I used Canva before I had a reason to.

Not for a business. Not for any strategy. I just liked designing things, so I kept opening it.

Back when it was still pretty new, before there were tons of templates like there are now, I was in there making things that probably nobody even saw. No plan. I just did it because I enjoyed it.

Fast forward a few years, and Pinterest became a serious part of what I do at TalkBitz. And the thing I didn’t expect was this: I didn’t have to learn design when I needed it.

The account grew, and one reason it grew is because the pins looked right. They looked right because I had been at it long before it had to matter.

That's when I realized I had accidentally learned something Stanford professor Tina Seelig covers in her book "What I Wish I Knew About Luck.”

The kind of luck that changes your life isn’t just random.

She says it’s more like wind. You can’t see it, but it’s always there. If you’ve already built a sail, you can catch it when it comes.

Most people are still waiting to build the sail until the wind shows up, which, well, you can imagine how that goes.

So what does building a sail look like when you’re just starting out?

Thing is, it’s usually not the big strategic move you keep planning. It’s the small thing you do because you like it.

The newsletter you write even when nobody opens it. The tool you keep messing around with on weekends. The niche you keep reading about at midnight, not because you have to, but because something about it just pulls you back in every time without a good reason.

Those hours are not wasted. That’s the sail going up.

The part most people miss is that the habit has to exist before the opportunity shows up.

You don’t get good at something when you need it. You get good, and then one day something needs exactly what you have, and from the outside it looks like luck.

So if nothing feels like it’s working yet, don’t change everything. Check what you’re already showing up for every week.

The thing you keep coming back to without a plan.

Start there.

Talk soon,

Minosh

P.S. Also, if this newsletter made you wonder whether what you’re already doing could actually turn into something, this is probably worth reading before you overthink it too long.