Five successful people, ranging from a noted psychologist to a legendary tastemaker, describe their most startling (and most revealing) blunders.
1. Totally embarrass yourself.
After the publication of my book Reviving Ophelia, in 1994, I was invited to a prestigious party. I got all dressed up; I was so excited to make connections. I had a wonderful time and was elated as I was walking back to my car. Well, that is, until I felt something on the back of my skirt. While I had gotten dressed for the function, I had apparently sat on a stack of clean laundry, and a pair of underwear had affixed itself. I had spent the entire night that way! I was mortified, but at the end of the day, it just didn’t matter. I went to other similar events after that, and as far as I could tell, that incident didn’t change people’s impression of me one little bit.
I tend to think that we are all always one static-cling mishap away from looking like a total idiot—and believing that helps me keep gaffes in perspective. And, of course, these grand embarrassments eventually loosen their grip anyway, leaving you with an ace-in-the-hole story to crack up your friends with for years to come.
Mary Pipher, Ph.D., has been a psychotherapist for more than 30 years. Her latest book is Seeking Peace ($16, amazon.com).
2. Ruffle people’s feathers.
Years ago, when I began working at a business school, I sat in meetings quietly, afraid I would say the wrong thing. Some people spoke up and were scoffed at. I didn’t want that to happen to me, so I held my tongue. I soon realized that my silence implied that I was on board with whatever was being said. I started voicing my opinion, even on controversial subjects, regardless of how my comments would be received. Occasionally colleagues would roll their eyes, but I found that even those who disagreed with me came to respect me for not backing down. Sometimes my ideas will make me unpopular, sure, but that’s better than being a blank slate.
Mary C. Gentile, Ph.D., is a senior research scholar in business management at Babson College, in Wellesley, Massachusetts. She is the author of Giving Voice to Values ($26, amazon.com).
3. Follow trends blindly.
Looking back on my life, I find it hard to think of a fad I did not embrace. When glam rock glittered, I bleached my hair and wore a dangly earring. When punk rock raged, I donned black leather. Not until my 50s did I find my look—I call it Carnaby Street mod circa 1966—which allowed me to hop off the trend merry-go-round. But I am grateful for this process: It took a fashion odyssey to help me find out who I really am.
Simon Doonan has been the creative director of Barneys New York since 1986. He is the author of Eccentric Glamour ($15, amazon.com).
4. Be willing to fail—doing something you love.
In 1997 I had just graduated from law school (with tons of student-loan debt) and was interviewing for high-paying positions at big firms. The problem was, my heart wasn’t in it. So I took myself out of the running in order to build a small Internet publishing company with a friend. After a year of barely staying afloat, our venture went the way of a 404 ERROR message. I was broke and unemployed, and Sallie Mae was hot on my tail. I wondered what endeavor I should try next.
It sounds crazy, but once again I decided to throw caution to the wind and just do what I wanted. I began working as a trial attorney for the U.S. Department of Justice. Over the next few years, I held a wide array of fascinating jobs that I took because they captured my imagination: serving in the military, reporting from Iraq for the Washington Post, and, most recently, becoming a full-time author. Some might consider me flighty for changing careers so often, but I contend that the key to professional happiness is asking yourself two simple questions every single day: Are you passionate about what you do? And if not, what are you going to do instead?
Bill Murphy Jr. is the author of The Intelligent Entrepreneur ($27.50, amazon.com).
5. Carelessly put yourself at risk.
I’m a terrible skier, and I’m not being hard on myself when I say that. Small children and monkeys are more coordinated than I am. So it was with unbridled terror that I once found myself alone on a black-diamond ski trail in the middle of a blizzard. (Long story.) With nobody to carry me down, I didn’t have a lot of options. So I wept—and had a fairly supplicating talk with God about my imminent death. (I believe I made a series of promises involving church attendance, reduced alcohol intake, and forgoing swearing.) And, finally, I skied—slowly, with zero elegance, and whimpering like an infant the entire time—down the mountain. It wasn’t pretty, but I did it.
