[0:00]Have you ever looked at someone else's life and thought, how do they get so lucky? If you could turn your luck around, wouldn't you? Today's guest is Dr. Tina Seelig. Her work is all about the science of luck. You can learn how to become a luckier person. Dr. Seelig earned her PhD in neuroscience at Stanford Medical School. She's also the author of 18 books. Luck is success or failure, apparently, caused by chance. Success or failure, apparently? What is the apparently in there for? That's the point. I mean, this is really important. It looks on the surface as though it's chance, but really underneath there are things that you have done to tempt good luck your way. There's something very, very important to keep in mind. Fortune is the things that happened to you. Luck is what you control. You know, if somebody feels really unlucky right now, what's the first thing they should do this week? I would say if you were going to pick one thing, Hey, it's Mel and before we get into this episode, my team was showing me 57% of you who watched the Mel Robbins podcast here on YouTube are not subscribed yet. Could you do me a quick favor? Just hit subscribe so that you don't miss any of the episodes that we post here on YouTube. It lets me know you're enjoying the guests and the content that we're bringing you because I want to make sure you don't miss a thing and I'm so glad you're here for this episode because this is a really good one. Alright, let's dive in. Dr. Tina Seelig, welcome to the Mel Robbins podcast. I could not be more delighted. Thank you so much for having me. I am thrilled about the topic that we're going to talk about. I love your research and thank you for taking time out of your schedule to come and share all of this research around luck and how we can use it to improve our lives. And I think that's where I want to start. So, could you talk to me and the person that's here with us right now and just tell us what might change about our lives if we really apply everything you're about to teach us today? I couldn't be more delighted to share this information because when people understand that they have more agency in their lives, they realize that they have levers they can use every single day to make themselves luckier. When you talk about luck, Dr. Seelig, what are you talking about? What does that mean? First of all, please call me Tina. The definition of luck is success or failure, apparently, caused by chance. Success or failure, apparently? Wait, what is the apparently in there for? That's the point. I mean, this is really important. The word "apparently" looks as though it's chance, but really underneath there are things that you have done to tempt good luck your way. Oh, okay, so I want to make sure that I am tracking, and I want to make sure that as the person who's with us is listening, we got that because I think that there is a little treasure buried in that, which is often times the things that we attribute to luck, are you saying that once we understand everything you're about to teach us, that those things we once just attributed to luck, bad luck or good luck, we could trace back and say, actually, there was something that I set in motion that I'm not giving myself credit for that made this chance thing happen? Exactly. And in fact, we often use the word luck to humbly say, oh, I didn't have anything to do with this. But if you actually unpack it, you'll see what actually happened to bring that good luck your way, or people don't understand the things they did to make themselves luckier. And so what I've been doing is unpacking all the things that are in that apparently to show the things that people actually are doing to make themselves luckier. Okay, so you have done all this research, you've written this massive bestselling book, what I wish I knew about luck, and you also have concluded that there is a science to becoming a luckier person. What's the number one thing that drives the lucky breaks that people get? Well, first of all, you have to realize that there is a physics to luck. All of the world is cause and effect, right? Fortune is the things that happened to you. Luck is what you control. And it's very, very important to distinguish between those two things because people conflate the concept of fortune and luck. And they make a mistake in thinking that everything is just happening to them. Well, of course, there are some things that are out of your control. How tall you are, where you're born, who your parents are. Those are things that are out of your control. That's, you know, you're fortunate or you're unfortunate.
[5:14]You might be systematic racism, there might be poverty, there might be all kinds of things. Exactly. A pandemic. Yes. But you have more control over how you respond to it. Okay, so I want to make sure I understand this because I would have thought it was the opposite because when I hear the word lucky, I think things that happen by chance, things that happen out of the blue, things that happen to certain people that don't happen to me. But when you say there's a big difference between fortune, which to me sounds like the things that you said you don't have control over, but there's a huge group of things that are either positive things of fortune or things that feel unfortunate, that are not your fault, you can't change it. But you want us to focus on creating more luck and making things go our way, which is in our control.
