13 Helping Points When Things Don t Go Your Way We all have problems.

The way we solve them is what makes us different. ~Unknown It s not stress that kills us, it is our reaction to it. Hans Selye (Originally written and published on May22, 2011.) Have you ever experienced moments when things just don t go your way? For example, losing your keys, accidentally spilling your drink, waking up late , missing yo ur buses/trains, forgetting to bring your things, not being able to flag a cab, getting stuck in traffic, getting into a car accident, being late for a meeting/ appointment, and so on. You re not alone. All of us have our times when things don t go as we expect. I cert ainly do too. Recent incident For example, just earlier this week, I lost my ezlink card. The ezlink card is a stored value card you use in Singapore for commuting. When you travel by train or bus, you tap this card with the reader, whereby the fare is deducted. This way, no physical cash needs to be used, and it makes traveling a whole lot more convenient. It s similar to the Octopus card in Hong Kong. Almos t everyone in Singapore uses ezlink for commuting, asdo I. It was a Wednesday, and I was out to meet up one of the business owners for an i nterview for the Successful Businesses Interview Series . (Speaking of which, I ll be continuing the series next week) After the appointment ended, it was already late at night, andI was beat and ready for the long trip home. The place was a good 1.5 hoursaway from my house, and being unfamiliar with the place, it took m e about 25 minutes before I was finally able to locate the bus stop where I coul d take the right bus home. When the bus arrived, I got on the bus, reaching out in my pocket for my ezlink card in the process. Much to my surprise, it wasn t there. I tried the other pocke t. Nothing too. Unfazed, I then reached into the pocket in my bag. Nothing as well. Thiswas when I felt something was amiss. Ilooked into the interior of my bag, followed by my wallet, even though I knew it couldn t be inside as I didn t remember putting my ca rd there. Nada. The thought of me losing my ezlink card (again) crept over me, slowly followed b y a wave of annoyance and anger. Refusing to accept that, I rummaged through my bag and my pockets a few times, one after another. Each time I did it with more thoroughness; each time I hoped the familiar shade of blue would rear itself. Bu t nope, there was nothing. The cardwas gone. Realizing the loss When it finally sunk in that the card was really gone, I felt so angry at myself . Reason being I have a knack forlosing things, particularly my ezlink cards. I ve lost at least 5 of such cards since young (including travel cards before ezlink was introduced and bus concessions). Each time I lost my card, I d feel incredibl y jaded. I would wonder what was wrong with me and why I couldn t even do somethin g as simple as keep a card in place. What ticked me off even more was that I had just topped up the card with$50 an a mount which I normally wouldn t top up with, because of my track record in losing my card (I ll usuallyjust add nominal amounts like $10 or$20). Also, this was not the first time I ve lost my card right after topping it up with a sizable amount o f money either. To clarify, what I was upset with was not really about the loss of money itself( money can always be earned back). It was more about how readily I seemed to just *lose* things, in the most annoying of situations (such as after just topping u p the card). It was the loss I was unhappy with, not the money itself. It seemed like some sort of a curse. A range of thoughts began to swirl in my mind almost immediately. Why is this happening again? Why do I keep losing things all the time? Why am I such a klutz? Why can t I do something as simple as not losing my possess ions? Is there something wrong with me?

What s the point of working so hard to earn money if I just end up losing it so fr ivolously each time? As I retreated into the last seat of the bus and slunk into it (I paid my fare i n cash), I couldn t stop thinking about the loss. Like the blood in a freshly cut wound, feelings of annoyance kept rising up. My mind kept racing back to the pre vious times I lost my belongings.Each time, I would tell myself I was notgoing t o lose anything from then on, but each time, it would continue to take place, li ke a disease. I thought about how clumsy and stupid I was to lose my things. I t hought about how I could have avoided this if I had been more careful. Even though I had originally planned to do some work and write a new article (th e bus ride was 1.5 hours long and I had my laptop with me), I was not in the sta te of mind to do anything. I wastoo bogged down by what happened. Working through the problem As I sat in the bus, feeling lousy about myself, I decided to process my predica ment, bit by bit. Rather than wrestle with myself, I allowed my emotions to flow through me from anger, frustration, self-annoyance, irritation, self-reproachin g, pain, disappointment , to regret. I acknowledged my thoughts, one after anoth er, be it self-reproaching thoughts, or frustration with the situation. I analyz ed the situation and identified what I could address, and what I couldn t address. I identified theplus points in the situation, and noted that it could have been much worse. I identified what was making me so angry and how I could fix that. Last butnot least, I picked out my learning points and worked through the things Iwas going to do differently from then on. By the end of this mini-exercise, I felt completely different. Funnily, even tho ugh it had just been 15 minutes since I realized my card was lost, and nothing h ad changed in my environment (I was still sitting inside the same bus, at the sa me seat, with the same passengers), the world suddenly seemed so different. A shift in perspective Suddenly, I felt so much lighter and happier. The universe felt like a great and happy place. I was no longer hung up with what just happened, but instead excit ed about my activities laterin the week. Rather than be held back by the grievan ces of the past, I was excited about the possibilities of the future. I began to think about the upcoming projects that I was working on. I wondered why I even spent all that time beating myself up just now. Irealized it was just a waste of time and energy. All these, from just a shift in perception. Was I still sore about the loss? Perhaps,but thinking further wasn t going to doan ything. Was I unhappy with losing yet another card? Sure, it d be great if I didn t lose it as I had to go and get another card the next day. Was I frustrated? Yeah sure, but staying frustrated wasn t going to solve the problem. I could no sooner run around in the bus, scream at the top of my lungs, yell at all the passenger s and smash my laptop to pieces just to vent and get back at the world , but it would n t change the fact that the card was lost gone. What To Do When Things Don t Go Your Way I realize that many of us today trap ourselves by virtue of how we think, and it s quite unfortunate. Because we don t cope with the incidences properly, we place o urselves in a negative cycle, and cause more damage to ourselves than we realize . We also waste time harping on the incident rather than move on to a better pla ce. These certainly don t helpus achieve our goals . Bad things happen every day in our life,to everyone, be it the rich or the famou s. They re no different or less susceptible to such daily incidences as everyone. While we can t change whathas already taken place, we can changehow we react to th em and what we do about them. If we learn how to cope with them properly, we can accomplish so much more. For the rest of this article, I ll share withyou a guide on how to deal with daily setbacks you may face in life. I hope you ll find these useful in dealing with si milar situations in your life. Bookmark this guide and refer to it regularly as you deal with such daily situations. 1. Take a step back and evaluate When something bad happens, it always help to take a step back and evaluate the situation. Here are some questions to ask yourself:

