Feeling Down on Your Luck? Try These Five Tips
Feeling Down on Your Luck? Try These Five Tips
Luck is the random occurrence of good or bad fortune. A quick Google search of the word “luck” will reveal many bloggers who believe luck is an important factor in one’s success. But what happens when your luck inevitably runs out? Whether you’ve hit a rough patch or your life has become a series of unfortunate events, it’s normal to experience bad luck every now and then.
Fortunately, you can make your own luck. The Universe is abundant—it is endless, infinite and anything but scarce. Whatever you seek is available to you, but you need to change your internal frequency. Author and philosopher Wayne Dyer tells us, “Abundance is not something we acquire, it’s something we tune into.” In order to attract good fortune, he says you must shift your mindset.
There are so many tools available that you can use to change your inner narrative. When your luck has run out, try these five practices to reignite that magic spark.
1. Get out of your head and back into your body
To make your own luck, you must hold yourself accountable for the circumstances of your life. When things aren’t going your way, get on your yoga mat. The physical practice of yoga helps you get out of your head and back into your body. As you become more embodied, you will feel more stable, secure and confident.
When you practice yoga consistently, you’re showing the Universe your dedication to your path. That’s why we we host our 20 in 30 yoga challenge twice per year. It’s difficult, demanding and downright laborious at times, but it reinforces commitment. You have to forge your own luck with all your might. You have to work for it day after day after day.
2. Be your own good luck charm
Good fortune is less of a chance happening than it is the confidence that extraordinary things are available to you all the time. You are the captain of your own ship, and you can steer yourself in whatever direction you choose. Often times, we spend so much of our life scrolling, searching, waiting for the next big thing that we forget, according to one Hopi elder, “we are the ones we’ve been waiting for.”
Stop waiting for divine intervention to improve your life. Challenge yourself to be more accountable. If you’re on the hook for something, follow through—whether you agreed to dinner with that semi-exhausting friend from back in the day, driving someone to the airport at 4 am or just texting someone back. “You always feel so much better when you do what you say you’re gonna do,” explains PFY President and yoga teacher Alison McCue. “You create so much noise in your head when you skip out on what you’re supposed to do.”
At the end of the day, how can you expect the Universe to watch your back if you can’t even depend on yourself?
3. Declutter your mind
By practicing meditation, you will become mindful of your thoughts and feelings. When you become the observer of your own mind, you witness the coming and going of various mental states including anxiety, fear, frustration and depression. You suddenly realize the incessant chatter of all the stories inside your head. Stories that tell you you’re not good enough, not smart enough or that your luck has run dry.
When you first try to meditate, the silence is deafening. You sit down, you try to shut up, but you can’t sit still for more than five seconds because your neck hurts and your shirt feels weird and your phone just buzzed and you’re kinda hungry and you’re really bored and you should probably just take a nap because Lawd have mercy meditation is exhausting! That’s okay. You just have to commit. “Do your practice, and all is coming,” says Patanjali.
Eventually, you’ll learn to turn down the volume of your thoughts. When you quiet down, sitting still requires way less effort and you’re suddenly cool as a cucumber. Your mind stops telling you how things should be, and you start accepting how things are. When you acknowledge the way things are, you stop wishing for luck to make things different.
4. Write yourself a better story
What you choose to focus on becomes your reality. So if you want to make your own luck, you have to hold your thoughts accountable. Buy a journal and start writing your story down. Commit to writing something—anything—every day so it becomes a habit. Clarify your favorite self-deprecating stories (“nobody likes me,” “I”m not good enough,” or “I’m too fat/skinny/weak/intense/ugly/etc.” are all fan-favorites). More often than not, these thoughts are far less factual than they are fictional narratives.
Once you clarify your story, it’s time to ruthlessly edit. The central tenet of many eastern philosophies is that nothing is permanent, including the stories we tell ourselves every day. Let go of the self-sabotaging narrative you’ve created. Plant yourself firmly in your chair, whip out your pen and jot down a better autobiography. After all, you are the author of your own life.
Envision what life would be like if you were your own chauffeur. See yourself in the driver’s seat, grab hold of the wheel and envision the path to the life you seek. What does it look like? What does it feel like? Keep writing. Who is in the passenger seat? Who is in the car next to you? What road are you on? Got it? Good. Now read it back to yourself. Then read it again. Focus on it. Live it. And breathe it into your reality.
5. Turn the attention away from yourself
When life repeatedly knocks you down, McCue suggests you “call someone else and see how they are doing.” Talking to others gives us perspective. Often times, in learning how other people are doing, we realize that our own lives really aren’t so bad. Moreover, sometimes we forget we’re all in this together, so it’s comforting when people relate to your struggles. Developmentally speaking, we are conditioned to learn through our relationships with other people. A basic overview of Attachment Theory suggests that most of our behaviors are learned through our primary relationships—our mothers, fathers, siblings, but even our spouses, lovers, close friends, etc. Therefore, calling someone to discuss an ongoing conflict could uncover what you’re seeking.
“Better yet,” says McCue, “do something good for someone else.” The universe is in an everlasting state of motion: ebbing and flowing, expanding and contracting, giving and receiving. If you want to attract good things, you’ve gotta sprinkle some glitter on other people’s lives. Compliment people often, leave your waiter a dollar more than you would normally tip and donate to a cause you really care about (like 2018 Yogathon!). It’s no secret that when you do good, you feel good.
A new story
In the end, to make your own luck is to be confident. And in order to be confident, you must hold yourself accountable—of your thoughts, words and actions. “Be accountable” is our Theme of the Month for April so stay tuned for some thoughts from your favorite PFY teachers!
