Good luck isn’t just chance—it can be learned and leveraged—and The Serendipity Mindset explains how you can use serendipity to make life better at work, at home—everywhere. Many of us believe that the great turning points and opportunities in our lives happen by chance, that they’re out of our control. Often we think that successful people—and successful companies and organizations—are simply luckier than the rest of us. Good fortune—serendipity—just seems to happen to them. Is that true? Or are some people better at creating the conditions for coincidences to arise and taking advantage of them when they do? How can we connect the dots of seemingly random events to improve our lives? In The Serendipity Mindset, Christian Busch explains that serendipity isn’t about luck in the sense of simple randomness. It’s about seeing links that others don’t, combining these observations in unexpected and strategic ways, and learning how to detect the moments when apparently random or unconnected ideas merge to form new opportunities. Busch explores serendipity from a rational and scientific perspective and argues that there are identifiable approaches we can use to foster the conditions to let serendipity grow. Drawing from biology, chemistry, management, and information systems, and using examples of people from all walks of life, Busch illustrates how serendipity works and explains how we can train our own serendipity muscle and use it to turn the unexpected into opportunity. Once we understand serendipity, Busch says, we become curators of it, and luck becomes something that no longer just happens to us—it becomes a force that we can grasp, shape, and hone. Full of exciting ideas and strategies, The Serendipity Mindset offers a clear blueprint for how we can cultivate serendipity to increase innovation, influence, and opportunity in every aspect of our lives.

Good luck isn’t just chance—it can be learned and leveraged—and The Serendipity Mindset explains how you can use serendipity to make life better at work, at home—everywhere. Many of us believe that the great turning points and opportunities in our lives happen by chance, that they’re out of our control. Often we think that successful people—and successful companies and organizations—are simply luckier than the rest of us. Good fortune—serendipity—just seems to happen to them. Is that true? Or are some people better at creating the conditions for coincidences to arise and taking advantage of them when they do? How can we connect the dots of seemingly random events to improve our lives? In The Serendipity Mindset, Christian Busch explains that serendipity isn’t about luck in the sense of simple randomness. It’s about seeing links that others don’t, combining these observations in unexpected and strategic ways, and learning how to detect the moments when apparently random or unconnected ideas merge to form new opportunities. Busch explores serendipity from a rational and scientific perspective and argues that there are identifiable approaches we can use to foster the conditions to let serendipity grow. Drawing from biology, chemistry, management, and information systems, and using examples of people from all walks of life, Busch illustrates how serendipity works and explains how we can train our own serendipity muscle and use it to turn the unexpected into opportunity. Once we understand serendipity, Busch says, we become curators of it, and luck becomes something that no longer just happens to us—it becomes a force that we can grasp, shape, and hone. Full of exciting ideas and strategies, The Serendipity Mindset offers a clear blueprint for how we can cultivate serendipity to increase innovation, influence, and opportunity in every aspect of our lives.

What if being lucky wasn't just chance but a skill you could master? Learn to identify and act on serendipity to lead a more joyful, purposeful, and successful life! 'A wise, exciting and life-changing book' Arianna Huffington, author of Thrive ___________________________________________ Modern life is full of chance encounters, changing plans, delayed journeys, human errors and other mishaps. This is the hidden force that rules our universe: serendipity. But what if we could use such unpredictability to our advantage? Dr Christian Busch has spent a decade exploring how, if acted upon, unexpected encounters can enhance our worldview, expand our social circles and create new professional opportunities. From couples who met during chance encounters to businesspeople who invented world-changing ideas after a misfire, Dr Busch has studied hundreds of subjects who improved their lives by learning to see opportunities in the unexpected. Connect the Dots is a revolutionary, well-researched exploration of an essential life skill that we can all develop and master. ___________________________________________ 'Busch shows convincingly that it's more than blind luck in Connect the Dots, which offers excellent practical guidance for all' Paul Polman, former CEO of Unilever and co-founder of Imagine 'Christian Busch reveals that luck isn't always dumb' Daniel H. Pink, bestselling author of When and Drive 'More than just a way to create exciting opportunities, it's the foundation for a more optimistic and meaningful life. An important book for a complicated world' Cal Newport, author of Digital Minimalism *Previously published as The Serendipity Mindset*

Reviews "Wow! A whole book devoted to serendipity. Serendipity is my favorite word in the English language and now, for the first time, I get it! I really get it and I know my life is going to change. Thank you Madeleine." - Elizabeth Bartlett, Single Mother of Three Product Description Sprinkled with inspirational and motivational insights and sayings, this book tells you everything you ever wanted to know about serendipity! Both elusive and compelling to most of us, serendipity is often defined as "a happy accident." But it's not an accident at all, Madeleine Kay tells us. "Serendipity is a faculty within us that finds, elicits and responds to the best in life and all it has to offer. It's that quality in us that creates order out of chaos, possibility out of potential . . . and reality out of possibility - the organizing principle that designs, directs and creates the life we want."

It's a common refrain: I want more time for the things that really matter in my life!In the midst of a busy and pressured life, how can I enjoy "time-rich" living? Is it possible to be both efficient and creative, time-precise and time-rich, task-driven and people-oriented, to satisfy (even exceed) expectations at work, and to enjoy satisfying relationships both at work and at home? Yes! This original and practical book introduces an approach to life that I call "smart serendipity." I'll introduce you to the two, fundamentally different, ways in which we human beings do things, or get things done. I call them "Form-First" (FF) and "Content First" (CF). We're all -- naturally -- geared or oriented towards one or the other of these mindsets. But we need both of them! In chapter one, I explain the differences between people who naturally default to a Form-First mindset (FFs) and those whose preference is Content-First (CFs), to help you discern which one is your natural default, or where you are on the "F-C spectrum." That will enable you to determine your personal goals as you read through the rest of this book and begin to put the ideas into practice. Chapters two and three are on the Form-First (FF) and Content-First (CF) mindsets, respectively. I explain in detail what they are, how they work, and how to develop them, using real-life examples and comparisons so that you can clearly see what I'm talking about. You'll find concrete suggestions for how to implement the things you've learned in each chapter. In particular, I introduce the two "secret key perspectives" of each mindset, discuss their main characteristics, and share some of their typical weaknesses. In the fourth and final chapter, I will give you the diagnostic tools to decide which mindset to engage when, and how they fit together to lead you to "smart serendipity," and truly "time-rich" living.

Serendipity is a mindset that's always looking for the good--even on the very worst days. Some days are easy. Others... well, sometimes it takes a LOT of looking to find even a tiny amount of serendipity. This is your place to think and write about what matters to you--whether it's something happy or sad, or something that makes you angry or confused. And hopefully, by writing about what you think, feel, see, and hear, you'll be able to find the moments of serendipity in your life every day.