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The School of Greatness
Fortune vs. Luck, and Why It Matters | Dr. Tina Seelig
01:13:50
Stanford professor, neuroscientist, and bestselling author Dr. Tina Seelig joins Lewis Howes to unpack the science behind luck, drawn from her book What I Wish I Knew About Luck: A Crash Course on Turning Aspirations into Achievements. Seelig, who also wrote What I Wish I Knew When I Was 20 and runs Stanford's Entrepreneurship Center, breaks down her Risk-O-Meter framework, the three-part model for catching luck, and the science of reframing failure, risk, and opportunity.
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- [00:01]
A
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- [02:45]
B
Oh, absolutely. The definition of luck is success or failure apparently caused by chance. It looks, and it might look to you, it might look to someone else like it was caused by chance. But when you pull back the curtain, you see all the things that happen, like applying for that job. I'm lucky that I got an interview or a second interview. Guess what? I wrote that thank you note or I was prepared. There were lots of things I did to get me to the next step.
- [03:07]
A
She's a Stanford professor, a best selling author, and one of the world's leading voices on creativity. Please welcome Dr. Tina Selig.
- [03:17]
B
The most common thing I say at work is, what can I do for you? What can I do for you? How can I be helpful? Most of the time people don't need anything, but if they do, it's usually something little that would be easy for me, like a little five minute favor that I can do. It's really meaningful to them.
- [03:31]
A
What would you say then is the formula to creating more luck in your life?
- [03:35]
B
Okay, the framework that I present in my book is that.
- [03:41]
A
So is there a science to being luckier in your life?
- [03:43]
B
Oh, absolutely. I think it's very, very important for us to start with the definition. Because of luck. Yes.
- [03:50]
A
What is the definition of luck?
- [03:51]
B
Okay, so when I ask people, there's a lot of hand waving. It's like. But the definition is really important. The definition of luck is success or failure apparently caused by chance. Apparently it looks, and it might look to you or it might look to someone else like it was caused by chance. But when you pull back the curtain, you see all the things that happen that set the stage for something really lucky to happen. Also, it's extraordinarily important to differentiate between fortune and luck.
- [04:22]
A
What's the difference?
- [04:23]
B
Big difference. Fortune is the things that happen to you. Luck is something over which you have much more control. So you're fortunate or unfortunate where you're born, you know who your parents are, what the weather is on your birthday. I mean, all these things that are out of your control. I was thinking this morning, boy, I'm so fortunate there's no traffic on my way to the airport. Right. These things were out of my control. But luck is something that I control, like applying for that job. Right. I'm lucky that I got an interview or a second interview. Guess what? I wrote that. Thank you Note or I was prepared. There were lots of things I did to get me to the next step. And we're in a constant dance in our lives between fortune and luck, the things that happen to us and how we respond. And sometimes that dance is so closely tied that it's hard to differentiate. But if you really tease them apart, you start seeing the places where you have more agency than you might think.
- [05:17]
A
Where do you feel like you're the luckiest in your life?
- [05:19]
B
Oh, my goodness. I would say the people in my life. I really have the most wonderful family, the most wonderful friends, and I realize that I cultivate that. I spent a lot of time doing things for other people. The most common thing I say at work is, what can I do for you? What can I do for you? How can I be helpful? And also with friends, you know, what can I do to be helpful? Usually the things, most of the time, people don't need anything, but if they do, it's usually something little that would be easy for me, like a little five minute favor that I can do that it's really meaningful to them. Making introduction, giving them a resource, helping them find their way through some political quagmire that they don't understand, like, oh, wow, thank you so much. And then it comes back later and I was like, I didn't even remember I did it because it was such a little thing that it was so meaningful to them.
- [06:19]
A
In some of my talks that I give, I like to do an exercise towards the beginning of my speech that has everyone take out their phone and think about one person in their life that they has done something for them that they want to appreciate and send them a quick little text towards the beginning of my speech appreciating them and just say, I appreciate you for this. And it's amazing. At the end of my speech, I say, take out your phone and see if those people replied. I love that people are like, the responses they get are so much gratitude and appreciation in return. And I say, listen, what you just created with 15 seconds of sending an appreciation text to a friend or whoever, family member, co worker, the bond you created with that individual and how made them feel today go so far into the future for creating luck for you, the potential for more good to happen. And all it took was 30 seconds.
- [07:13]
B
Well, it's such a great example. I just love that. That's totally brilliant to do that in a short period of time. Well, just a few weeks ago, as an experiment, right. I do a lot of experimenting and that's actually another Aspect to luck is try lots of things, keep what works. I mean, clearly this podcast at some point was an experiment, and you just kept adding more fuel to the fire. That's another thing, like building on success. So again, you know, pulling it apart. But I did an experiment. I ran a free online luck makeover workshop. I thought, what's the minimum viable intervention I could have to help people get luckier? And I just put on LinkedIn. I had about 75 people who signed up. And I just did two Sunday, two one hour workshops, one week apart. And then we went through all these different things that people can do to be luckier. And they had to then make a commitment to do something during the week and then report back the next week. A number of people chose appreciation. So can I give you some examples
- [08:10]
A
of what happened as one of the
- [08:11]
B
things that we did, as one of the things they were going to do that week? So can I give you some examples? Okay. So one person went to get their car fixed, and when they got their car fixed, they were so appreciative of the mechanic, they said, thank you so much. You did a great job. The car is working so beautifully now and it's really clean. I couldn't be more delighted with how your customer service was. And the guy said, you know what? I'm gonna give you $80 off. Instantly, right? Appreciation.
- [08:38]
A
Just because of appreciation.
- [08:39]
B
Because of appreciation. Another person called up someone who had been a mentor to them and helped them get a job a year earlier and gave them some coaching. And they said, you know what? Called them up a year later and said, I just wanna let you know how things are going. And I really appreciate all the advice you gave me. At the end of the call, they had some other really cool opportunities they had to know about before. And a third person contacted their chess coach. It was a woman. She was, I think, at Oxford and she's now a poor grad student. And she had been a chess, a professional chess player. She called up her chess coach she hadn't talked to in three years and said, I just want to thank you so much for everything you did for me. That was really meaningful. And at the end of the call, he said, you know what? I'd be happy. I know you can't afford it. I will coach you for free if you maybe you can help me hone my English. And all three of them, I mean, realize there's no statute of limitations, right? It doesn't mean you have to do it right away. Like, even three years later, it was
- [09:40]
A
valuable wow, that's beautiful. What would you say then is the formula to creating more luck in your life?
- [09:46]
B
Okay, so the framework that I present in my book is that luck is ubiquitous. Opportunities for good luck are plentiful, but they're like the wind. They're invisible. They're powerful and they're ever present, but they're invisible. And so if they're like the wind, you need a sail to catch them. And so how do you catch the winds of luck? That's the framework. And so there are three things you need to do, major things. One is you need to build that ship. That's all the internal work you have to do. Think of the quote, fortune favors a prepared mind. That ship is your prepared mind. Next, you need to recruit your crew because luck seldom sails solo. Right. You need other people. The appreciation plays into that.
- [10:30]
A
Team sport.
- [10:31]
B
Exactly. Luck is a team sport. And third is how do you hoist the sail? So that is the things you do every single day to catch that wind that's blowing by.
- [10:42]
A
Wow. Didn't you have an image of this too?
- [10:44]
B
I do, I do, I do.
- [10:45]
A
You want to see? Yes. See it?
- [10:47]
B
Oh, where did it go?
- [10:47]
A
It's right here.
- [10:48]
B
Yeah, yeah. So I created this little image. Can you see that?
- [10:52]
A
Yeah.
- [10:53]
B
And the thing that's really fun about this image is I wanted to capture all the ways that you can engage with the winds of luck. So if you're engaging with the winds of luck, you can stay inside, you can essentially ignore it. Shut the curtains, shut the blinds, say, I really don't care. My life is my life. I'm not going to do anything about it. You can be a wind vane on the top of the house spinning.
- [11:18]
A
Huh?
