Luck: How to become a lightning rod for more opportunities
Chuck Frey
B2B Content Strategist ? Brand Strategist ? Digital Strategist ? Entrepreneur ? Mind Mapping Expert
Like the device that attracts and channels lightning during a storm, you can increase the odds that luck will strike in your life.
There’s a popular perception that luck is a random, unpredictable, uncontrollable event that just happens to you.
But a growing body of work suggests the opposite - that luck or serendipity can be arranged or engineered. In other words, there are many things you can do to position yourself so that you get significantly luckier, more often.
The Roman philosopher Seneca once said that "luck is what happens when preparedness meets opportunity." As I've nurtured a career and numerous side hustles over the years, this I can tell you that this mindset is abundantly true. I believe in it so strongly that I've written about it in this newsletter here and here.
Sahil Bloom, a popular blogger and podcaster who is focused on business, finance, technology, and entrepreneurship, recently took the deepest dive I've ever seen into this topic:
In this article, he presents 20 ideas to help you increase your "luck surface area."
First, a level set: What is luck, in Sahil's parlance? "Much of what we come to call 'luck' is actually the macro result of thousands of micro actions. Your daily habits put you in a position where 'luck' is more likely to strike."
To increase your exposure to new opportunities, he recommends doing two key things:
Remove the “black holes” (anti-luck) from your existence: These are the habits and practices that prevent us from experiencing lucky or serendipitous events. One source of anti-luck Bloom highlights is ruthlessly eliminating negative people from your life. They act like black holes, sucking up most of your energy and blinding you to opportunities around you.
The corollary to that is to surround yourself with positive, idea-oriented people who can inspire you and connect you to people and opportunities that matter. More exposure to new ideas and people, more luck. Simple.
As Sahil points out, "Pessimists see the doors that are closed. Optimists see the doors that are open—and probably kick down the closed doors!"
Purposefully take actions that position you for more opportunities: People who sit on the sidelines don't get lucky. You need to "get in the arena," he insists. You need to expand your network, hustle hard, follow your curiosity and maintain an open mind to the unexpected.
Sahil's luck-accelerating strategies include these:
Write in public: Publish your ideas and insights, which attracts other like-minded people.
Talk to strangers: "New relationships spark new ideas, insights, and opportunities."
Send more cold (unsolicited) emails: "Cold emails are a force multiplier for your efforts."
Spend more time in digital communities: In one of Sahil's podcasts, he emphasizes that the locus of sharing ideas has shifted from in-person networking events (thank you COVID!) to online communities that are focused around specific interests. They're amazing places to share and discover life-changing ideas - as well as build relationships with potential collaborators and partners in future ventures.
The best part? There are no barriers to entry: "The world has changed—you no longer need to live in a big city or have a fancy degree to connect and build valuable relationships... Join a Discord, engage in good faith. Create value, receive value."
My favorite tip?
"The best things in life come to those who create value with no expectation of a return. I don't know how it happens, but when you put out good energy, it tends to come back to you—often multiplied. Be genuine. Create value. Good things will happen."
I can't explain it either. But each time I've done this, amazing opportunities have presented themselves in my life.
Before you can get heat from the fireplace, you need to put wood in and light a fire. You go first. The world responds. That's how it works.
It's up to you now. A world of vastly expanded luck, serendipity and opportunity awaits.
What actions will you take to increase your luck surface area?
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Visual Velocity
领英推荐
Get focused with the weekly priority matrix
A simple, visual approach to help you make sense of your ever-expanding to-do list
As creators of one stripe or another, we all share a common challenge: Our to-do lists are constantly expanding, fueled by the ideas and insights that constantly pop-into our creative brains. How can you prioritize this maelstrom of ideas, projects and priorities?
The traditional task list helps us convert our to-dos into tangible form, but it doesn’t help us make the trade-offs necessary to focus our efforts. To solve this problem, the brilliant visual thinker Dave Gray (who intriguingly calls himself a "possibilitarian!") and his colleagues have devised this cool template called the Weekly Priority Matrix.
It's designed to be used in on a Mural board. To use it, you first do a brain dump of tasks into the left column as virtual sticky notes. You then rank them based on impact and effort by dragging them into one of the four quadrants.
Although Gray’s article is mainly focused on using the matrix to help focus team efforts in virtual meetings, I’m convinced that it also has value to you as an individual. As he explains, it can help you to:
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Say What?
We need to use better tools to solve our challenges!
"We live in an era of large-scale radical transformations... all of which exceed the grasp of our existing conceptual, social, ecological and political tools. To truly engage with these and other novel changes we need new tools — for it is our historical tools, structures and habits that have gotten us into this reality and are unlikely to get us elsewhere.”
- Iain Kerr and Jason Frasca
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Killer Question
How can I make a simple prototype of my idea - a "minimum viable product" - to get feedback from others?
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Share the wealth!
Do you have friends, colleagues or coworkers who want to accelerate their results but aren't sure where to start? If so, please share the CATALYST with them. They'll thank you for it!
Got an opinion or something cool to share? Please send me an email. I look forward to hearing from you!
Chuck Frey
Author & Publisher