Stacking the Cards in Your Favor

June 14, 2007 — -- Some people seem to have all the luck.

They're always in the right place at the right time, getting all the breaks, living the good life.

But is it blind chance? Are they fated to be blessed by good fortune?

What exactly makes a person lucky?

Dr. Richard Wiseman of the University of Hertfordshire has studied hundreds of lucky and unlucky people for more than a decade. According to Wiseman, "If there's a single message from the research … to a very large extent, you're creating a lot of your own luck."

Wiseman explained that it was important to distinguish the difference between luck and chance. For example, some illnesses and accidents are completely out of our control.

In his book "The Luck Factor," Wiseman writes about essential traits of lucky people. "There's a very large percentage of events where we'll say, 'Oh, that was really lucky. I went to a party, bumped into this person, changed my life.' … In fact, lots of those events very much are to do with the way in which we think, the way in which we behave."

According to Wiseman, lucky people encourage good fortune by believing in their own luck: They are optimistic and resilient.

Actress Rachel Reenstra has been struggling with the daily rejection that comes with working in Hollywood for more than 10 years, and never got her "lucky break."

Yet Reenstra did exactly what Wiseman says lucky people do. She never gave up and visualized where she wanted to end up. "I created an ideal scene," she said. "I am traveling the world. I am enjoying getting paid lots of money hosting a show. … I didn't know how it was gonna happen, but I knew that's what I wanted."

So Reenstra took a proactive role in making her dream happen. She took her life savings — even though it meant going into debt — and began traveling the world, videotaping herself with animals. Finally one day her agent sent her a letter telling her that Discovery was looking for its next female adventurer. "I looked at that letter and I went, 'Well, this is me, and they need to know this is me!'"