Book Review : The Luck Factor

This book is written about luck factor. The author researched luck people and unlucky people and tried to find common feature of these people. He advocates 4 principles and 12 sub principles.

Here are these principles.

Principle One: Maximise Your Chance Opportunities

•  Lucky people build and maintain a strong 'network of luck’.

•  Lucky people have a relaxed attitude towards life.

•  Lucky people are open to new experiences in their lives.

Principle Two: Listen to Your Lucky Hunches

•  Lucky people listen to their gut feelings and hunches.

•  Lucky people take steps to boost their intuition.

Principle Three: Expect Good Fortune

•  Lucky people expect their good luck to continue in the future.

•  Lucky people attempt to achieve their goals, even if their chances of success seem slim, and persevere in the face of failure.

•  Lucky people expect their interactions with others to be lucky and successful.

Principle Four: Turn Your Bad Luck Into Good

•  Lucky people see the positive side of their bad luck.

•  Lucky people are convinced that any ill fortune in their life will, in the long run, work out for the best.

•  Lucky people do not dwell on their ill fortune.

•  Lucky people take constructive steps to prevent more bad luck in the future.

quoted from Wiseman, Richard (2011-01-25). The Luck Factor:

After I understood these principles, I tried to change my attitude according to the principles. One of the feature of lucky people is that they often chat to strangers. So I attempted to talk to strangers during my last vacation.

I attempted to talk to a man who was next to me on the Ferry. I said 'Shall I take your picture?' and subsequently asked where he came from. His name was Shuman and he came from USA. We became friendly. Consequently, we travelled for three days together.

It was not only fun but also a great opportunity to improve my English.

The next time, I attempted to talk to a woman who was on the same tour in Iceland. I just said 'Are you Japanese?' and she was Japanese. After we had a few conversation we discovered there were a lot of people who we both knew. What a coincidence! We became friendly and enjoyed the tour and went to dinner together. The experience became a very good memory in my life.

I think the principles which the author advocates are lack of qualitative evidence. But, in my case, they actually worked out. It was very exciting experience, so I recommend that you read this book and try some exercises which the author suggests.