- [11:18]
B
Where you are looking at it, you notice it, but you don't do anything. You know, it's funny, I was thinking about this yesterday because I was giving a talk at a part of Stanford campus that I hadn't been to frequently. And I thought, wow, there are all these things out the window here that I'm actually not very familiar with. And here I am on this campus and I see it. Am I going to engage or not? Right. We often see things that are there opportunities, but we don't do anything. God, you know what? I need to go to that museum. I need to introduce myself to that person. I need to engage because otherwise I'm just a wind vane spinning around, seeing it but not actually doing it.
- [11:55]
A
Yes.
- [11:56]
B
You can be a hot air balloon. And that's actually an interesting thing. Sometimes in our life we have to Be a hot air balloon, you know, letting the winds take us where they may. And I know that when I moved out to California when I was much younger, and I was like, I just want to be a leaf in the wind. I want to see what opportunities surface. And so there are times in our life where we want to sort of like when you're in college, take lots of classes.
- [12:19]
A
Who knows what I'm going to major in?
- [12:20]
B
Exactly. Exactly. Before something's your passion, it's something you know nothing about. So I'm going to go try lots of things. You can be a windmill. A windmill is capturing that luck efficiently in a local place, in a job, in a class, in your lab, in your podcast. Like saying, okay, I'm going to harness this right here and squeeze all the juice out of the opportunity right here. Or you can say, there's something I want to accomplish or something I want to do. It's not here right now. And I'm going to build a sailboat, and I'm going to go out in search of the winds, and I'm going to go move my sail. I'm going to trim that sail to catch luck to take me to my destination.
- [13:04]
A
Wow. What if you're in a sailboat and you don't know where you're going?
- [13:07]
B
Well.
- [13:07]
A
And you don't see it in front of you, what's ahead?
- [13:10]
B
Yeah. You have to have a compass. You need to know where you're going. And that's one of the parts of your prepared mind, is having some very clear objectives. Otherwise, I mean, I guess you can go out for a day and go sailing around the bay and come back, but if you want to, which is also fun. Right. But if you have a destination that it's much easier to point the sail in the right direction.
- [13:32]
A
What has been the most surprising part of your research around luck that would shock most people?
- [13:39]
B
You know, there are some foundational things that people don't realize affect their luck. So the opening chapter is about values and why you need to be really clear on your core values to be luckier.
- [13:56]
A
Why is that?
- [13:57]
B
Because, well, all you have to do is read the newspaper every day and see people who weren't clear on their core values who end up in prison. Right. People who get on a slippery slope make decisions that we're not smart. If you take the time to really think about what's important to you, what you won't compromise. So that when you're asked to do something, you know, whoa, will you just fudge these numbers or will you just exaggerate, you know, what this product does. Or for me, it was a situation when I was in just my first job out of school, I was asked to misrepresent myself at a conference.
- [14:32]
A
Wow.
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B
And to go there, not tell people I was part of working for the company, and to say I was team sealing from Stanford, you know, just be
- [14:41]
A
there, research and spy a little bit. Exactly.
- [14:43]
B
Yeah. But I got caught.
- [14:46]
A
I got caught because you lied about earnings.
- [14:47]
B
I lied. I lied. I mean, and I didn't for one second even take the time to think that, wow, this was actually not okay. And there are lots of ways to inoculate yourself against making decisions like that. You can have a personal board of advisors, people who you can go to and say, hey, listen, Louis, does this smell right? You know, I'm being asked to do this. Is this okay? Imagine it on the front page of the newspaper. You know, how would I feel if the story of what I did was something that everybody knew? And also being able to walk away knowing that that's an option, that you can. If you're being asked to do something that you doesn't, is inconsistent with your values, that you can say no.
- [15:34]
A
That's so. That's so interesting because, you know, I say that not all money is good money. And in my business, you know, it's mostly run through sponsorships, and there's a lot of different shows out there have different sponsors. But for me, I decided early on, there's certain categories I'm not going to promote on my show. My show's all about positivity and personal growth and development and becoming a better version of yourself. And there's a lot of companies that, let's say, don't support that, you know, that want to give me a lot of money. And I've said no to from the beginning. But sometimes you're like, oh, man, that's. That's a lot of money to say no to. Like, do I really want to say that? Can I get behind this? You know, and it's. And you've got. I think you've got to be so clear on your values. And because I'm clear on that, maybe I've made less money over the time, but I feel at peace and what I'm endorsing.
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B
Exactly, exactly.
- [16:29]
A
Yeah. But not all money is good money.
- [16:32]
B
Yeah. It's interesting. We do a number of case studies with our students that help them practice doing this.
- [16:39]
A
What does that look like?
- [16:39]
B
They say, well, it might be a donor to university who wants to give you Money, but they have a lot of strings attached. At what point do you say, no, I'd rather not take it. Even though it would be game changing. Right. Like, oh my gosh, this is going to help us get out of debt. This is going to help us retain our faculty. It was like, at what point you say, no, I won't do this. There's a case that I use in my classes. It's a Harvard Business School case about a young man who really has a lot to prove in his life and his boss starts asking him to fudge the numbers. And he's the CFO of the company and it's really sort of like approving expense reports of the things that really are not kosher.
- [17:23]
A
They both have wrong values. The boss and the cfo.
- [17:25]
B
Exactly. But, you know, you're seeing the story from this young guy's perspective. And at what point do you say, I say no to your boss or quit your job?
- [17:36]
A
Yeah.
- [17:37]
B
Sometimes. What happens though is you get so far into it that you're putting sort of, you're now so deep into it, you can't leave now. You're also culpable.
- [17:46]
A
You can't leave. And you're the one who's probably gonna take the fall.
- [17:48]
B
Exactly.
- [17:48]
A
Because the boss is not gonna take the fall. It's gonna go on. You probably say, oh, you're the one who made these, not me. You might be the one going to jail or who knows what.
- [17:56]
B
Yeah. And I really, you know, sometimes young people are so in a hurry. I see this. They're so in a hurry to be successful as measured by, you know, making a lot of money. And I really try to urge them to just slow down, just not get out over your skis, because patience. Right. This is a long game. Yes. You might see someone who like won the lottery essentially by instantly at a very young age having early success process, but it doesn't preclude you're doing it in the long run.
- [18:29]
A
That's true. And it might compound even more in the long run, the more patient you're willing to be. There's so many relationships I built from 2008, 2009, 2010, when I was just getting started in the online business world that I didn't do anything with for the first 10, 15 years that are just now because we've stayed connected and something opened up for one of us just now starting to work together or, you know, and it's how we've called, how we both cultivated the relationship over time, that we both have the ability to Help one another or something like that. And had I pushed everyone early on and thinking, what can you do for me? I don't think I'd be here today.
- [19:10]
B
Yeah, well, I think it's also really interesting to differentiate between networking as people define it and actually building real relationships.
- [19:17]
A
Real relationships.
- [19:18]
B
I mean, honestly, I can't stand the concept of networking. I mean, silly, what a waste of time. It's really about building trust. And so when you ask what are the things that people misunderstand about luck? Building trusting relationships over time is really powerful. In fact, I have a story about one of my former students who ended up becoming the videographer for Kamala Harris at the White House. How did she get that job? Well, she had a professor when she was in college who she took a documentary class, loved the class and stayed in touch over 10 years, just stayed in touch with this professor, sent samples of things she was doing and, you know, they just became colleagues and friends. And when she graduated from graduate school, she sent out hundreds of applications for jobs and could not get a job. She was really panicked and she reached out to this professor and said, hey, I'm just really struggling. I just need one job. I can't even get an answer. The professor said, you know, I just got a call from a friend who's trying to source some candidates for this job at the White House. May I throw your hat in the ring? And lo and behold, she got the job. But she would not have gotten the job if she just reached out to this professor out of the blue. Right? It was. They had a 10 year long real relationship that opened the door to something really special.
- [20:48]
A
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- [23:15]
B
Well, let me tell you, it can go both ways. Right. You can have a negative experience that people, you know, basically say, no, I'm not gonna work with you. I mean, luck is a long game. I mean, sure. You get calls for references for people.