The point being, sometimes you have to get in over your head to realize that you’re not really in over your head at all. Two years ago, I got a job that I desperately wanted but had no idea how to do. So I took it, endured several panic attacks, and eventually learned the ropes. My choices were either figure it out or get fired. The bottom line: Most of the time, a high-risk situation won’t kill you, because you are stronger than you think. And it’s never a bad thing to be reminded of that.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Friday, September 17, 2010
Increase the Luck - and Love- in Your Life
We all know a woman who seems to be more fortunate in the guy department than the rest of us. For me, it’s my friend Anne. She moved to New York right after college, got a job, and, there, she met Paul, a sweet mountain-man type who — by pure coincidence — was from her East Coast hometown, had attended her smallish state university, shared several of her friends, and enjoyed her favorite outdoorsy activities. Four years later, they’re still happily together and living in a quaint one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn. “It was all meant to be!” she told me over drinks. “Everything happens for a reason.” Theirs is a great story, no question, but I couldn’t get on board with her theory that fate had a hand in the matter. The way I figured it, she was probably just really, really lucky. Because if everyone is fated to have an amazing love life, wouldn’t we all be dating Ryan Gosling right now?
The Frisky: 20 ways to feel more confident about your relationship
“It is totally fate,” says Kate, 29. “I met my husband on a plane from Boston to New York. The flight had been cancelled and rescheduled three times, and I was drunk as a skunk from nervousness about flying. I made him hold my hand for the landing, and then we shared a cab and went out for a drink in the East Village afterward.” Aw.
But the universe is not always so kind. (Example: Snooki’s terrible luck on just about every episode of “Jersey Shore.”) “I know more girls who are consistently unlucky than lucky,” says Erin, 29. “Some of us make smarter decisions than others; however, some very earnest and well-intentioned lady friends of mine seem to never win — like myself. Overall I really do have great memories of most relationships. I think the universe just didn’t have it in the stars for some reason or another.”
The Frisky: She cheated, how do I move on?
Chances are, you already know a few key principles that’ll increase your odds of building a solid relationship, like stepping outside your apartment regularly or, say, not dating John Mayer. But beyond that, some of us need an extra cosmic push, which is where a little bit of luck could help.
We scoured the country and asked love experts whether luck in love really exists—and how you can skew the magnetic pulls of the universe in your favor. Before you read on, though, you’ve got to ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do you?
Expert #1: Sloan Bella, intuitive medium and metaphysician, says you should quit that dating servic e to be lucky in love :
Does luck in love really exist? “I believe luck is tied to what you build up in past lives and what you bring into this life. What we perceive as being lucky right now may not actually be from this life—it may be from something they earned. So, luck is a focus of earning a gift in this life, and then having the free will to do with it what you will. You could still screw it up, technically.”
How can you increase your luck in love?
Never act out of fear. “The secret is to stay open to meeting people and what’s to come to you. Be in the moment. Desperation is fear. People who go out and date randomly: That’s a little bit of fear, don’t you think? The universe is about being open to your opportunities so you recognize them.”
Stop online dating. “Never join a dating service. What the hell are you doing? I just think it’s stupid. I think it’s lazy. If you’re in a working environment, a medical environment, a home environment, wherever you are, you can meet people. And if you’re having trouble meeting people, you need to teach yourself how to be more open to communicate with people.”
The Frisky: Online dating negatives
Expert #2: Bianca Acevedo, social neuroscientist, University of California, Santa Barbara on the science of being lucky in love:
Does luck in love really exist? “I don’t know that my research could answer that, but engaging in other rewarding activities and other rewarding relationships [other than the dating scene] may help. By being happy and satisfied in their lives, people may attract a mate in that way.”
How can you increase your luck in love?
If you’re already coupled, embark on a challenge with your partner. “There’s a series of studies that indicate that engaging in novel and challenging activities increases feelings of romantic love. What that means depends on the couple: If you’re not the outdoorsy type, go on a hike, or even taking a walk in the woods could seem like something new and somewhat challenging.”
