By GEOFF TAN

WHATEVER the incidents that frustrate you in your life are, they are more likely to be influenced by how you react to them than the incidents themselves.

If you've ever wondered why such incidents happen to you more so than to anyone else, you may want to consider applying management guru Stephen Covey's 90/10 Principle to rid yourself of these frustrations once and for all.

This principle is founded on the premise that 10 per cent of life is made up of what happens to you, and the remaining 90 per cent is decided by how you react to those events.

Take, for example, this scenario: You are having breakfast with your family. Your son spills a cup of tea on your office shirt.

You have no control over what just happened. But what happens next will be determined by how you react.

You may swear or shout at your son for being so careless. He breaks down and you turn to your wife, accusing her of placing the cup too close to the edge of the table.

She starts an argument while you stride to your room to change out of your shirt.

Your son is too distraught to finish breakfast. The delay causes him to miss his bus.

Your wife leaves for work. You decide to take your son to school and end up getting fined for speeding.

Your son, still angry at you, slams the car door without saying goodbye. You get to the office half-an-hour late and realise you had forgotten to take your laptop with you.

It was, all in all, a very bad start to the day. Then, it gets progressively worse and you wish the work day would end soon so that you can go home.

When you do, you find both your wife and son refusing to talk to you.

You ask yourself: Why did I have such a bad day? Was it the tea that caused it? Or was it your son?

Nope, you were the one responsible. You, and you alone!

How you reacted in the seconds after the tea was spilt set off a chain of events which led to the day being a bad one.

If you had applied the 90/10 Principle, this could have happened instead: Tea is spilt on you - the 10 per cent you can't control.

But you can determine the outcome of remaining 90 per cent. Your son is about to cry. You put your arm around him and tell him that it's okay.

You change out of your shirt, grab your laptop and head for the car after kissing your wife goodbye. Your son waves to you from the bus and you get to work on time.

You feel on top of the world and the day is off to a great start.

Isn't it strange that both scenarios started out the same way but ended on vastly different notes?

My friends, don't let the 10 per cent that happens to you lead you to make wrong decisions for the remaining 90 per cent, which is very much within your control.

For example, if a car rudely cuts into your lane, a taxi driver sounds his horn at you, a colleague passes a negative remark, your maid stains your favourite shirt or, worst of all, your boss tells you that you're fired, take a deep breath.

Now, think very, very carefully, because what you do in the next few seconds will determine whether you come out a "winner", or face a disastrous outcome.

You decide!

The writer is a senior vice-president of the SPH marketing division and the general manager of SPH NewMedia for Zapcode.

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