- [23:29]
A
Sure.
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B
And you decide, wow, is this someone who I wanna support or not? There's a funny story about 18 years ago, I was on a trip with my family to Costa Rica and I'm so excited about this trip. Our son was about 16, 17 years old. So excited. The trip was over the Christmas break and we got there and this trip turned into a disaster, really disaster. It was a Stanford alumni trip. They had scoped out the trip during the off season. And when we got there, it was on. It was high season and it turned into like a party bling. There were bars in the pool. The drinking age was not enforced. The music was blaring day and night. We were right at the beach. So it was really dangerous, the alcohol. There were a lot of parents who were so upset, they just took off Other parents who were really angry and screaming at, yelling at the staff, who certainly had nothing to do with planning this trip. They were just running it. I apparently, was very supportive and helpful. I don't even remember. Honestly, I don't remember. You know, over time, I forgot about it. You know, tragedy plus time equals comedy. We went through it. But guess what? Fifteen years later, I was being considered for my current job, really, which is my, like, dream job. And it turns out one of the people on the team was person leading that trip.
- [25:02]
A
No way. And they remembered.
- [25:03]
B
Of course they remembered. I didn't remember her. I mean, it was 15 years earlier.
- [25:07]
A
They remembered how you handled it, made it better, and made it more.
- [25:10]
B
It wasn't until after I was hired several months that she told me that she had led that trip. And it was like a nightmare for her. And I know. And she told me there's no way I would have gotten that job if I had behaved badly 15 years earlier.
- [25:24]
A
Well, of course. Well, that's crazy.
- [25:26]
B
Yeah, but that's the point. I mean, think about it. You know, you hear from someone who, you know, I, I see this all the time, like somebody who's behaving badly, and I feel really bad for them. I think this is gonna come back to bite you. I, I, I'm sorry.
- [25:39]
A
It's what you're saying. There is, like, every decision we make on a daily basis is setting ourselves up for 5, 10, 20 years in the future to have the most incredible luck and life of our dreams based on how we act today.
- [25:54]
B
I love it. One of my favorite things I ever told my son when he was in high school was the choices you make today determine the choices you will have tomorrow. I think that we don't realize that, that we are making choices every single minute, every single day, and it sets the stage for the opportunities that flow to you in the future.
- [26:18]
A
What is actually happening in the brain that causes most people to miss lucky opportunities, even when they're right in front of them, even if there's something right in front of them that they could take, but they miss it.
- [26:30]
B
Okay. I love that question. I mean, I don't know if, you know I'm a neuroscientist, right. So I certainly, I'm not going to answer this from a neuroscience perspective, but it's kind of funn that you asked me about the brain. I think a lot of it has to do with the story people tell about who they are in the world, that we all have a story, not just the story we tell about ourselves. But also the story other people tell us about ourselves. You know, we're constantly integrating, you know, how people are treating us and how we think about the opportunities. And sometimes we don't take opportunities because we don't think we deserve them, or we don't think we can do it. You know, we limit ourselves. I have such a. Because I have so many students, I get to see every single day how their stories get manifest in the world, right? Those people who have a can do attitude and feel, sure, I can do that, give me a hard problem, I can crack it.
- [27:19]
A
I'll figure it out.
- [27:19]
B
I'll figure it out. And the others who go, oh, no, no, I can't do that, or, I want to be the president of my home country, or, oh, gosh, I would like to. They have very low aspirations for themselves. And I think it's incredibly important for us to each own our story. If you think about it, it's the same skills, same skills to do something on a tiny stage as a big stage. And you get to decide what stage you play out your life.
- [27:48]
A
That's true.
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B
You get to decide. Now, there's nothing wrong with playing out your life on a small stage that might be super comfortable and that's what you want. But I think you should be intentional about it, about it.
- [27:58]
A
Is there anything that's felt scary to you when luck has come to you?
- [28:03]
B
Oh, that's an interesting question. What would be an example? Tell me, how would you answer that?
- [28:08]
A
I mean, like, where you're like, wow, this massive opportunity came to me and like, every week and every month, there's just more good things that come to me constantly. My life is so lucky, and it's just bigger and bigger. Have you ever felt that way? Like, why is this happening to me versus it doesn't happen for others. Do you feel guilty about how lucky
- [28:26]
B
you are when one person. I'm going to say this more generically than personally, but when one person in a friendship or in a group of
- [28:36]
A
friends, family,
- [28:39]
B
is having a lot of luck and someone else is struggling, it creates a lot of tension because, you know, the person who's really struggling is probably frustrated, envious, disappointed. And there may be things that they're doing. It might not just be bad fortune, right? It could be. It could be health issues. It could be. I mean, there are all sorts of things that can happen that really get in the way that are headwinds that, you know, really push you back. But I think that's the biggest problem when one person is really successful and Has a lot. Had a lot of good fortune. Even if they've worked really hard for it. Even if they have. It's difficult when there are people who haven't. And that creates attention. I think the question then is how can you be as generous as you can to those and help them in a way that would be meaningful?
- [29:35]
A
You had another graph here as well, right?
- [29:37]
B
Yeah.
- [29:37]
A
Can you share what this is?
- [29:39]
B
Yes. So one of the things that I spend a lot of time with my students is helping them understand how to take risks.
- [29:48]
A
Because do you have to take risks in order to be lucky?
- [29:51]
B
You bet. You have to push yourself. You have to get out of your comfort zone. But let me ask you a question. Are you a risk taker?
- [29:57]
A
Yes.
- [29:57]
B
Okay. That was a trick question, though, because there are lots of different types of risk. Right. Risk is not binary. Right. There are physical risks. Probably you very comfortable taking physical risks. There are intellectual risks. Right. Taking on a big problem.
- [30:12]
A
Social risks.
- [30:12]
B
Social risks. Getting up and giving a talk in front of. Of big group. Okay. Emotional risks. Telling people how you feel. There are financial risks. Right. Investing in a company. Political risks. You know, speaking truth to power. So this is a riskometer, a riskometer that we developed in our class where students get to. And you can do it too. I'll be a student, map their risk profile. So it's called a spider chart because the looks like a spiderweb. The inside is at the bottom and the ordinant is 0 and then 10 at the end. And so you map your risk profile.
- [30:53]
A
So 1 to 10, 10 being you're willing to take the most risk.
- [30:56]
B
Exactly, exactly.
- [30:57]
A
And you do it in each area.
- [30:58]
B
Exactly. Okay, so are you a.
- [31:01]
A
Let's start with political is probably my lowest.
- [31:04]
B
Okay. I think you're a pretty high risk taker all the way around. I'm gonna.
- [31:07]
A
I'm very high all the way around. Except for political. I went right to the leaf story, low political. But yeah, it's more like I want to. I don't want to talk about it on my show because I want to be able to have everyone involved.
- [31:18]
B
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. In fact. Right. You're probably not going to say your opinion because you want other people to be able to express.
- [31:26]
A
But I also don't. Also I'm not as knowledgeable in that category. So I'm also like. Well, I don't have as much intellect in that area to really speak about certain things. So questions. Yeah.
- [31:38]
B
Right. So intellectual risks.
- [31:41]
A
What does that look like?
- [31:42]
B
It means a problem like. Okay, I'm gonna have a. There's a problem. I'm gonna solve it. Yeah.
- [31:47]
A
I would say it's pretty high, then.
- [31:48]
B
Pretty high, yeah.
- [31:49]
A
Yeah.
- [31:49]
B
Financial?
- [31:50]
A
Pretty high.
- [31:51]
B
Pretty high, yeah.
- [31:52]
A
Social is the highest because it used to be that in emotional. Used to be the lowest because I was so afraid of embarrassing myself, afraid of looking silly, afraid of judgment of other people. And I was afraid of exposing my emotions. So I would mask them when I was kind of my teens and twenties. So those were the lowest, but I've made those probably the biggest.
- [32:17]
B
Well, I love this. Here's what's so important about what you just said. They weren't fixed.