[6:08]Absolutely. That's a completely different version of luck than I thought. Well, it's it's it's really important. It's critically important to distinguish between the things that happen to you and how you respond. I mean, there's this fabulous, you know, very famous quote by Victor Frankl about the fact that, you know, the world is happening to you, and you have this this time between stimulus and response where you get to decide how to respond. And that's where luck comes in. It comes in by taking the time to think about how you actually engage with the world. We are in a constant dance with the world where we are either leading or we're following. And there are times in which the world is leading, right? The pandemic happened and our world's all turned upside down. But then you get to decide what you're going to do with it. I I I've never thought about luck this way. I I've always thought about luck as just something that kind of happens to you or, you know, if you're unlucky, that happens to you too. And so really thinking about the fact that yes, there are lots of things that happen that are unfair. And yes, there are very real problems and that is true and unfortunate. And we can take the science of creating your own luck if you will and use it to respond in a different way. Exactly. And I am so excited to share the things that people can do to unlock luck in their lives. All right, I want to read to you from your bestselling book, what I wish I knew about luck. This is on page six. Luck requires taking a chance, a calculated risk. It begins the moment you decide to act in the face of uncertainty. Whether it's throwing your hat into the ring for a competitive opportunity, moving to a distant city without a clear plan, or simply introducing yourself to someone new, each action is a leap of faith beyond the familiar. These moments may seem small, but they're pivotal, creating openings to capture lucky opportunities. What does that mean?
[8:18]Every decision you make opens the door to something brand new. We are always one decision away from a completely different life. I think about this all the time. You know, some of the closest friends I have made in my life are people who were standing next to me in line, who I started a conversation with and we found that we had something in common, and then we started working together, and then we became best friends. If I had not started that conversation, that entire world would not have existed. Okay, let's stop right here, because I love this kind of thing. Okay. So I was standing in a bar in 19, well, it was in a bar, I was standing at a United Way benefit in 1994, I was a brand new legal aid attorney in New York City. And I ordered a Bourbon on the Rocks to go. I wanted it on a plastic cup because I was gonna bounce from the party. And behind me, I heard somebody say, that sounds great, make it two. I turn around, and it was Christopher Robbins, who I will be celebrating my 30th wedding anniversary with this year. Let's unpack that moment in the framework of luck versus fortune. Do you see what I mean? Okay. Exactly. Well, I think it's a great example because A, he, you know, he saw you, he was intrigued, he said, I'll take the same, and you started a conversation. It could have been the end. Think of the number of conversations that went nowhere. Thank you very much. I'll see you later. I'm going home. Think about the moments where you see somebody who's interesting, but you don't walk across the room. Exactly. And I have so many examples. Let me tell you one that is uh well, in fact, this book is the result of a conversation I had with someone sitting on an airplane next to me. Really? I was flying across the country, early, early morning flight, could have just shut my eyes and gone to sleep. The man sitting next to me was a publisher. And I started to chat with him. We talked for a good long time. At some point, I pulled out a book proposal. I took a little risk. And I said, Guess what? I've got a book proposal right here on my computer, and he was kind enough to look at it. And you know, he said, this is very nice, Tina, but not really for us. So I said, okay, no problem. But guess what? At the end of the flight, we exchanged contact information. And he sent me a text as I was walking off the plane. I stayed in touch. I was teaching a class, my creativity class at Stanford, and I thought, you know, I'm doing a project this quarter. What should it be on? Maybe I'll do it on the future of publishing. So I called him up again, and I said, Hey, guess what? I'm doing a project on the future of publishing. Would you come to class? He said, Sure. So he came, he met my students. We had great, great opportunity for everyone. I followed up again with some videos of some projects my students had worked on some more as part of a global innovation tournament. They were pretty cool. He said, Wow, there is a book in here for the students. And he wanted to meet the students who had worked on this project. I said, okay, that sounds pretty cool. Uh, and I set up a lunch. At the end of the lunch, which he had brought one of his editors to, his editor turned to me and said, Hey, would you ever consider writing a book? And I gave him the exact same proposal I had given his boss, I don't know, it was either one, two years earlier. But I'd kept that relationship going. That was the point, there were all these little choices I made that ended up leading to the publication of what I wish I knew when I was 20, starting with the conversation with the man sitting next to me on the plane.
