Tina Seelig on Luck, Gratitude, and Why Your Phone Is Killing Your Opportunities
Season 2026
Episode 24
Published 1 week ago
Description
A Stanford professor who has spent 27 years studying how opportunity works says the device in your pocket is destroying your luck.
Tina Seelig, PhD in neuroscience, builder of Stanford's entrepreneurship center, and author of What I Wish I Knew About Luck, sits down with Joe De Sena to break apart the difference between fortune and luck.
Tina explains why saying hello to a stranger in line has launched friendships, businesses, and marriages. She also shares the story of a thank-you letter that was read at a professor's funeral 20 years after it was written, and talks about the time she was caught acting as a corporate spy because she had never defined her own values.
Things You Will Learn:
The difference between fortune and luck, and where your agency actually lives.
Why a sincere thank you is the shortest distance to unlocking new opportunity.
What happens to your decision-making when you skip defining your core values.
Tools & Frameworks Covered:
Luck vs. Fortune Distinction: Fortune is what happens to you. Luck is what you build through decisions, energy, and engagement.
The Anti-Luck Device Test: If you walk through your day with headphones in and eyes on a screen, you are closing doors you will never know existed.
Gratitude as a Compounding Asset: A sincere thank you reopens closed loops, rebuilds bridges, and creates opportunities that transactional networking never will.
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