- [32:22]
A
No.
- [32:23]
B
You stretched.
- [32:24]
A
I stretched.
- [32:25]
B
You stretched. And you said, I want to be able to accomplish this, therefore, I need to do that. This I need to get comfortable making.
- [32:32]
A
Yes.
- [32:33]
B
Social risks.
- [32:33]
A
It's interesting. I met someone when I was 23. I was actually learning to salsa dance because that was a big fear of mine. So this was a social risk. Was like being in a Latin dance club as, like, a tall white guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was like, I do not belong here based on, like, society standards. And that's why I went there, because I was like, I want to learn how to. How to belong in someplace that I'm not supposed to belong. Right. And I met a guy who was an amazing dancer that I was, like, just observing when I went to the club, the nightclub, and I asked him what he did for a living, and he said, I'm a public speaker. I go, man, that would terrify me also. I was like, this is from one fear to another. And he said, let's meet up, like, tomorrow. We'll go get coffee, and I'll tell you what I do or whatever. And he taught me. He was like, if you want to change the world in any way, if you want to change the world at a company you're with or on a bigger platform, you need to be able to speak in front of people. You know, five people at a time and 5,000 people at a time. If you want to enroll people, you need to be able to communicate. And he was like, you've got to go to Toastmasters. Go every week. It's a public speaking class. And overcome your fear until it disappears.
- [33:43]
B
I love that.
- [33:43]
A
And I did that every week for a year. And I humiliated myself and embarrassed myself. But it was my social experiment. How can I improve? And so that expanded on this web of. What do you call it again? Web of.
- [33:55]
B
Yeah, this is your riskometer.
- [33:57]
A
Riskometer. So that expanded on the Social. And then also the emotional side expanded when I got into relationships and intimacy and when I started healing wounds of the past and exposing myself by talking to other people about my. My insecurities from my past. And once I was able to expand those, I felt like unlimited in what I could create.
- [34:19]
B
Isn't it amazing?
- [34:20]
A
Like I was superhuman almost.
- [34:21]
B
You know, it's such a funny thing when you said you went to Toastmasters. A couple of thoughts. One is we teach storytelling. We have an entire year long program on communication skills for all of our first year students.
- [34:33]
A
That's cool.
- [34:34]
B
And they say this is one of the most important things I know should be mandatory. Exactly. Get up. And every week they're practicing, telling stories and learning new approaches to know your first and last lines, you know, add in mystery, add and like all different things to help you become better at storytelling. But I also thought, you know, what would I do if I wasn't afraid? Like, what is it? And you know, it's funny, I was like, oh, my gosh, I don't know. It's like, it's so off the radar for me that I don't even. Wouldn't even consider it is singing. Like I've been told since I was a little kid, you can't sing. You can't carry a tune. So I'm thinking that that's your next level.
- [35:13]
A
That's your next level. Whatever you're afraid of.
- [35:15]
B
Exactly. Could I, like, you know, could I actually.
- [35:20]
A
100%. You could, but you got to commit every week for a year.
- [35:24]
B
Yeah.
- [35:24]
A
But this is your new social challenge. You know, it's interesting because you said before we got started, I want, I want to keep that up for a second because you said, when I asked you before we started, I said, what's the biggest thing blocking people from becoming luckier in their lives? You said the story they tell themselves about themselves.
- [35:40]
B
Yeah.
- [35:40]
A
And the story that other people tell about you, you heard. Maybe it was only one time, but it was. You believed it over and over. Maybe you heard it over and over. You can't sing. Don't go do dance.
- [35:51]
B
Do something else. Exactly. Just move your mouth. Right. Just.
- [35:54]
A
Yeah, yeah. Maybe don't sing because you're not there yet. So whatever story you believed, you've held onto it your entire life. And now it's time, Tina, for you to break free.
- [36:04]
B
Okay. Okay. Next I see you, I'm gonna sing.
- [36:07]
A
Yeah. See, imagine the next level of luck you create because of the next level of internal freedom you develop. You know, you're the One talking about in the sailboat, you need the values and the internal skills to be able to then have the crew and everything of the sail open. But that's the next level. We all have something.
- [36:25]
B
Exactly. Well, you know, it's funny. Funny, not funny. When my son was in second grade, his teacher told him he couldn't draw.
- [36:35]
A
Oh, man. Yeah, I had that too.
- [36:37]
B
Did you really?
- [36:37]
A
Yeah. When I just. Just, you know. You believed it. You're like, ah.
- [36:40]
B
Then he shy. Then he stopped. I mean, this like, what a tragedy. And so you know the messaging that adults can give their students.
- [36:49]
A
What are your thoughts on. On words being a program?
- [36:54]
B
Say more.
- [36:56]
A
So, you know, the words we hear and the words we speak about ourselves become a program that we believe. You heard you're not a good singer. And it became a psychological program, essentially a weapon against you because you interpreted that story as true. And if we speak over and over, I can't do this. I'm not good at singing. I'm not able to do this. I can never find love again. I can never trust someone again. I'm not good with money. Whatever the words we're saying, it becomes a psychological program. And I believe it becomes an imprint in our nervous system where our body starts to believe what we're thinking, of course, and therefore we're manifesting that belief in a negative or positive way.
- [37:40]
B
You're absolutely right. I mean, it's again, these stories. So this is a major thing that gets in the way of people achieving their dreams is the story they tell. I have, you know, some sort of both positive and negative experience of this in my own life. I mean, when I was a kid, I was really interested in the brain. I mean, I used to, you know, we didn't have the Internet and I would read my parents medical encyclopedia. That was like the only thing I had access to to find out like, how do you do brain surgery? And my parents had a friend who is a neurosurgeon and I asked him, you know, some question I got up the nerve to ask him and he made some joke and was really dismissive and it was terrible. Honestly, I could have been his protege. I could have been. I mean, it was such a disappointment to be really dismissed because, you know, of my interest. You were curious. I was really curious. But when I was in college and I had a professor who wrote on the top of my paper, tina, you think like a scientist, Boom. Every cell in my body, every cell like shifted at that moment.
- [38:49]
A
Isn't it fascinating?
- [38:50]
B
It's amazing when someone Gives you that, and I'm very aware of it, that we have such power over what we say to people.
- [38:58]
A
Oh, as a Stanford professor and as a neuroscientist yourself, what have you noticed through the study of neuroscience on the words we use about ourselves and the words we speak into others, on how it unlocks greater possibilities for their life?
- [39:15]
B
Well, first of all, I have not been in the lab for a long time, so I'm not going to speak as a neuroscientist. I just think that we need to really be very aware of those messages and change the story. And we can change the story. I have often asked people to write their life story from different perspectives. Write your life story from perspective of all of the trauma that you've had. Now write your story from all of the amazing good fortune you've had. Now write the story with all the funniest things that have happened to you. And you realize, oh, every single day you have a choice of which way, which frame you want to use. So I think I spent a lot of time thinking about framing problems and how you can look at things from different directions to completely unlock new solutions.
- [40:07]
A
Really?
- [40:08]
B
Yeah.
- [40:09]
A
So give me an example. If someone is faced with a challenge in life right now, maybe something that's really hard, they're going through a breakup, a breakdown, bankruptcy. They're not getting the opportunity they want. They feel like a friend betrayed them, whatever it is, and they're experiencing this challenge right now. How can they tell a different story around that? Not to bypass the pain, but to see it for what it is to create more opportunities in their life.
- [40:35]
B
Having the ability to framestorm. So that's what I call it.
- [40:40]
A
Framestorm.
- [40:41]
B
Framestorm. That is to brainstorm. The question you're asking before you even start coming up with the solutions is really important because what you're asking is, you know, you're assuming that you know what the problem is, right? If you're saying, I want to. I want to get married, Right. Well, what is it that you really want? Is it that you want companionship? Is it that you want security? Is it you want children? Like, there are lots of things you
- [41:14]
A
don't want to be alone.