The Frisky: 9 ways women bruise men’s egos without even knowing it
Expert #3: Cathlee n McCandless, feng shui expert at San Diego Feng Shui , on creating your blueprint for love:
Does luck in love really exist? “I don’t believe in luck. Luck implies something is random, and I don’t think anything in life is random. There are ways we can use a blueprint. There are ways we can deliberately enhance our surroundings to create the life we want to have.”
How can you increase your luck in love?
Decorate your home with pairs of items. “Ladies, go through your space and notice what images or items you have on display that depict single items: pictures of one person, one cat. If you have one candle, put another next to it. If you’re a single mother, start to pair up the toys. If you have a painting with a single image, you want one with two images. Go to an art website and type in ‘pair’ or ‘couple.’ This creates a template to your brain that says ‘pair = good.’ ”
Set up your “partnership” corner. “Get a compass and find the southwest direction of your space. That area is associated with partnership. In traditional feng shui, the way to energize the southwest is with pairs of things made of earth: rock, stone, cement, pebbles. Rose quartz is associated with love, so that’s a traditional, nice thing to add.”
The Frisky: Why women should just ask men out on a date
Expert #4: Vanessa “Lady Maverick” Rousso, professional poker player with more than $3 million in winnings, on who has the best odds at being lucky in love:
Does luck in love really exist? “Luck is just another word for variance. You can have good luck, which is positive variance from expectations, or bad luck, which is simply negative variance from expectations. I don’t believe in ‘being lucky,’ per se. Although I will say that oftentimes when people are getting lucky or running well (in poker, life, or even love), they’re in a good mood, which in turn helps sow the seeds for more good things to happen for them, which can make them seem like a lucky person. That’s why good things generally happen for positive people. It’s also the danger in being a pessimistic or negative person: When things aren’t going well and you let it get to you, you actually breed further detriment to yourself by being negative, which can cloud your judgment and affect how/whether others want to be around you.”
How can you increase your luck in love?
Read your date to gauge his honesty. “People move their feet when they are uncomfortable, or being dishonest. This is rooted in the primal urge to ‘fight or flight’ when we sense danger. Since someone who is lying subconsciously senses a danger of being caught, their instincts kick in and their foot may move. This phenomenon occurs instinctually, and most people aren’t aware that they do it.”
The Frisky: 9 things not to break up over
Expert #5: Vinita Ling, Ph. D. candidate in social psychology, University of Hawaii at Manoa , believes better luck can come from being unavailable:
Does luck in love really exist?“Luck is really preparation meeting opportunity. What does it mean to be prepared? Knowing one’s self very well. Go out and do things: explore, experiment, have fun, let loose, and be yourself (even if being yourself means holing up in the physics section of a bookstore). The other part of the equation is opportunity. Create opportunities to meet people. That could mean taking a yoga class, attending your niece’s baptism, learning to make sushi, signing up for a tour of Indonesia. Make plans with those in your social circle regularly, and honor those commitments.”
How can you increase your luck in love?
Make yourself scarce. “Certain regions of the brain related to pleasure light up in the face of unexpected rewards, which, practically speaking, might serve as advice to young women to make themselves ‘unavailable’ on occasion — ideally, due to a rich and rewarding life — so that when they do become available, their presence and company serve as an unexpected and pleasant surprise.”
The Frisky: People who married objects
Expert #6: “Psychic Christina,” medium/health sensitive/clairvoyant in New York City , claims we are born with our luck:
Does luck in love really exist? “I don’t really believe in luck. I’m very into psychology and very much into energy. We all vibrate at different frequencies. People are born into different family situations, and they take a lot of patterns from those relationships with their families, and they act it out in adulthood. We need to be conscious and focused about it so we can make different choices.”
How can you increase your luck in love?
