The Luck Surface Area Effect: Inviting More Opportunities into Your Creative Career
Luck Isn't Magic. It's a Skill You Can Develop: Context Collapse #321
There was an after-work industry event a few years ago. One of those networking things where you shake hands and eat mini snacks, drink wine and make small talk about sports and reality TV with people who work at other companies that kind of sort of do the same thing you do.
I forced myself to go even though I really didn’t want to. It had been a long week, and I was tired, but I knew I should do something social instead of staying home and watching TV.
I ended up meeting a future client who bought me on for a $15,000 project.
I didn’t know it, but I was expanding my luck surface area.
Roughly speaking, the idea is this: By being proactive and making sure you meet new people, do new things and speaking up, you increase the opportunity for good things happening in your life.
As Atomic Habits author James Clear puts it, “You can increase your surface area for good luck by taking action. The forager who explores widely will find lots of useless terrain, but is also more likely to stumble across a bountiful berry patch than the person who stays home. Similarly, the person who works hard, pursues opportunity, and tries more things is more likely to stumble across a lucky break than the person who waits.”
This is especially true for creatives and self-employed people who often rely on both serendipity and personal or professional networks for growth and new projects.
As human beings, we have more agency and control over our circumstances than we think. By putting ourselves out there and taking the initiative, we have more opportunity to have good things happen in our lives.
The person who works hard, pursues opportunity, and tries more things is more likely to stumble across a lucky break than the person who waits. - James Clear
II. The Luck Equation
The luck equation is simple: Opportunity + Action = Increased Luck.
Opportunity: The potential for an interaction. Do you know someone who works at your dream company? Do you live in a city or metro area that’s a big focal point for a hobby like surfing, writing or hiking? Are you involved in online communities where you’re in touch with people who are doing the kind of things with their lives that you want to do? These are opportunities.
Action: Taking action. Sending that cold email. Going to the party or the in-person event. Joining the webinar. Learning the new skill.
Increased Luck: More chances for more positive things to happen to you.
If you aren’t creating things or talking to people or going places or taking breaks from your usual routine, you aren’t expanding your luck surface area basically.
III. Ways to Increase Your Luck Surface Area
Every time you make something new, talk to someone new, go somewhere new or try something new, you expand your luck surface area. Here are a few ways that are especially important for creatives:
1. Publish Your Work Publicly
Putting art, writing and other creative things online. This can be through email newsletters, blogs, portfolios, social media, TikToks, YouTube, or anything else.
Reject fear of judgment and failure when sharing your work. Focus on creating and sharing in public.
2. Talk to Strangers (Yes, Really!)
Practice casual conversations with strangers at coffee shops, airplane seatmates, and in similar situations. Not everyone’s a natural at this and that’s OK.
Learn new ways of opening conversations without being awkward.
Find common subjects that you can talk about with other people from different walks of life.
3. Reach Out to People You Admire
Don’t be afraid to write to podcasters, YouTubers, or writers you admire.
Don’t gush, don’t overdo it. Just send a short note saying you like their work and you appreciate it.
4. Show Up
Set time every month (within reason), no matter how busy you are, to attend events, meetups, conferences, or local creative gatherings. In-person is best, but online will do.
Follow up with new people you meet after an event. Send them an email or connect with them on LinkedIn.
5. Say Yes to More Opportunities (But Not All of Them)
When more opportunities come your way, pick and choose the most interesting ones without overextending yourself.
Don’t say yes to everything. Focus on the opportunities that help yourself and others most.
IV. The Mindset Shift: Luck is a Muscle, Not a Gift
One of the most important things you can remember is that luck is a muscle, not a gift. We all play a part in making our own luck.
If you tell yourself you’ll fail ahead of time and don’t make opportunities where you can improve your circumstances, things won’t get better.
Curiosity, openness, and genuine interest in others matter. It doesn’t have to mean going out to different places every night for a month; it can be something as simple as showing up each week at a sports league with people you didn’t know before.
Rejection and failure happen. Brush them off, focus on the good things that are happening to you, and move on.
V. Get Out of Your Own Way: There Are Always Constraints
Everyone always has inner and outer constraints around increasing their luck surface area. Ignore the inner constraints and manage the outer constraints.
Inner constraints are things like fear of failure and imposter syndrome. Ignore them. There are so many mediocre people who have floated upwards into positions of wealth and responsibility in their lives. You can do better than them. You will do fine.
Where things get tricky are with the outer constraints. Health considerations. Childcare. Eldercare. Personal and work responsibilities. Figure out what you can do to increase your chances of getting out there within reason. It is worth it, I promise.
VI. You Can’t Control Luck, But You Can Make Some More
Here’s the thing. You can’t control luck, but you can control how much space you give it to find you.
Figure out one small thing you can do to increase your luck surface area. Go out on a night you’d normally stay in? Send an email to that YouTuber you watch each week? Texting an old work friend you haven’t spoken to in years to say hello?
You might be surprised about how far it goes.
Wishing all my readers a wonderful 2025.
-Neal
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