- [41:15]
B
I don't want to be alone. Right. So it's really important to framestorm and to think what problem you're really trying to solve before you run to the solution. We so often think that we know what the right problem is, and we race. You know, especially in school, you know, you're. You're like, how quickly can you do your Multiplication tables, you know, you rush to the answers. But living in the problem space and really understanding what the issue is at the beginning is one of the most powerful things you can do. You want me to give you a fun example from my classes on creative problem solving? So I will ask people, okay, since I just flew here, I'll say, you know, everybody has a suitcase, right? And I'll say, okay, make a list of all the things you love and hate about your suitcase. So people will make all sorts of, you know, the handle gets stuck, the wheels get dirty, there's not enough space, blah, blah, blah, it's too heavy, I have to lift it, whatever, all the things they don't like about their suitcase. So I said, great, design a new suitcase that solves these problems. So they go and they quickly, you know, they're so excited designing this brand new suitcase. I go, great. Why do we use a suitcase in the first place? And they're stuck. It's like, what, what problem were we really trying to solve with a suitcase? And it takes them a while to figure it out because we just assume we have to use a suitcase, but we use a suitcase because we want to have the things we need at our destination. We don't use a suitcase because we love packing a suitcase or we like dragging a suitcase around or we like losing our suitcase. We use a suitcase despite the fact that we hate using a suitcase. So I go solve that problem. The problem of how do I have the things I need at my destination?
- [43:12]
A
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- [45:43]
B
But guess what? You didn't even need to buy the apartment. You could have just left your suitcase.
- [45:47]
A
I could have done that too.
- [45:47]
B
You could have just like had a hotel where you just leave the suitcase.
- [45:50]
A
Or we could ship our stuff beforehand or whatever it is.
- [45:52]
B
Exactly. Or think about all the creative solutions. What about, you've got Airbnb for clothes. Maybe you find your body double down in Mexico City and they just sort of rent you their closet.
- [46:04]
A
I like that too.
- [46:04]
B
Or my favorite, which I think it used to sound like real science fiction, but what about 3D printed clothes? What if I have my closet in the cloud and in the morning I just go online and I go, oh, I want to wear this and this and this and that. In fact, I'd like that jacket not in purple. I'd like it in green. Tomorrow I want it in red. Right. And I just print it out.
- [46:24]
A
That's happening.
- [46:25]
B
I mean, so the point is we're going to put that suitcase companies out of business.
- [46:28]
A
Exactly.
- [46:29]
B
Because nobody really wants a suitcase. So anyway, the point I'm making is you need to question the question you're asking in the first place. So when you're really struggling to think about what problem am I really trying to solve for? And then start thinking about, okay, what are all the different ways, ways in which I could address that.
- [46:45]
A
Of all the things that you teach at Stanford in your classes, what are the three things that surprise you the most that people get the most benefit out of? Maybe it's something small, maybe it's something not even in the main curriculum, but it's a little off thing or. I don't know, what are three things that you get the biggest response from with your students?
- [47:06]
B
Okay, that is such an interesting question. Okay. I want to make sure that I really think it through. One would be. So we talked about the riskometer and risk taking. I ask my students what the bottom is made of when they hit, when they fail. When they fail. What is the bottom made of? What's their mental model of what the bottom is?
- [47:26]
A
What do most people say?
- [47:28]
B
A black hole, you know, burning lava, broken glass. I was like, really? If you get a B on that exam, you're going to die, you know? So I'm curious, when you hit bottom, what is it made of?
- [47:43]
A
It's more like sadness.
- [47:45]
B
No, no, you need a physical, physical thing. Is it rubber? Is it a trampoline?
- [47:52]
A
Is it a rocky cold? Okay, yeah, like hard, rocky cold.
- [47:57]
B
Okay. So this is so interesting though, because who told you that? Like, where did you get that? And so there some people who say a trampoline or a safety net.
- [48:06]
A
I like that. You just bounce right up.
- [48:07]
B
But the thing is, you get to tell that again, the story you tell.
- [48:11]
A
That's cool.
- [48:11]
B
And to help people become more resilient, because resilience is one of the best ways to become luckier because every time you bounce back, you get another chance.
- [48:22]
A
Yeah. Isn't Angela Duckworth is all about resilience and grit.
- [48:25]
B
Right.
- [48:25]
A
It's like. Is she Stanford also?
- [48:27]
B
Yeah, no, no, she's a Penn.
- [48:28]
A
Penn. Okay, sure.
- [48:29]
B
Course.
- [48:30]
A
Oh, yeah, yeah. Not as good as Stanford. No. Yeah, but it's all like the key determine for successful people is like grit. And that's really resilience. Right. It's like being able to be resilient.
- [48:42]
B
Yeah. And keep. Right. Try again and try again. I don't know it yet. Right. I haven't done it yet. So I haven't learned to public speak yet. So that's one is understanding publicly. Yeah. So One would be definitely getting more comfortable with failure. In fact, I have my students write failure resumes, all their biggest screw ups, personal, professional, academic. And it's okay to fail as long as you capture what you learned and what you're going to do differently.
- [49:11]
A
Yeah. I think of failure as feedback. It's information that exactly telling you what didn't work and what you can do differently to work next time.
- [49:19]
B
Well, let me ask you, did you walk the first time you tried?
- [49:22]
A
No.
- [49:23]
B
Did you ride a bicycle the first time you tried?
- [49:25]
A
No.
- [49:25]
B
What about anything else hard? What about salsa dancing?
- [49:28]
A
I wish painful moments for months of this. Humiliating myself in front of people, you know?
- [49:35]
B
Yeah, but now you're probably pretty good.
- [49:36]
A
I'm really good. I bet you I can say that confidently. My wife, who's Mexican says that I'm better than her. So as long as she says that, okay, great.
- [49:44]
B
So the point is being willing to like, what did I do wrong? What do I do differently? I mean, think as an athlete, you are practicing and getting better and have a coach and being willing to own your failures and to move on. So one is about risk taking, the other is really about framing and the idea that you really need to understand what problem you're really trying to solve and that if you live in that problem space long enough and do your real need. Finding and understand. There's a great famous quote, Einstein. It's attributed to Einstein, which is that if I had a daunting problem to solve, I had one hour to solve it and my life depended upon the solution. I would spend the first 55 minutes framing the problem because once I framed it properly, the answer would become obvious.
- [50:34]
A
Really interesting. So can you give an example for your personal life of what that would look like?
- [50:41]
B
Okay, let me.
- [50:42]
A
Framing the problem and then finding the solution because of the frame rather than just the pain of the problem.
- [50:51]
B
Well, let me just see. I don't. I want to make sure I get
- [50:54]
A
maybe something from the past or like, I don't know.
- [50:56]
B
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So maybe I want to get a job. I really want to get a job. And you're applying, you're applying, you're not getting it. And you're like, actually I want to work, I can start my own company.
- [51:09]
A
Me.
- [51:09]
B
Right. So instead of sort of thinking, oh, I've got to have someone else who hires me, you know, I actually want to have meaningful work and I want to have an income, I don't need someone else to do it for me, I could do it myself. So that would be an example okay, got it.
- [51:25]
A
Awesome. And then back to the risk, the riskometer. If you show that up one more time, and people go through this, they go 1 through 10 on each area of like, where are you able to take risks at, right? And let's say it expands higher in some places and shrinks in other places. What does that show you when you take this riskometer for yourself? You know, should we be trying to expand in all areas?
- [51:53]
B
Well, not necessarily. And so it's a really good question. You're going to find out like, okay, some people are really, you know, their risk profile really small. Some people are very angular, like it looks like a bow tie. You know, there are a couple of things or three or four things that they're really strong at and very comfortable taking risks, and others, they. They're not. Now, one thing that keep in mind, right, People who, like our venture capitalists, you might say they're very high financial risk takers, but they're really not because they're trying to squeeze all the risk out of it.
- [52:30]
A
They're going to lose money.
