Do successful people strike you as lucky? Do you think someone who is successful leads a charmed life?
I’ll admit it may look that way. However, the reality is quite another matter.
I will admit that luck plays a role in winning lottery tickets, inheriting millions, and discovering a long-lost antique of great value in grandpa’s attic. Otherwise, luck is the illusion that keeps the chronically unsuccessful in the dark about success and how to achieve it.
Consider this definition of luck from the ancient Roman writer Seneca: Luck is what happens when opportunity meets preparedness.
Now that’s a definition we can embrace because it implies we can make our own good luck.
According to Seneca, luck has two components. One is opportunity and the other is preparedness. Fortunately, we can do something about both. This means we can play host to good luck on a regular basis.
Let’s begin with preparedness. Whatever your business or occupation, you can prepare for success. You can be a student of your business. You can learn the latest innovations in your field. You can continuously raise the standards to which you hold yourself. You can take extra care to make sure you provide the highest quality of service possible.
Of even greater importance, you can also prepare your mind for success. This means you think, act, speak, and feel like a successful person. It means that you can practice thinking of yourself in terms of success. It also means that you can (and should) seek the company of people more successful than you.
As you prepare your mind for success, you begin to notice opportunity. Awareness of opportunity follows naturally when you prepare for success. As your mind becomes more and more accustomed to the idea of your own growing success, you develop “opportunity radar.” Your mind “tunes into” opportunity and you take notice while others are oblivious.
Here are two simple questions that will help you develop these components of luck: How would a successful person prepare for success? What goes through the mind of someone who “tunes into” opportunity?
These questions are powerful because of the presuppositions that they imply. The first question implies that successful people do prepare for success. This negates the whole issue of good fortune as the cause of success. The second question implies that opportunity is ever-present and that anyone can fine-tune his or her mind to recognize it.
In addition, the questions engage the imagination. They ask you to muse, wonder, and daydream. They ask you to step out of your normal, everyday thinking for a moment and assume the mental and emotional space of one who prepares for success and recognizes opportunity.
So ask yourself these questions now and then. Let your mind dwell on them for a moment and then go about your business.
You will find that you get luckier and luckier.
At least that’s what the uninformed will think.
© 2007 Tony Papajohn
Tony Papajohn coaches excellence and specializes in money. If you are a real estate investor, financial trader, entrepreneur, or want money to treat you like its new best friend, check out Tony’s free e-courses at http://www.WelcomeMoreMoney.com .
