The Secret of Luck: Why Some People Have All the Luck

Why do some people have all the luck while others are perpetually unlucky? Professor Richard Wiseman of the University of Hertfordshire was determined to get to the scientific bottom of the phenomenon of luck, and what he discovered may surprise you:

I placed advertisements in national newspapers asking for people who felt consistently lucky or unlucky to contact me.

Hundreds of extraordinary men and women volunteered for my research and over the years, have been interviewed by me. I have monitored their lives and had them take part in experiments. The results reveal that although these people have almost no insight into the causes of their luck, their thoughts and behaviour are responsible for much of their good and bad fortune. Take the case of seemingly chance opportunities. Lucky people consistently encounter such opportunities, whereas unlucky people do not.

I carried out a simple experiment to discover whether this was due to differences in their ability to spot such opportunities. I gave both lucky and unlucky people a newspaper, and asked them to look through it and tell me how many photographs were inside. I had secretly placed a large message halfway through the newspaper saying: 'Tell the experimenter you have seen this and win $50'.

This message took up half of the page and was written in type that was more than two inches high. It was staring everyone straight in the face, but the unlucky people tended to miss it and the lucky people tended to spot it.

Unlucky people are generally more tense than lucky people, and this anxiety disrupts their ability to notice the unexpected.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/3896391.cms | Richard Wiseman's official website | His book: The Luck Factor


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Someone said that: Luck is when preparedness meets the opportunity.
I think that says everything. If you are focused and working hard on something than you will see the opportunity among the coincidences.
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I used to be a very scientific kinda guy, there was no such thing as a magical thing called luck that controlled our destiny in life. I now know that is complete bull crap.
Me and my poker game are living proof.
there are 3 types of people in this world those with positive luck, those with neutral luck and those with negative luck.
If you have positive luck you wont win everytime but you will win more than average.
If you have neutral luck you will win and lose about an even amount of time.
and if you have negative luck you will sometimes win but on average you will lose far more then you will win even if the odds were always 50/50. Its just how it is. I have proven it over and over.
By far most people have neutral luck, then us born losers. The smallest percentage are the positive luck people. Know were you stand and except your fate.
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Yeah, Val? I don't think you quite get it. All these people who 'almost always win at gambling', they go to vegas and literally are worth billions of dollars right? I mean, those machines will spit out money over and over again so long as you keep scoring.

Also, in regards to many games people consider 'chance' based (Poker, for instance). I've got rather a great deal of experience there, having been a professional game designer and going on the circuit as it were.

When people with no skill lose, they claim to be unlucky.
When people with great skill lose, they dwell on the plethora of mistakes they made.

Just consider the approach each is making. Why is the good player good? Because he actually analyzed his mistakes, and attempted to avoid them.
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There's no secret to luck.
As a professional astrologer I can tell 'when' and many times 'what form' the luck will take.
For example, most everyone, at some time in their life, has come across someone who almost always wins at gambling or other games of chance and you may have wondered why.
It will always clearly show in their astrological chart if you have the correct date, time and place of birth. (FYI: this is NOT "sunsign" stuff; in fact it has nothing to do with your 'sunsign'...)
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This makes so much sense. It does no good to acquire the education, skills, and determination to do well, and then miss every opportunity that comes along because you weren't paying attention, ironicaly because you were trying too hard. The key would seem to be to let go a bit and enjoy life. I hate to paraphrase Ferris Bueller but "Luck goes by pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you're gonna miss it." I have noticed that when my stress level goes up, my luck goes down, but I never put the two together as cause and effect. This study gives me a clue as to why. Thanks!
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