- [52:31]
B
They ride. They want the best team, they want the best, best product. They want the best market, they want the best timing. They're going to try to squeeze the risk out. Nobody's going to jump out of a perfectly good airplane unless they know their parachute has been packed properly. So when we take risks, the best thing to do is to take tiny risks from, like, you get a little better, a little better, like, push a little bit further, right? I'm not going to decide that tomorrow I'm going to run a marathon. If I decided I wanted to be, you know, run a marathon each day I'm gonna run a little bit more. And we all know, I mean, not necessarily all know, but it's, you know, if you get 1% better every day or 1% better every week, it's amazing what happens. Do you know? Are you familiar with this? If you take 1.0, you do the same thing every day, 1.0, and you multiply it times 365, what do you get? 1 times 365.
- [53:24]
A
365.
- [53:25]
B
111 times 1 times 1 times 1 times 1 is 1. If you multiply 1.0, 11 0, 1 1%, 1.01, 365 times, what do you get? 38.
- [53:42]
A
Wow.
- [53:42]
B
So if you get better 1% a day over 1% a week, if you did 1% a week, you would be twice as you would be at 2. So it compounds again the compounding effect we talk about appreciation, the compounding effect of taking risks. The compounding effect, I think that's another thing, Right. The compounding effect of the things you do. Luck and life is a long game. And that by compounding, you end up tempting really good things your way.
- [54:14]
A
So how do you learn to retrain yourself to be lucky if you've always been risk averse and never felt like luck comes your way?
- [54:22]
B
But there are lots of little experiments you could do. One of my favorite things about being lucky is just meet new people, right. Every new person you meet. I am addicted to talking to people standing next to me in line, talking to people sitting next to me on airplane. I can tell you so many stories about the things that have happened. So my best friends have resulted by standing in line on the way to get on an airplane.
- [54:52]
A
Really?
- [54:52]
B
Yeah. And they've like changed my life. You know, we're sitting there chatting on the way and then one person, my friend Beverly, we ended up switching seats to sit next to each other on the plane and then we talked the whole way. We've become. Became fast friends. We've been a bunch of collaborations.
- [55:08]
A
Yeah.
- [55:09]
B
And it's amazing. We went on, on an airplane and
- [55:12]
A
you took a risk just by saying, hello, how's your day? What are you up to? Where are you going?
- [55:16]
B
Yes, exactly. And one of the hacks there is, you know, have something with you, whether it's a back. I never. I usually travel wearing something with a Stanford logo on it.
- [55:26]
A
So it attracts and it's a signal, say something.
- [55:29]
B
Oh, is that Stanford? I went to Stanford.
- [55:31]
A
Trees or something. What is it the tree or.
- [55:34]
B
Exactly. There's something, or you see something someone else has. Oh, that's so interesting.
- [55:38]
A
So funny you say that because I'm from Ohio and anytime I see someone with an Ohio State hat, I say, oh. And you try to get a response IO in just a little moment and
- [55:46]
B
it starts something, Right? Yeah, I'll tell you. Can I tell you a funny story?
- [55:50]
A
Yes.
- [55:50]
B
So when Josh, my son, was maybe around 7 or 8 years old, I was at the grocery store and this man came up to me and he was with his little daughter and he asked me how to make lemonade. And I said that it's kind of interesting because most people sort of knew like, mix three cans of water with lemonade, but it didn't say lemocam. So I explained it to him, but I was sort of curious. So I got in line behind him. Right. I took a little risk. I got in line behind him at the grocery Store. And I said, hi, I don't recognize your accent. Where are you from? And he said, I'm here from Chile. I said, really? That's interesting, but what brings you here? And he said, well, I'm in town to learn about entrepreneurship. I'm going to be taking over my family's business, and I'm here in Silicon Valley to learn about entrepreneurship. I said, so interesting. I run the entrepreneurship center at the School of Engineering at Stanford. Here's my business card, if I can be helpful. Well, he reached out, and I introduced him to some people who could be helpful. He ended up bringing an entourage of people to Stanford. I helped them just secure a space, things that were easy for me to do. End of that story. But we had sort of stayed in very loose touch. I then two years later, was going to Chile. I was running a conference in Santiago. So I reached out to him and I said, hi, would you like to get a cup of coffee? And he said, sure, that sounds great. But as the time came up, he said, I can't get away, but do me a favor. Bring a couple of your colleagues with you and meet in the lobby. My building, my company's building. So I grabbed a couple people, didn't know what was gonna happen. We went over there. We got met by one of his colleagues, taken to the roof of the building. We got invited to go onto their helicopter and flown around the city of Santiago, up to their family's ski resort, and then back down. How lucky, right?
- [57:45]
A
That's cool.
- [57:46]
B
But of course, most people think of luck as, like, you know, oh, I'm turning lemons into lemonade. But that's an example where I'm turning lemonade into helicopters. That's cool, right? And that's the way it works. It's like, there is a million dollars in every room. It's up to you to find it.
- [58:03]
A
Oh, man.
- [58:04]
B
And if you think of life that way, that there is a million dollars in every room, and it's a game. Who should I know here? Who's going to be my new best friend? Who's going to be my business partner?
- [58:17]
A
So true. I feel like you and I think a lot alike in that way because I didn't grow up thinking I had, like, the. The intellect from school. I was, like, in the bottom of my class, and I didn't feel like I had skills outside of sports, but I could ask questions, and I was very curious. Kind of like you were with that. That person when you were younger, trying to ask someone, but you got stick getting, like Stunted and being curious. But I always had the courage to ask people much older and wiser than me, like, man, how'd you do that? You know, tell me more about this or how you overcame this. And just being fascinated on how people became who they were. And I didn't have to have any other skill or talent other than curiosity and being present.
- [59:03]
B
I love it. Curiosity is. Is so important. I mean, it is a superpower. And I learned how to be curious from my father.
- [59:13]
A
Really.
- [59:13]
B
My father was the most curious person in the world. And he taught his grandkids to be to me. But also I watched him with his grandkids. Here's something you can do with your two daughters.
- [59:23]
A
Yes, tell me.
- [59:24]
B
Okay. This is really a fun thing he used to do with his grandkids. Whenever they would go into a new room. It could be a restaurant, it could be a party, it could be somewhere. He'd say, okay, look around. Take a minute to look around and then say, shut your eyes. And he would do test them. How many windows are there? What color is the carpet? How many doors are there? What kind of light fixtures, you know, and how many tables are in the room. And they got so good at observation because they always knew their grandfather was going to test them on paying attention.
- [60:00]
A
Observation is a superpower.
- [60:02]
B
Yeah.
- [60:02]
A
And if you can observe people on, you know, their body language, what they're saying, what they're not saying, and just ask follow questions. I just feel like it goes a long way.
- [60:12]
B
Yeah, Ben. And also just being so curious about everything. Another thing my dad used to do, we. We were kids and someone left the cap off the toothpaste tube. Okay. That was a very big transgression. Right. So he lined the three of us up and he did a lie detector test. He measured our pulses.
- [60:34]
A
Who left the cap off?
- [60:35]
B
What's your name? What's your favorite color? What's your birthday? Did you leave the cap off the toothpaste too? You know, just like turning everything into a bit of an experiment.
- [60:50]
A
Cool.
- [60:51]
B
Yeah. So I think, you know, growing up in an environment where curious curiosity and experimentation or sort of everyday activities is. Is trains your mind to think that way 100%.
- [61:04]
A
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- [63:58]
B
I think it just takes experience, right?
- [64:02]
A
Yes.
- [64:03]
B
Right. You just have to do little experiments. One of my favorite things I learned teaching was with my colleague Alberto Savoya, who has a book called the Write it. And he helps people do tiny little experiments to test their ideas. You don't wanna do experiments that are just gonna, like, if they don't work, you're gonna lose all your money, lose your leg. Small stuff. You wanna do tiny things. And how do you do tiny things? He calls them pretotypes. Right. A prototype test if something will work, but a pretotype tests if it's the right thing to be working on. And so there are lots of ways to do some really, really fun pretotypes to test things in your own life.
- [64:50]
A
Yes.
