The Luck Factor: The 4 Essentials to Luck

Prof. of Psychology Dr. Richard Wiseman; Ashley Wells, Jen B. (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Is luck just fate, or can you change it? A groundbreaking new scientific study of the phenomenon of luck and the ways we can bring good luck into our lives.

What is "luck"? Is it a psychic gift or a question of intelligence? What is it that "lucky people" have that "unlucky people" lack?

Research psychologist Dr. Richard Wiseman put luck under a scientific microscope for the very first time, examining the different ways in which lucky and unlucky people think and behave.

After three years of intensive interviews and experiments with over 400 volunteers, Dr. Wiseman arrived at an astonishing conclusion: Luck is something that can be learned.

It is available to anyone willing to pay attention to Four Essential Principles:

1. creating chance opportunities
2. thinking lucky
3. feeling lucky
4. denying fate [fatalism].

I love to count my gold. Don't touch it.

Readers can determine their capacity for luck as well as learn to change their luck through helpful exercises that appear throughout the book.

Illustrated with anecdotes from the lives of the famous such as Harry Truman and Warren Buffett, The Luck Factor also richly portrays the lives of ordinary people who have been extraordinarily lucky or unlucky.

Finally, Dr. Wiseman gives us a look into "The Luck School" where he instructs unlucky people and also teaches lucky people how to further enhance their luck.

Smart, enlightening, fun to read, and easy to follow, The Luck Factor will give readers revolutionary insight into the lucky mind and could, quite simply, change a life.

BOOK: The 4 Essentials

Filled with real-life stories from hundreds of interviews, there are also inspirational quotes from the likes of Benjamin Franklin and Oprah Winfrey.

There are graphed research data from his eight-year study of luck, Dr. Wiseman's book promises to offer "a scientifically proven way to understand, control, and increase your luck."

While many believe luck is a mystical force influenced by superstitious rituals, Dr. Dick Wiseman, chair of psychology at the University of Herfordshire in England, claims lucky people simply possess something.

They possess four basic psychological traits that unlucky people don't. What are those traits? They are the ability to:

1. maximize chance opportunities
2. listen to "gut feelings"
3. expect good fortune
4. see the bright side of bad luck.

Questionnaires and exercises offer guidance on how to acquire or enhance luckiness while keeping a "luck journal" and incorporating techniques to increase intuition, stop negative self-fulfilling prophecies, and learn how to effectively network.

The format is marked by repetitive chapter summaries, but Dick Wiseman's upbeat, charismatic tone might persuade even skeptical readers of the transformative effect luck can have in their personal and professional lives. More