Change your focus. “We say ‘I don’t want someone who doesn’t have a job or isn’t available to me,’ et cetera. What we should be focusing on is what we do want. Keep talking about it, and keep visualizing it, and when you do, you start to feel it. You’re changing what you’re putting out, and it comes back to you. We all consist of kismet.”
The Frisky: 20 ways to feel more confident about your relationship
“It is totally fate,” says Kate, 29. “I met my husband on a plane from Boston to New York. The flight had been cancelled and rescheduled three times, and I was drunk as a skunk from nervousness about flying. I made him hold my hand for the landing, and then we shared a cab and went out for a drink in the East Village afterward.” Aw.
But the universe is not always so kind. (Example: Snooki’s terrible luck on just about every episode of “Jersey Shore.”) “I know more girls who are consistently unlucky than lucky,” says Erin, 29. “Some of us make smarter decisions than others; however, some very earnest and well-intentioned lady friends of mine seem to never win — like myself. Overall I really do have great memories of most relationships. I think the universe just didn’t have it in the stars for some reason or another.”
The Frisky: She cheated, how do I move on?
Chances are, you already know a few key principles that’ll increase your odds of building a solid relationship, like stepping outside your apartment regularly or, say, not dating John Mayer. But beyond that, some of us need an extra cosmic push, which is where a little bit of luck could help.
We scoured the country and asked love experts whether luck in love really exists—and how you can skew the magnetic pulls of the universe in your favor. Before you read on, though, you’ve got to ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do you?
Expert #1: Sloan Bella, intuitive medium and metaphysician, says you should quit that dating servic e to be lucky in love :
Does luck in love really exist? “I believe luck is tied to what you build up in past lives and what you bring into this life. What we perceive as being lucky right now may not actually be from this life—it may be from something they earned. So, luck is a focus of earning a gift in this life, and then having the free will to do with it what you will. You could still screw it up, technically.”
How can you increase your luck in love?
Never act out of fear. “The secret is to stay open to meeting people and what’s to come to you. Be in the moment. Desperation is fear. People who go out and date randomly: That’s a little bit of fear, don’t you think? The universe is about being open to your opportunities so you recognize them.”
Stop online dating. “Never join a dating service. What the hell are you doing? I just think it’s stupid. I think it’s lazy. If you’re in a working environment, a medical environment, a home environment, wherever you are, you can meet people. And if you’re having trouble meeting people, you need to teach yourself how to be more open to communicate with people.”
The Frisky: Online dating negatives
Expert #2: Bianca Acevedo, social neuroscientist, University of California, Santa Barbara on the science of being lucky in love:
Does luck in love really exist? “I don’t know that my research could answer that, but engaging in other rewarding activities and other rewarding relationships [other than the dating scene] may help. By being happy and satisfied in their lives, people may attract a mate in that way.”
How can you increase your luck in love?
If you’re already coupled, embark on a challenge with your partner. “There’s a series of studies that indicate that engaging in novel and challenging activities increases feelings of romantic love. What that means depends on the couple: If you’re not the outdoorsy type, go on a hike, or even taking a walk in the woods could seem like something new and somewhat challenging.”
The Frisky: 9 ways women bruise men’s egos without even knowing it
Expert #3: Cathlee n McCandless, feng shui expert at San Diego Feng Shui , on creating your blueprint for love:
Does luck in love really exist? “I don’t believe in luck. Luck implies something is random, and I don’t think anything in life is random. There are ways we can use a blueprint. There are ways we can deliberately enhance our surroundings to create the life we want to have.”
How can you increase your luck in love?
Decorate your home with pairs of items. “Ladies, go through your space and notice what images or items you have on display that depict single items: pictures of one person, one cat. If you have one candle, put another next to it. If you’re a single mother, start to pair up the toys. If you have a painting with a single image, you want one with two images. Go to an art website and type in ‘pair’ or ‘couple.’ This creates a template to your brain that says ‘pair = good.’ ”
Set up your “partnership” corner. “Get a compass and find the southwest direction of your space. That area is associated with partnership. In traditional feng shui, the way to energize the southwest is with pairs of things made of earth: rock, stone, cement, pebbles. Rose quartz is associated with love, so that’s a traditional, nice thing to add.”