- [64:51]
B
You know, let's imagine. So my son and daughter in law and our new grandbaby live in New York. Well, I think, oh, should I move to New York? It's like, well, I don't need to move to New York. Like, maybe I pretotype it. Maybe I stay for a month, you know, and see if I like it. Right. You don't have to go and like, you didn't need to go and buy a place in Mexico City, but you did. How nice. That's right. But you could have said, I went
- [65:17]
A
there for a few, for years and did these things.
- [65:20]
B
Exactly. And then I said, okay, let me, let me try it out. Let me spend enough time. And you can do that in so many other parts of your life. Yes, you can take little tiny with. And therefore you get better at knowing if you're doing the right thing.
- [65:33]
A
You know, a lot of people in their manifestation or visualization space and the mindset space think about the idea of just thinking of something and they're going to manifest it. But a lot of your research talks about luck, heavily rewards people who act and who move and really take action. Where's the line between getting your mindset right and thinking and believing something is possible versus acting consistently to create that luck?
- [66:01]
B
Yeah, the cognitive manifestation is really funny to me because, yes, it's a starting point to envision where you want to go. That's like having your compass and knowing where you want to go. But you have to do something. Right. I can't manifest getting into medical school right now, I have to say, one of my students, he. He told me the story, which I thought was brilliant, which he does. He writes a letter to himself from the perspective of the future, of all the things he's accomplished.
- [66:31]
A
I love that.
- [66:32]
B
And he writes it in blue text. And every time he accomplishes something, he turns the text black until finally the whole letter is Black. And then he writes a new letter. And so by writing this letter, he sort of sets an intention, but then he has to do it. So he actually went to medical school. So he said, I want to go to medical school. And so what he did is, okay. It's like, okay, I need to go study for my MCATs, and I need to go write my essay, and I need to go do all of these things. So the manifestation is really about setting an intention. You know, you had to set an intention to salsa dance. You were not going to learn to salsa dance by, you know, thinking about it.
- [67:12]
A
Thinking about it.
- [67:13]
B
Yes. You need to get out there and. And move your feet.
- [67:16]
A
Yeah. I love that you talk about the intention, because in your book on page 80, it says, Luck favors those who are both clear in their intentions and bold enough to ask. And you give a framework for asking. The first question is, what do you need? Who will you ask, and how will you ask such that it is likely to get a lucky response?
- [67:36]
B
Okay, this is important. Okay. All right. You need to ask for what you want from people who can help you, but you need to know how to ask in a way that they're likely to say yes.
- [67:49]
A
How do you do that?
- [67:49]
B
My guess is you get a lot of people asking you for things, and sometimes you just hit delete.
- [67:55]
A
Oh, yeah.
- [67:55]
B
And sometimes you answer right away. So, first of all, people need to do their homework, right? They need to know, like, to say, hey, listen, you know, I know you're an expert in xyz. I listen to your podcasts. I have one question, right? Ask for something little. Ask for something that is very specific to the person and do your homework. Don't. Don't say, can I meet you for coffee tomorrow? That's another way. Can I meet you for coffee tomorrow so that I can pick your brain?
- [68:26]
A
No, Read my book first.
- [68:28]
B
Yeah.
- [68:29]
A
Go listen to a podcast.
- [68:30]
B
I've taken everything I know and put it in this content. Please do your homework. It's interesting. It's really funny. This last week, there was a little bit of an aha for me. This woman said, I'm on campus this summer. Can I meet you for a cup of coffee? And I said, I'm really busy. Why don't you send me one or two questions, and I'll do my best to answer? She then wrote back, and she said, I just bought your book. Would you be willing to. To sign it for me?
- [69:03]
A
That's good. That's good. I like that. I was like, of course I'll sign my book. If you're gonna come to my office, I'm sure.
- [69:09]
B
Exactly. And now I said, of course. So come on over. I'll say, and of course I'll have 15 minutes with her when she signs book. But she was gonna go read the book. And she, like, it was like. And it's not that she needed to buy the book. Like, that was not the issue. But she was doing something that indicated that she was doing her homework. And she also found something that would resonate with me, you know? So here's a great example. I love this example. So this young man named Oliver reached out to me. He was living in Japan. He had graduated from college and decided he wanted to live in Japan and have an experience living somewhere else and having a new, brand new experience for a couple years before he moved back to the States and got a job. He watched my TED Talk on luck, and he said, it really resonated with me, and I want to become a luck coach. Would you be willing to talk to me?
- [70:06]
A
That's cool.
- [70:07]
B
So I said, that's cool. And I just started working on this book. So I said, sure. I'm happy to talk to you for a few minutes. So I got on a call, and we had a very nice conversation. Maybe five, ten minutes, we chatted. And then. And afterwards. What did he do? What did he send me?
- [70:22]
A
Thank you.
- [70:22]
B
Thank you. Send me a thank you. But he didn't stop there. He sent me a list of 10 things he could do to help me with the book.
- [70:30]
A
Wow.
- [70:31]
B
Like. Wow, right?
- [70:33]
A
Like real things.
- [70:33]
B
Real things. Like, here are 10 things I could do. I understand you're writing this book. Here are things I could do to help you. Nothing was on there. That was exactly what I needed. But I was so taken with his initiative that I asked him if he wanted to be a researcher assistant for the book. You have to realize, I've never, ever, ever had a research assistant for a book. Like, that's not something I do. But I thought, I think he could help me. And so I hired him. And there's now a whole chapter about him in the book and the things he does to become luckier. And it started with him just asking a favor, but then building on it,
- [71:04]
A
and it goes back to chapter seven on here, page 81. Appreciate luck. Luck favors those who give thanks. Goodwill grows into good fortune.
- [71:12]
B
Fortune, exactly. Which is where we started.
- [71:13]
A
He was creating goodwill for you, saying, how can I help you? Here's ways that I can help you.
- [71:17]
B
He's very specific.
- [71:18]
A
He was even asking, how can I Help you. Which is also not even. It's not a bad thing to do. I think him saying, here are 10 ways that I could help you makes you not think of, okay, here's what I mean.
- [71:29]
B
I have to figure out.
- [71:30]
A
I have to come up with the work, right? Not that it's a bad thing. I think offering hey, how can I help you? Is a great starting point. But the next level of that, the advanced, the extra credit version of that, speaking in professor talk is here are three things that I see might be helpful for you.
- [71:49]
B
Right? I see you're struggling with this thing. You know, you see someone and you go, let me help you with that.
- [71:56]
A
Right.
- [71:56]
B
I know you're working on this thing. The other thing is, you know, I know you're working on this. Here's an article that might be interesting right here. Someone you might want to talk to.
- [72:06]
A
Yes. These, you know, these skills. The cool thing about luck is you don't have to go get a master's degree in learning these skills like you teach it in this book. That's like, send someone an email thanking them, appreciate someone, offer solution for someone, be curious, take a risk. You don't need to go to school to learn this. You can go through your book and just take a two minute action a day to create more luck in your life.
- [72:37]
B
Yes. What I find is that people are leaving like gold coins on the playbook. So I'll give you an example. I might invite in an amazing speaker. You come in and give a talk to the students and at the end you go, you know what? If you have any further questions, feel free to reach out. Here's my email. How many people are gonna reach out?
- [72:57]
A
Maybe one. Maybe, Maybe. And you're like, I gave my email to anyone? Yes.
- [73:01]
B
Like, really and truly, you didn't follow up.
- [73:04]
A
Crazy.
- [73:05]
B
Even just to say thank you.
- [73:06]
A
Thank you.
- [73:07]
B
Even to say thank you.
- [73:08]
A
There's a kid, now that I'm thinking about this. There's this kid who I spoke at my alma mater a couple years ago and there was a kid who graduated like last year who's been emailing me just saying thank you from like my talk there a couple years ago. And now he's come coming to like live in la and he's been following up like every six months for the last couple years, just saying thank you and hey, I would love to meet you someday. And now he's moving here and I'm supposed to meet him in the next couple weeks, I think. But it's because he continues to follow up because he followed up after I spoke that I'm like, yeah, come by the office and I'll meet you for an hour. Who knows what'll happen? I don't know. But it's, it's, it's just taking the initiative. When you, when someone's willing to reach out and say, hey, hey, here I am, feel free to reach out to me. Most people don't follow up on it.
