I know positive thoughts create positive outcomes

The link isn't magic, it's arithmetic. A hopeful person sends the application. A person certain of rejection edits it for a week and then doesn't send it at all, and is proved right — not by the world, but by the unpressed button.

Outcomes are made of attempts, and attempts are made of what you expected before you started. That is a slower and more ordinary mechanism than it sounds, and it is also much harder to argue with.