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Be lucky - it's an easy skill to learn

telegraph.co.uk

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Re: Be lucky - it's an easy skill to learn

#2

Post by JacobAldridge »

I remember this article from when it first came out - in 2003 - and have used the newspaper / picture story as an example countless times.

If you don't believe you create the reality you experience, think again. Blaming external factors, like luck, just absolves us of our own responsibility to ourselves.

Re: Be lucky - it's an easy skill to learn

#4

Post by RevRal »

Don't take luck personally; there isn't enough luck out there for everyone to be as lucky as Bill Gates.

There are a lot of things out there that guarantee success. Low risk, and time consuming. Most people are too scared of high risk endeavors to attempt anything high risk more than a few times in their entire lives.

Re: Be lucky - it's an easy skill to learn

#5

Post by ccarpenterg »

lionheart wrote: post #3

Well, lucky people could just be more naturally observant. It seems that would be a useful trait.

This is more about anxiety than luck. It seems the 'unlucky' volunteers had a higher level of anxiety and thus a decreased ability to detect opportunities.

Anxiety and stress can interfere in many activities.

Re: Be lucky - it's an easy skill to learn

#6

Post by modelic3 »

ccarpenterg wrote: post #5
lionheart wrote: post #3

Well, lucky people could just be more naturally observant. It seems that would be a useful trait.

This is more about anxiety than luck. It seems the 'unlucky' volunteers had a higher level of anxiety and thus a decreased ability to detect opportunities. Anxiety and stress can interfere in many activities.

Totally true. Anxiety saps all kinds of brain power.

Re: Be lucky - it's an easy skill to learn

#7

Post by codexon »

He has convolved luck with happiness.

If someone believes he is happy, he is happy.

If someone believes he is the lucky, he is not necessarily lucky.

Seeing the world rose colored glasses does not make you any luckier, it makes you happier. By only asking for those that self-identified as lucky or unlucky, he has failed to isolate the variable of happiness.

Here is an excerpt from the book which points out the author's faulty reasoning.

"On average both `lucky' and `unlucky' participants lost about £2.50. Wiseman's conclusion: `The results indicated that luck wasn't due to psychic ability'."

In this quote it is revealed that the people who "felt" lucky really weren't lucky. In fact, they were about as lucky as the people who felt unlucky. The people who were "lucky" also expected to win twice as much as people who felt "unlucky". So his whole experiment is flawed.

This is the type of optimism hawked by many self-help gurus. But then again, it doesn't really matter if your situation really has improved with these "tips" as the Romans found out with church and bread and circuses. Keep the plebs amused and fearful and they will willfully ignore everything else.

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