We all know people who seem especially lucky or, in some cases, unlucky.

Janice Kaplan wondered whether this was due to random chance or luck overlooked, so she co-authored the book, How Luck Happens: Using the Science of Luck to Transform Work, Love, and Life. In writing the book, she learned how we can tilt the scales in our favor, even in cases where the odds are long.

Janice is the former editor in chief of Parade magazine and author of 13 popular books, including the New York Times bestseller, The Gratitude Diaries.

In this interview we discuss:

How there are aspects of luck within our control
How a winning combination of talent, hard work, and knowing your goals can increase your luck
How optimism and a belief in making our own luck makes good things happen
Why an optimistic mindset ensures we will apply the effort it takes to make our own luck
Why we need to toggle between focused and wide-ranging attention to see events as opportunities
What it means to choose the statistic we want to be
How we can put ourselves in a position where luck can find us
The fact that our weak ties have a greater chance of helping us achieve our goals
Why we may need to zig versus zag or try out a different lane to be successful
How revisiting what we thought of as dead ends can help us see new possibilities
Why goals and knowing what we want are paramount to making our own luck
How lucky breaks can actually be small events that make a big difference if we know how to take full advantage of them
Why it can be helpful to navigate life with a compass, rather than a map
The key role curiosity plays in helping us do things differently in order to make a lucky moment out of something that does not seem that way at first

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CM 104: Janice Kaplan on Making Your Own Luck

Curious Minds at Work