- [73:54]
B
Yeah. This is the, you know, luck. Seldom sail solo. Luck comes through other people.
- [73:58]
A
Yes.
- [73:58]
B
And understanding that and understanding the relationship get built. I also talk about conflict resolution. You might like, why is there conflict resolution? Well, think about it. If you wake up every day and there's a conflict in your life, not only is it, you know, something negative, that it's something that weighs you down.
- [74:17]
A
Yes.
- [74:18]
B
You know, if you can get up in the morning and say, my slate is clean, I don't have anyone. I don't have anything that's perseverating in my brain. That story. I don't have a story that's going on. Your mind is free.
- [74:33]
A
Your energy is more expansive.
- [74:35]
B
Exactly. And so one is. It's good for you, but it's also good, again to have those relationships clean because, again, good luck comes through relationships.
- [74:47]
A
Absolutely. One of the things is, there's two questions I try to ask most people is, what are you most excited about in your life right now? Because for me, when someone is able to express their biggest joy and excitement, you never know what they're going to say and how you can relate to that as well and connect on that level. And then the second question I like to ask is, what's the biggest challenge you're faced with in your life right now? And to see what opens up for them? Maybe it's not related to their career or business at all. It might be like health challenge or a relationship or this and that. And if you can be a problem solver for someone's biggest challenge or add to their biggest excitement, that is going to. In my mind, it's always created more luck for me as well.
- [75:28]
B
Absolutely. Yes. Yeah. And asking people, right, what are you excited about? What's getting in the way of that and how you can contribute to. I think it's brilliant. Totally brilliant. Brilliant.
- [75:37]
A
Tina, this is amazing. I'm super excited about this book. What I Wish I Knew About Luck. A crash course on turning aspirations into achievements. I want everyone to go get a copy of this book or give it to a friend who's really lucky to see how they can be luckier or someone that maybe feels like they don't have luck on their side, so they can start getting luck on their side again. What I wish I knew about luck. I've got a couple final questions for you, but. People can get this online, but where else can they follow or support you? I know you're a professor right now at Stanford, but what else?
- [76:09]
B
Well, I love to. I tend to use LinkedIn.
- [76:11]
A
Okay.
- [76:12]
B
And I'm pretty easy to find connecting
- [76:13]
A
with you after this.
- [76:14]
B
Yes, yes, I. That I use. I use LinkedIn to share a lot of things. My publisher has been encouraging me to use Instagram, which I really don't.
- [76:22]
A
You're not on there, Marsha.
- [76:24]
B
I'm on there. I'm not on very much, but I might be, But I think LinkedIn is going to.
- [76:27]
A
What is your. Just your name.
- [76:30]
B
Yeah.
- [76:31]
A
And if anyone is watching or listening and you message her on there, maybe if you mess with the right one.
- [76:37]
B
I always answer. I answer everything. I do answer everything because it might take me a few days, but you know, what if someone takes the time. The other thing is trick, though. Send a short message.
- [76:48]
A
Short. Not a long story of your whole life.
- [76:50]
B
Send something really long. Now I have to go through and figure out what. What is it that's in here?
- [76:56]
A
Too much.
- [76:56]
B
Yeah, just send it. You know, the goal of a conversation is to get to the next conversation, you know, not to, like, have it sitting in my inbox.
- [77:04]
A
Exactly.
- [77:04]
B
You know, waiting, you know, for me. Okay. When am I going to have. Okay, I'll get to this when I have time.
- [77:08]
A
Yeah, exactly.
- [77:09]
B
And when are you going to have time?
- [77:10]
A
This question is called the Three Truths. So imagine, Tina, hypothetical, you get to live as long as you want to live, but it's your last day on earth, many years away, and you get to create and do all the things you want to do, but for whatever reason, you have to take all of your work with you on the last day. So this book, you know, you're the 30 books that you have by that point. This conversation, it's gone hypothetical. But on the last day, you get to leave behind three lessons to the world. I call it Three Truths. What would that be for you?
- [77:41]
B
Okay, well, I can tell you I did my homework.
- [77:44]
A
I know you did. You came prepared.
- [77:46]
B
So I've actually had some time to think about this, which was really hard. Most people don't.
- [77:50]
A
They're like, oh, you know.
- [77:51]
B
Yeah, it was really. No, but I've really thought about it. Seriously, what would the three truths be? So the first one is that we all have more agency in our life than we might think. And whenever we feel stuck to realize, what are the things I really do have? What can I do with what I have? Yes, constraints are often an incredible stimulator of creativity and problem solving. What do you have? Where is the agency that you have?
- [78:23]
A
Okay, that's one.
- [78:24]
B
The other is that most problems are actually opportunities. And the bigger the problem, the bigger the opportunity. And so if you're struggling with something, probably other people are too, what is it? That maybe you can not just solve it for yourself, but you can solve it for others. And that turns into a pretty big opportunity. Opportunities. So reframing problems as opportunities. And the final one is, you know, luck really is a long game and we are investing. I love the appreciation appreciates. So I'm going to quote you on that. I'll give you attribution is that, you know, it is a long game and we are investing every single day. And the more you invest, the more comes back to you. It really, really happens. I can tell you that I wrote a book what I wish I knew when I was 20, and I really wish I knew these things when I was 20, because at that stage when you're sort of primordial and you don't have much you can do except for just investing, just invest a little bit every single day and the payoff is truly, really remarkable.
- [79:35]
A
Well, two things, Tina. I wanna, I wanna acknowledge you and thank you for being here. Thank you for coming down here from, from Stanford and for having so much excitement and passion about this, because I believe the world makes room for passionate people and you have created luck in your life in so many different ways from, from creating a beautiful, rich life for yourself, I think because of your passion and excitement. So I acknowledge you for that and I thank you, you for being here and sharing this wisdom with my audience. Thank you very much.
- [80:04]
B
This is a huge opportunity. I could not be more delighted. And thank you so, so much for inviting me to join you. I am learning so much from your podcast and I know it's just the beginning.
- [80:15]
A
Thank you. I have one final question. What's your definition of greatness?
- [80:18]
B
My definition of greatness? I think it's different for every person. It's about finding who you are in the world and resonating. I am a strong believer that before something's your passion, it's something you know nothing about. And so you need to experiment and try lots of things until you find like, oh, my gosh, this is what resonates with me. It wasn't until I was 41 years old that I ended up in a job that just finally was sang for me. I changed careers. Not just jobs. I used to joke. I used to change careers every every two years whether I needed to or not. I mean, really, I started as a neuroscientist, then I ended up teaching entrepreneurship to engineers. You know that there's a lot of pivots in there and I can tell you that when you find the place that really resonates, it's remarkable. And so it's different. Greatness is different from every single person. It's about finding your place in the world.
- [81:14]
A
Yeah. Dr. Tina, thanks for being here.
- [81:16]
B
Appreciate it. Thank you so much. It was really a joy.
- [81:18]
A
I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally as well as ad free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our greatness+channel exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Share this with a friend on social media and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts as well. Let me know what you enjoyed about the this episode in that review. I really love hearing feedback from you and it helps us figure out how we can support and serve you moving forward. And I want to remind you if no one has told you lately that you are loved, you are worthy and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great. Introducing Toyota's family full of all electric rides. As cool as you are, the adventurous BZ Woodland, the trend setting CHR and the versatile bz. Zip around town in the BZ with a smooth and sporty driving dynamic. Explore the outdoors in the BZ Woodland with dual motors and available all terrain tires. Be bold on the road with the C HR's sharp handling. Imagine what you can do with an all electric vehicle that gets you. Learn more about the new all electric family@toyota.com toyota let's go places. Hey Fidelity, can I get a second
- [82:59]
B
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- [83:12]
A
That's right.
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B
I am always right.
- [83:15]
A
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