Sometimes when I’m really frustrated, worrying about something or in a bad mood I sit down and play video games to calm myself down and forget about my problems. The main thing it does is allow me to think about my problems in the back of my head without them being pressing issues which is how I find, better ideas come to me.
Lately I’ve been having some crazy days at the office where I just have to unwind and since I have a commute which is over an hour each way, I unwind on the train ride home. I use my commutes for reading and podcasts to make my time the most productive. While listening to podcasts, I need to do something besides just listening, to really get the full effect of the podcast so I play solitaire on my ipod. I noticed that although the game depends a lot on the way the cards are dealt, I was doing proportionately well at the game as the day I just had at the office. There was even one game that I went through the deck 3 times without being able to make a move. That’s usually where I would abandon the game and start a new round. Instead I put the game away for a little while and just relaxed with my eyes closed and some good music. A while later when I went back to my game, I ended up winning. It seems that my mood prevented me from seeing opportunity.
The bottom line is that the better mood you are in, the more opportunity you will see. When you’re in a bad mood, subconsciously, you have no patience for opportunity and you block it out. What I’m trying to say is that the better mood you are in, the luckier you will be.