The Frisky: Why women should just ask men out on a date
Expert #4: Vanessa “Lady Maverick” Rousso, professional poker player with more than $3 million in winnings, on who has the best odds at being lucky in love:
Does luck in love really exist? “Luck is just another word for variance. You can have good luck, which is positive variance from expectations, or bad luck, which is simply negative variance from expectations. I don’t believe in ‘being lucky,’ per se. Although I will say that oftentimes when people are getting lucky or running well (in poker, life, or even love), they’re in a good mood, which in turn helps sow the seeds for more good things to happen for them, which can make them seem like a lucky person. That’s why good things generally happen for positive people. It’s also the danger in being a pessimistic or negative person: When things aren’t going well and you let it get to you, you actually breed further detriment to yourself by being negative, which can cloud your judgment and affect how/whether others want to be around you.”
How can you increase your luck in love?
Read your date to gauge his honesty. “People move their feet when they are uncomfortable, or being dishonest. This is rooted in the primal urge to ‘fight or flight’ when we sense danger. Since someone who is lying subconsciously senses a danger of being caught, their instincts kick in and their foot may move. This phenomenon occurs instinctually, and most people aren’t aware that they do it.”
The Frisky: 9 things not to break up over
Expert #5: Vinita Ling, Ph. D. candidate in social psychology, University of Hawaii at Manoa , believes better luck can come from being unavailable:
Does luck in love really exist?“Luck is really preparation meeting opportunity. What does it mean to be prepared? Knowing one’s self very well. Go out and do things: explore, experiment, have fun, let loose, and be yourself (even if being yourself means holing up in the physics section of a bookstore). The other part of the equation is opportunity. Create opportunities to meet people. That could mean taking a yoga class, attending your niece’s baptism, learning to make sushi, signing up for a tour of Indonesia. Make plans with those in your social circle regularly, and honor those commitments.”
How can you increase your luck in love?
Make yourself scarce. “Certain regions of the brain related to pleasure light up in the face of unexpected rewards, which, practically speaking, might serve as advice to young women to make themselves ‘unavailable’ on occasion — ideally, due to a rich and rewarding life — so that when they do become available, their presence and company serve as an unexpected and pleasant surprise.”
The Frisky: People who married objects
Expert #6: “Psychic Christina,” medium/health sensitive/clairvoyant in New York City , claims we are born with our luck:
Does luck in love really exist? “I don’t really believe in luck. I’m very into psychology and very much into energy. We all vibrate at different frequencies. People are born into different family situations, and they take a lot of patterns from those relationships with their families, and they act it out in adulthood. We need to be conscious and focused about it so we can make different choices.”
How can you increase your luck in love?
Change your focus. “We say ‘I don’t want someone who doesn’t have a job or isn’t available to me,’ et cetera. What we should be focusing on is what we do want. Keep talking about it, and keep visualizing it, and when you do, you start to feel it. You’re changing what you’re putting out, and it comes back to you. We all consist of kismet.”
How to Get Lucky
Scientific proof that you make your own breaks.
For centuries, people have recognized the power of luck and have done whatever they could to try seizing it. Take knocking on wood, thought to date back to pagan rituals aimed at eliciting help from powerful tree gods. We still do it today, though few, if any, of us worship tree gods. So why do we pass this and other superstitions down from generation to generation? The answer lies in the power of luck.
Live a Charmed Life
To investigate scientifically why some people are consistently lucky and others aren't, I advertised in national periodicals for volunteers of both varieties. Four hundred men and women from all walks of life -- ages 18 to 84 -- responded.
Over a ten-year period, I interviewed these volunteers, asked them to complete diaries, personality questionnaires and IQ tests, and invited them to my laboratory for experiments. Lucky people, I found, get that way via some basic principles -- seizing chance opportunities; creating self-fulfilling prophecies through positive expectations; and adopting a resilient attitude that turns bad luck around.
