In this week’s blogs, I would like to share with you a simple but powerful formula that I was taught back in 2006 by Jack Canfield, who is founder of the book brand Chicken Soup for the Soul® and a leading authority on Peak Performance and Life Success.

The formula taught me that I whilst I can’t always control events, I always have total control over the reaction to them and my reaction will affect my life experience. At times it can be scary but overall it has given me a feeling of empowerment and I have learned that I have 100% responsibility for my results in life.

This clarity has focused my mind and enabled me to channel my energy on dealing with any situation or set of circumstances rather than wasting energy wishing things were different, complaining or worrying about things . I have found it really helpful and I hope that it helps you too and enriches your life experience. Let me explain the formula in more detail:-

E Stands for Event

Defining the Event:

The event can be anything. A difficult customer or supplier, the weather, the economy, Government policy, late payment of money owed to you, people not keeping their commitments, appointments being cancelled at the last minute, a friend’s/people’s behaviour, your favourite sports team losing, the traffic, unemployment, toothache. In other words – anything and everything that is outside of your control.

R Stands for Response

Understanding the Response:

This is where the work for us comes in and what has the major bearing on our life experience. This part of the formula is our response or reaction to the event. This is where we get to choose how we respond to a situation or set of circumstances. The response is not necessarily how we responded to an event in the past. It is about the choice you make in the moment about your response.

This part of the formula helps you to get clarity that you are the creator of your own movie, the writer of your life script and that you are the driver of the car not a passenger.

As I said earlier it can be a scary place but overall it does give you a feeling of strength and power and helps you to be sure that you are master of your destiny. There is a phrase that I have heard mentioned many times, “if it is to be, it’s up to me.”

The elements to your response are your thoughts and feelings which shape your behaviour and actions. On some occasions we seek to change our behaviour before we have addressed the underlying thoughts and feelings that are driving our behaviour.

Having a greater understanding of our thoughts and self talk, as well as understanding what triggers us emotionally is a great insight into how we typically respond to events.

O Stands for Outcome

The Outcome:

The final part of the formula is the outcome or results that we get in life. The response we give to an event whether it is a positive or negative response will shape the outcome we attain and ultimately our life experience.


A simple everyday example of E+R=O

To give you a simple example, imagine you are on your way to an important appointment and you are driving on the motorway and suddenly you see lots of brake lights in the distance and you realise that you are heading for the traffic jam from hell. There is not an opportunity to exit the motorway, you are just stuck in lines of traffic, the road is gridlocked and each lane is jammed. You are stuck. Twenty minutes go by and the traffic has not moved. Now you have a choice in that moment about how you respond. How you respond will not make the traffic go faster or disappear but it will have an effect on your mood, stress levels and blood pressure i.e. your life experience and the outcomes that you experience.

Person A is stuck in the jam, they can get agitated, beep their horn, wave their fist and generally get stressed but it will not make the traffic go faster. They phone their appointment to say that they are going to be late and due to their anxious and irate tone the contact is not impressed by their manner and suggests that the meeting be cancelled.

Person B also stuck in the jam can say to themselves “oh no this is not good news, I wonder what has happened, perhaps there has been an accident, and I hope that nobody has been injured. I had better phone my appointment and let them know what is happening.” They are calm when they make the call. The contact is understanding and impressed by their calmness and politeness. The contact says that it is not a problem and to keep them advised of progress, that they will reschedule their diary if necessary and it is not a problem if the meeting needs to be delayed by a couple of hours.

After the respective calls are made, miraculously the jam disperses and Person B is able to make the appointment on time and the meeting goes well and they secure some new business, Person A gets even more agitated because they have a spare afternoon, they have had a wasted journey and it gets worse when their contact resists all attempts to reschedule the meeting and they never secure that piece of business.

An extreme example, I know but I wanted to illustrate how our response to an event outside our control can affect the outcome and results that we get in life.

Are there situations, relationships or challenges, where if you adopted a different thought pattern and response you may a better outcome? This week, why not have a think about if there are events where you can change your response and what would be the motivation and payoff for you to do so.

Quote for the week:

“You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them.” Maya Angelou, the African-American author, poet, activist and storyteller who died last week aged 86.

To arrange a free no obligation consultation, please contact Stephen Pauley via the contact form or by e mail: Stephen@befirstclass.co.uk