Why Some People Seem to Have All the Luck

"Good luck with that." "Beginner's luck." "You lucky dog."

We're surrounded by the idea of luck. It's so baked into our daily language that we rarely stop to think about what it means. We nod along, subconsciously accepting that success and happiness are tied to some mystical force beyond our control. When things go well, we’re “in luck.” When they don’t, our luck has simply “run out.”

Society has done an incredible job of convincing us that a dream life is just a matter of being lucky. This belief is so powerful that entire industries are built on it. In the U.S. alone, people spend over $200 billion a year on lottery tickets, casinos, and sports betting—more than the entire GDP of many countries. All of that money is spent on the slim hope that "Lady Luck" will glance our way and change everything. This mindset can be a real roadblock, especially when you decide to and need to rely on your own initiative.

The Cautionary Tale of Lottery Winners

Of course, luck does exist in a purely random sense. People win the lottery all the time, which is a game of pure chance with zero skill involved. But what happens after they cash that giant check?

The strange reality is that nearly 70% of multimillion-dollar lottery winners eventually go broke. A study from the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia found that the majority of people who win a million dollars or more file for bankruptcy within five years.

Think about that. One day you’re handed a check for $20 million, and a few years later, you're in a courthouse declaring bankruptcy. It sounds crazy, but it happens all the time. After what was probably one heck of a five-year spending spree, many find themselves in a worse financial position than before they won.

The reason is simple: they broke a fundamental rule of success. You have to before you can . They were handed a $20 million check, but they had never become the kind of person who knows how to manage that level of wealth. Holding onto money requires skills—living within a budget, understanding investments, and knowing how to say no to endless requests for handouts. They had the money, but they hadn't developed the character or knowledge to keep it. For those looking for , this is a powerful lesson: true wealth is about competence, not just chance.

Is Success Just a Roll of the Dice?

So, what about our own goals? Is building a career, finding happiness, or launching a successful just another game of chance? Is life all about the luck of the draw, or is something else going on?

When I started looking into the concept of luck, I came across a great quote from Sam Goldwyn, the founder of MGM movie studios. He said, “It's funny but the harder I work, the luckier I seem to get.” He understood that we can create our own luck through effort. Success in life is a result of cause and effect; winning the lottery is a result of pure luck.

Perhaps we attribute other people's success to luck because we don't see the full picture. The media loves to showcase big wins and overnight successes. We see the final result, not the years of hard work, setbacks, mistakes, and persistence that went into it. The sizzle sells, but the struggle is what actually builds success, especially when developing that appear to take off out of nowhere.

Dr. Richard Wiseman, a professor at the University of Hertfordshire, studied nearly two million people for his book, . He wanted to know why some people seem to be consistently luckier than others. He found that they weren't actually luckier at all—they were just better at spotting and acting on opportunities. Because of their open-mindedness and focus, they noticed possibilities that others simply missed.

As the inventor Thomas Edison once said, “If you don't know what you are looking for, you will never know when you find it.”

How Your Brain Filters for "Luck"

In the late 1990s, I met Catherine Leach, a world-renowned expert in adult education. She explained something that has stuck with me ever since: our brains have a built-in filtering mechanism.

Every day, our five senses are flooded with so much data that if we processed all of it consciously, our minds would short-circuit. To handle this, our brains evolved a filter called the Reticular Activating System (RAS). Think of it as a gatekeeper.

Our dominant thoughts and beliefs act as the instructions for this gatekeeper. When information from the outside world aligns with what we're focused on, the RAS lets it through to our conscious awareness. If it doesn't align, it gets filtered out as irrelevant noise. This is why you might notice a specific type of car everywhere right after you start thinking about buying one. The cars were always there; your brain just started flagging them as important.

This system is key to understanding luck. If your dominant thoughts are negative, you will disproportionately notice negative things in your environment, creating a vicious cycle. But if you have a and are focused on finding new clients, you'll start noticing potential leads and opportunities you were blind to before. The world you experience is shaped entirely by what you choose to focus on.

A 4-Step Process to Manufacture Your Own Luck

Over the years, I've had the chance to interact with founders of billion-dollar companies, Super Bowl winners, and people who have overcome incredible odds. I started to see a common pattern in how they navigated life—a process that allowed them to create their own luck instead of waiting for it.

There are no shortcuts. The time and effort you invest create the circumstances for opportunity to appear. Action generates information, and that information teaches you what works. What you focus on is what you become.

Opportunity rarely announces itself with a flashing neon sign. You have to keep an open mind and look for possibilities in every situation. As Zig Ziglar said, "When you focus on problems, you get more problems. When you focus on possibilities, you get more opportunities."

Disappointments are guaranteed to happen. They are part of the journey. Every great success is built on a foundation of overcome obstacles. Treat every mistake as a learning opportunity. The philosophy of "lucky" people is simple: win or learn. This is crucial for anyone hoping to turn their work.

This might be the most important step. Ignore the people who tell you it can’t be done. The world is full of people who are comfortable with mediocrity and want you to join them. If you want to achieve your dreams, you can't follow the path they follow. Remember, the only thing an unsuccessful person can teach you is how to be unsuccessful.

To get your mind right, try repeating these two ideas often:

• The harder I work, the luckier I get.
• With focus, perseverance, and an open mind, I can manufacture my own luck.

Ultimately, the myth of luck takes away our sense of personal responsibility. It suggests our fate is in the hands of some unseen force. The truth is, our lives are far more about cause and effect. Your thoughts and actions directly create your outcomes, both good and bad.