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This is how you make yourself luckier. Derek Sivers sold CD Baby for $22 million in 2008 and

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everyone called it luck. Right place, right time, the internet boom caught the way, right? But what

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they didn't see is that he'd been building music distribution system since 1997. So 11 years

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of showing up before the big exit and during those 11 years dozens of other music distribution

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companies started and most quit within two years. Some made it five years before selling for

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nothing or shutting down. But Derek was still there in year 11 when the buyer showed up. So was

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selling for $22 million lucky? Absolutely. The buyer could have picked any competitor,

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timing could have been different. A dozen variables outside of Derek's control had to align.

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But here's what people miss. Derek created the conditions for luck to find him and then he stuck

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around long enough for it to show up. And that's not the same as just working hard and it's not

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the same as just getting lucky. It is something else entirely. See a lot of us don't understand

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what luck actually is. Most people think about luck and binary terms. Either you got lucky and you

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didn't deserve it, it was just random chance or you earned it. So hard work means no luck involved,

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right? This is wrong. This is a lie. And believing it's how luck works destroys your ability to actually

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benefit from luck. So here's what actually happens. Luck is always involved in any success story.

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But some people create conditions where luck can find them and others don't. So when someone wins

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a lottery, that is pure luck. They bought a ticket. Anyone could have won. The work required was

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minimal. The outcome was random. But when someone builds a company for 10 years and gets acquired,

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that's also luck. But it's a different kind of luck because they didn't just show up. They

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position themselves in a place where good luck could reach them. And then they stayed there long

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enough for it to arrive. The difference isn't deserved versus undeserved. The difference is

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probability. See, pure luck has the same odds for everyone who participates. You buy a lottery ticket,

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you have a one in 300 million chance of winning. But earned luck has better odds. So you built something

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valuable for 10 years in a growing market. You have a one in 50 chance that somebody wants to buy it.

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So it's still luck, but it's much better odds. Now most people don't understand this distinction.

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So they either work hard and get better when luck doesn't show up. Or they wait for luck and get

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bitter when hard work doesn't make it appear. Or they get lucky once and they believe it was all

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skill. Or they watch others get lucky and believe it was all chance. All four of these ideas miss

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what's actually happening. But let me explain how this works with the story for my own life.

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I have been writing online for a very long time. I would say total writing anything online

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over five years. I guess the current newsletter that I put out has been about three years. But

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I've been writing for a very long time because there's been multiple previous iterations

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of writing. And I've killed some of these projects. But say the first two years I've ever written

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anything, nothing happened. I wrote every week. Sometimes multiple times for a week and the

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engagement sucked. It was flat. There was no opportunities, no growth. Just showing up to an empty

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era. And year three, which was really around the time when I started this newsletter, someone

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with 50,000 followers shared one of my pieces. Traffic spiked. I got 500 new subs in a week.

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So was that luck? Completely. They could have shared anyone. They could have never seen my work.

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There was a dozen different variables that had to align for them to share my work. But what

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people don't see is I published well over a hundred pieces before that person ever saw my work.

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And if I'd quit at newsletter 50 or newsletter 100, I wouldn't have been there when they went

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looking for something to share. And that is the definition of earned luck. I didn't make them share

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my work. But I made sure there was work to share when they were looking. Now you're foreign to my

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writing career. I got invited to speak at a very large conference. Decent size, paid well,

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changed the entire trajectory of my career. How did I get invited? Well, the person who shared my

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newsletter in year three had recommended me to the person who was putting on the conference because

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they liked my work. See, that is luck stacked on luck. But both pieces of luck required the same

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thing. I was still there, still publishing, still building when opportunity showed up. See,

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most people quit for luck has a chance to find them. They work hard for six months, see no results,

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decide it's not working. They were building the conditions, but they left before the luck could

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show up. So now you understand there are different kinds of luck. There's pure luck and earned

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luck. But this is really what makes earned luck different from pure luck. The probability of earned

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luck increases over time. It compounds if you're positioned right. So with pure luck, lottery ticket,

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right? You buy a lottery ticket once your odds are one in 300 million. If you buy a lottery ticket

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every week for 10 years, your odds are still one in 300 million. Each ticket is independent. But if

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you build something valuable, your odds start low. You start a company, you write a newsletter,

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you start a podcast, put content on social media, the odds start low, but they increase with time

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if you're in the right place. So year one of you building your company, your unknown, no network,

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no track record, odds of a big break are pretty close to zero. Year five, you have a body of work,

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a network that knows you, proof you can deliver. So your odds are meaningfully better. Year 10,

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you have become unavoidable in your niche. Odds are legitimately good that something happens.

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Now, this only works. This formula only works if two conditions are met. Your position in a place

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where opportunity exists and you don't leave before luck shows up and most people fail at both.

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They position themselves in a place with no opportunity or they position themselves right,

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but they quit too early. Now, why do people make this mistake? Well, a few reasons. But the first

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mistake is they confuse effort with positioning. So you can work incredibly hard in a place where

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luck will never find you. The odds never improve and you're just grinding with no probability of a

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breakthrough. So working 80 hours a week in a dead end job isn't creating conditions for earned luck.

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You're working hard, but you're not positioning yourself anywhere that luck can actually reach you.

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Now, writing a novel for five years, but never showing it to anyone also isn't positioning.

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You're creating something, but you're hiding it from the mechanisms that could create

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opportunity. See, effort matters, but only if it's happening in a place where luck can find you.

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Now, the second mistake people make is leaving right before probability catches up. So most people

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quit around month 18 right before their work is starting to compound right when they're starting

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to be known right before the probability curve starts working in their favor. See, they were

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tired, they positioned themselves right, then they left before luck could show up. And this is

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one of the most painful things to watch because they did everything right except stay long enough.

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Now, let's go back to Derek and CD, baby. Derek Sivers didn't just work hard for 11 years.

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He positioned himself in the exact place where opportunity would eventually show up. He built

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something that musicians needed in a market that was growing with a model that created leverage.

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And then he stayed there while his competitors quit while the market shifted while years passed

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with no big exits in sight. But by year 11, he was one of the few people still standing in that space.

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And when a buyer showed up looking to acquire a music distribution company, there weren't many

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options left. Now, was it lucky that the buyer showed up? Yes. Was it lucky they chose CD, baby? Yes.

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But Derek spent 11 years making himself one of the only options. That is not pure luck. That is

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earned luck. The buyer was going to show up eventually. Music distribution was valuable.

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Someone would want to consolidate that market. That was predictable. What wasn't predictable was

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which company would still be there when the buyer arrived and Derek made sure it was him. Now,

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what does this mean for your life? You can't force luck, but you can make yourself luckier,

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not through positive thinking, not through manifestation, through positioning and persistence.

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Position yourself in a place where opportunity exists, where the thing your building has a chance

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of mattering and where luck can actually find you if it shows up and then stay there. Long past

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when it feels like it's working, long past when others quit. See, most people leave right before

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probability catches up. They work hard for 18 months, see no results, decide they're unlucky,

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but they weren't unlucky. They just didn't stay long enough. Luck doesn't show up on a schedule.

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You cannot force it to arrive in year two or year five, but you can make sure that you're still

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there when it does arrive. That is the thing that you can control. See, the people who seem lucky

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aren't luckier than you. They have positioned themselves better and they didn't leave. That is the

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whole game. Position persist. Be there when the luck shows up because luck will show up eventually

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if you're in the right place, but that only matters if you're still there when it does.