Short Story: Why Are You Unlucky
Professor Richard Wiseman, a psychologist says he has discovered the answer.
He says: Ten years ago, I set out to examine luck. I wanted to know why some people are always in the right place at the right time, while others consistently
experienced ill fortune. 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.
Over the years I interviewed them, monitored their lives and had them take
part in various experiments.
I carried out a simple experiment to discover whether their disparity in luck
was due to differences in their ability to spot 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. As a result, they miss
opportunities because they are too focused on looking for something else.
They go to gatherings intent on finding their perfect partner and miss opportunities to make good friends. They look through newspapers determined to find certain types of job advertisements and miss other types of jobs.
Lucky people are more relaxed and open, and therefore see what is there
rather than just what they are looking for. My research eventually revealed
that lucky people generate good fortune via four principles. They are skilled at creating and noticing chance opportunities, make lucky decisions by listening to their intuition, create self-fulfilling prophesies via positive expectations, and adopt a resilient, "never say die" attitude that transforms bad luck into good.
He says: Ten years ago, I set out to examine luck. I wanted to know why some people are always in the right place at the right time, while others consistently
experienced ill fortune. 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.
Over the years I interviewed them, monitored their lives and had them take
part in various experiments.
I carried out a simple experiment to discover whether their disparity in luck
was due to differences in their ability to spot 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. As a result, they miss
opportunities because they are too focused on looking for something else.
They go to gatherings intent on finding their perfect partner and miss opportunities to make good friends. They look through newspapers determined to find certain types of job advertisements and miss other types of jobs.
Lucky people are more relaxed and open, and therefore see what is there
rather than just what they are looking for. My research eventually revealed
that lucky people generate good fortune via four principles. They are skilled at creating and noticing chance opportunities, make lucky decisions by listening to their intuition, create self-fulfilling prophesies via positive expectations, and adopt a resilient, "never say die" attitude that transforms bad luck into good.
So, here are four tips for becoming lucky:
- Listen to your gut instincts – they are often right.
- Be open to new experiences and breaking your normal routine
- Spend a few moments each day remembering things that went well
- Visualize yourself being lucky before an important meeting or phone call.
Remember that the happiest people in the world are not those who
have no problems, but those who learn to enjoy things that are less than perfect.
~ Professor Richard Wiseman, University of Hertfordshire
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