, or has more stamina. It does not mean that they have some secret ability that others don’t. All it means is that they have an optimal way of perceiving failure and challenge. People who are resilient get their energy from the fact that they have faith in their own abilities. Dr Ginsburg is an expert on child development and the subject of resilience in the face of trauma, and he finds that there are 7 parts to having grit and being strong in the face of trouble:

Competence (“I know how to do this”)

Confidence (“I can do this”)

Connection (“I’m not doing this alone”)

Character (“I’m a good person with high self-esteem”)

Contribution (“I have a part to play in the world”)

Coping (“I can survive stress”)

Control (“I am in charge of my actions and decisions”)

In fact, if you read the above statements out loud, it’s hard not to stand a little taller and feel like you’ll be OK, no matter what!

Luck and learning

Finally, while we’re on the topic of taking action and taking charge, let’s mention the role of learning in creating more luck in your life. We’ve seen that an external locus of control and a resigned attitude will always fail to make the best of opportunities. Again and again, it seems that the path to a luckier life is in what you do, and the decisions you make.

But of course, indiscriminate or even useless action won’t get you anyway. Action, if it’s to bring us into more contact with beneficial chance encounters, needs to make sense. Lucky people don’t just act and then close their eyes and wish for the best. They act, notice the effect their actions have had, and adjust accordingly.

Always be aware of your circumstances and how they are changing with the choices you make. Look carefully at what is actually bringing you luck, and what is just a useless gesture, like crossing your fingers and hoping passively for a miracle. See what works, then do whatever you can to create those same conditions again. In other words, be intelligent about the way you coax and invite fortuitous events into your world.

Lucky people engage with the results of their actions and notice what works. And, because they have faith in their abilities and believe that their actions matter, they are ready and willing to adjust, adapt, evolve or switch things up when needed. It could be as simple as noticing that you often get a coffee on the house when you go to your favorite café in the morning, and a particular barista is behind the counter. So that’s when you go, and that's how you get more free coffees in your life.

It could be realizing that every successful relationship you’ve ever had has been with someone you met through friends, and not online. Now, by shifting where you focus your energies when finding a mate, you apparently increase your “luck” and find someone amazing faster. In this way, learning from what works and what doesn’t is a way to take a lucky break and run with it, essentially learning how to be luckier. If you get a heads up on a brilliant new available property that’s not yet been advertised, and you nab that property before anyone else, you might realize, “wait a second. When you have good relationships with people in the know, you can get a lucky break without much effort.” How much luck could you find for yourself in the world if you consistently applied this lesson, and befriended those people who would also have inside information when it counted?

In this case, the thought pattern is, “XYZ worked! Now how can I make that happen again?” This train of thought takes optimism and gratitude (to recognize when you’ve been lucky), awareness (to notice how and why it happened), and proactive self-belief (the faith that if you take the right actions, you’ll get a similar result). What it doesn’t take is a belief in dumb luck and a thought that goes, “XYZ worked! What a fluke. Well, that was nice, but I wonder when the next disaster will happen…”

Wiseman’s three personality traits for luck can be more accurately said to create situations for luck to thrive. And believing in karma, having resilience, or being ready to learn and adapt also creates the mindset that invites more luck in. You can embody these traits and thought patterns yourself, in small ways – or you can deliberately cultivate a mindset that amplifies the negative and makes sure that when opportunities come, you never see or grasp them!

Seneca was on to something when he realized that recognizing opportunities is the key to finding luck. It happens when you seize the moment and don’t let fear get in the way. Believe in yourself, take action, and learn to master what works. Relax, stay calm, look around, and take the chance when the chance arrives.

Summary:

• Seneca famously said, “luck is where preparation meets opportunity.” There is plenty we can do to prepare ourselves so that we are ready to notice and seize new opportunities that emerge, and make ourselves more “lucky.”

• There are three main traits associated with being a lucky person. The first is extroversion, which leads us to engage with others socially, speak out, make connections and win others over. This will naturally create more opportunities for help, random connections, or new information that can spell a lucky break.

• The second trait is open-mindedness, which is a receptive, spontaneous state of mind that approaches life with curiosity rather than fear, bias or expectation. With openness to new experiences, we say yes to new opportunities and encounter more life experiences that have the chance to evolve favorably.

• The third trait is low neuroticism. When we are relaxed and not acting from fear, we see solutions, think outside the box and encounter unexpected positive outcomes – and we don’t jeopardize any good luck we do encounter!

• There are three thought patterns associated with being lucky. Believing in karma means you take your actions seriously and are more likely to have a proactive internal locus of control, and treat others well – naturally leading to more luck opportunities.

• Belief in your own competence and ability to withstand adversity creates resilience, meaning you take beneficial action for longer, which means you increase your chances of a positive outcome.

• Finally, lucky people learn what works and deliberately try to recreate those conditions that they know have led to luck for them in the past.