Open Your Mind
Consider chance opportunities: Lucky people regularly have them; unlucky people don't. To determine why, I gave lucky and unlucky people a newspaper, and asked them to tell me how many photos were inside. On average, unlucky people spent about two minutes on this exercise; lucky people spent seconds. Why? Because on the paper's second page -- in big type -- was the message "Stop counting: There are 43 photographs in this newspaper." Lucky people tended to spot the message. Unlucky ones didn't. I put a second one halfway through the paper: "Stop counting, tell the experimenter you have seen this and win $250." Again, the unlucky people missed it.
The lesson: Unlucky people miss chance opportunities because they're too busy looking for something else. Lucky people see what is there rather than just what they're looking for.
This is only part of the story. Many of my lucky participants tried hard to add variety to their lives. Before making important decisions, one altered his route to work. Another described a way of meeting people. He noticed that at parties he usually talked to the same type of person. To change this, he thought of a color and then spoke only to guests wearing that color -- women in red, say, or men in black.
Does this technique work? Well, imagine living in the center of an apple orchard. Each day you must collect a basket of apples. At first, it won't matter where you look. The entire orchard will have apples. Gradually, it becomes harder to find apples in places you've visited before. If you go to new parts of the orchard each time, the odds of finding apples will increase dramatically. It is exactly the same with luck.
Relish the Upside
Another important principle revolved around the way in which lucky and unlucky people deal with misfortune. Imagine representing your country in the Olympics. You compete, do well, and win a bronze medal. Now imagine a second Olympics. This time you do even better and win a silver medal. How happy do you think you'd feel? Most of us think we'd be happier after winning the silver medal.
But research suggests athletes who win bronze medals are actually happier. This is because silver medalists think that if they'd performed slightly better, they might have won a gold medal. In contrast, bronze medalists focus on how if they'd performed slightly worse, they wouldn't have won anything. Psychologists call this ability to imagine what might have happened, rather than what actually happened, "counter-factual" thinking.
To find out if lucky people use counter-factual thinking to ease the impact of misfortune, I asked my subjects to imagine being in a bank. Suddenly, an armed robber enters and fires a shot that hits them in the arms. Unlucky people tended to say this would be their bad luck to be in the bank during the robbery. Lucky people said it could have been worse: "You could have been shot in the head." This kind of thinking makes people feel better about themselves, keeps expectations high, and increases the likelihood of continuing to live a lucky life.
Learn to Be Lucky
Finally, I created a series of experiments examining whether thought and behavior can enhance good fortune.
First came one-on-one meetings, during which participants completed questionnaires that measured their luck and their satisfaction with six key areas of their lives. I then outlined the main principles of luck, and described techniques designed to help participants react like lucky people. For instance, they were taught how to be more open to opportunities around them, how to break routines, and how to deal with bad luck by imagining things being worse. They were asked to carry out specific exercises for a month and then report back to me.
The results were dramatic: 80 percent were happier and more satisfied with their lives -- and luckier. One unlucky subject said that after adjusting her attitude -- expecting good fortune, not dwelling on the negative -- her bad luck had vanished. One day, she went shopping and found a dress she liked. But she didn't buy it, and when she returned to the store in a week, it was gone. Instead of slinking away disappointed, she looked around and found a better dress -- for less. Events like this made her a much happier person.
Her experience shows how thoughts and behavior affect the good and bad fortune we encounter. It proves that the most elusive of holy grails -- an effective way of taking advantage of the power of luck -- is available to us all.
For centuries, people have recognized the power of luck and have done whatever they could to try seizing it. Take knocking on wood, thought to date back to pagan rituals aimed at eliciting help from powerful tree gods. We still do it today, though few, if any, of us worship tree gods. So why do we pass this and other superstitions down from generation to generation? The answer lies in the power of luck.
Live a Charmed Life
To investigate scientifically why some people are consistently lucky and others aren't, I advertised in national periodicals for volunteers of both varieties. Four hundred men and women from all walks of life -- ages 18 to 84 -- responded.
Over a ten-year period, I interviewed these volunteers, asked them to complete diaries, personality questionnaires and IQ tests, and invited them to my laboratory for experiments. Lucky people, I found, get that way via some basic principles -- seizing chance opportunities; creating self-fulfilling prophecies through positive expectations; and adopting a resilient attitude that turns bad luck around.
Open Your Mind
Consider chance opportunities: Lucky people regularly have them; unlucky people don't. To determine why, I gave lucky and unlucky people a newspaper, and asked them to tell me how many photos were inside. On average, unlucky people spent about two minutes on this exercise; lucky people spent seconds. Why? Because on the paper's second page -- in big type -- was the message "Stop counting: There are 43 photographs in this newspaper." Lucky people tended to spot the message. Unlucky ones didn't. I put a second one halfway through the paper: "Stop counting, tell the experimenter you have seen this and win $250." Again, the unlucky people missed it.
The lesson: Unlucky people miss chance opportunities because they're too busy looking for something else. Lucky people see what is there rather than just what they're looking for.
This is only part of the story. Many of my lucky participants tried hard to add variety to their lives. Before making important decisions, one altered his route to work. Another described a way of meeting people. He noticed that at parties he usually talked to the same type of person. To change this, he thought of a color and then spoke only to guests wearing that color -- women in red, say, or men in black.
Does this technique work? Well, imagine living in the center of an apple orchard. Each day you must collect a basket of apples. At first, it won't matter where you look. The entire orchard will have apples. Gradually, it becomes harder to find apples in places you've visited before. If you go to new parts of the orchard each time, the odds of finding apples will increase dramatically. It is exactly the same with luck.
Relish the Upside
Another important principle revolved around the way in which lucky and unlucky people deal with misfortune. Imagine representing your country in the Olympics. You compete, do well, and win a bronze medal. Now imagine a second Olympics. This time you do even better and win a silver medal. How happy do you think you'd feel? Most of us think we'd be happier after winning the silver medal.
But research suggests athletes who win bronze medals are actually happier. This is because silver medalists think that if they'd performed slightly better, they might have won a gold medal. In contrast, bronze medalists focus on how if they'd performed slightly worse, they wouldn't have won anything. Psychologists call this ability to imagine what might have happened, rather than what actually happened, "counter-factual" thinking.
To find out if lucky people use counter-factual thinking to ease the impact of misfortune, I asked my subjects to imagine being in a bank. Suddenly, an armed robber enters and fires a shot that hits them in the arms. Unlucky people tended to say this would be their bad luck to be in the bank during the robbery. Lucky people said it could have been worse: "You could have been shot in the head." This kind of thinking makes people feel better about themselves, keeps expectations high, and increases the likelihood of continuing to live a lucky life.
Learn to Be Lucky
Finally, I created a series of experiments examining whether thought and behavior can enhance good fortune.
First came one-on-one meetings, during which participants completed questionnaires that measured their luck and their satisfaction with six key areas of their lives. I then outlined the main principles of luck, and described techniques designed to help participants react like lucky people. For instance, they were taught how to be more open to opportunities around them, how to break routines, and how to deal with bad luck by imagining things being worse. They were asked to carry out specific exercises for a month and then report back to me.
The results were dramatic: 80 percent were happier and more satisfied with their lives -- and luckier. One unlucky subject said that after adjusting her attitude -- expecting good fortune, not dwelling on the negative -- her bad luck had vanished. One day, she went shopping and found a dress she liked. But she didn't buy it, and when she returned to the store in a week, it was gone. Instead of slinking away disappointed, she looked around and found a better dress -- for less. Events like this made her a much happier person.
Her experience shows how thoughts and behavior affect the good and bad fortune we encounter. It proves that the most elusive of holy grails -- an effective way of taking advantage of the power of luck -- is available to us all.
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