1. What is the problem? 2. Are you the only person facing this problem in the world today? 3. How does this problem look like at anindividual level? A national level? On a global scale? 4. What s the worst possible thing that can happen to you as a result of this? 5. How is it going to impact your life in the next 1 year? 5 years? 10 years? For example, say you overslept and you re running late for a meeting. Most of the time, people will panic, fluster and become extremely stressed out. If we are to apply the set of questions above to the situation, we ll find that it s actually no t such a big problem afterall. For example: 1. What s the problem? You oversleptand you are running late for a meeting. 2. Are you the only person facing this problem in the world today? No. People ov ersleep all the time. In fact, there are probably thousands ofpeople out there w ho are in the exact same predicament as you are right now. 3. How does this problem look like at an individual level? A national level? On a global scale? At an individual problem, it seems like a big issue. You re late a nd your counterparts are likely going to be ticked off. But at the national leve l, people are late every day, and life goes on. No one cares about someone overs leeping in the comparison to national issues such as politics and state of econo my. At a global scale, the problem becomes sominute that it can t even be seen as a problem . People out there are dealing with worse things like poverty, famine and death. Imagine you re one of the kids experiencing famine in South Africa right n ow. Would you care about waking up lateor losing a card? I didn t think so either. 4. What s the worst possible thing that can happen to you as a result of this? You r colleagues may have a bad impression of you. They may think you re not serious a bout your work. Most likely, nothing s going to happen. In the worst case scenario , maybe you ll get fired. 5. How is it going to impact your life in the next 1 year? 5 years? 10 years? By itself, your problem isn t going to have any impact in the long-run. It ll just fad e away as with other days in your life. 1 year from now, you re not even going to remember this incident. 5-10 years later, it s totally insignificant. Doing this exercise is not to undermine the problem or disclaiming responsibilit y,but to consider different perspectives, so you can adopt the best approach for it. Most problems we encounter daily may seem like huge issues when they crop up , but most, if not all, don t havemuch impact in our life beyond that day. Hence, there s no reason to get so stressed up over them. Taking a step back helps us to keep this in check. 2. Vent if you have to, but don t linger on the problem If you feel very frustrated and need to let off some steam, go ahead and do that . Talk to a friend, complain, crib about it, or scream at the top of your lungs if it makes you happy. Don t coopup your frustrations if they re grating you, becaus e it s not healthy to do so. It s like putting the lid on a pot of boiling water the heat and pressure will only increase. No sooner will it explode, and you don t wa nt to explode in anger! However, don t get stuck with the venting. I know some people who are angry all th e time, and it makes them very unattractive both inside and out. Some taxi drive rs are very angsty and it s tiring to face them. They complain about everything th e whole time, and after 10-15 minutes of talking to them,you feel like you re done . In fact, I came across one yesterday when taking the cab. Venting may temporarily relieve yourself, but it s not going to solve the problem ultimately. You don t want to be one of those energy vampires stuck in his/her neg ative vortexes. It s also not good for your soul. The more negativity you hold on to, the more you damage yourself. Vent if there s a need to, but do it for only sa y, 15, 20 minutes. Then move on after that. 3. Realize there are others out there facing this too Like I mentioned in Step #1 (Take a step back and evaluate), even though the sit uation may be frustrating, you re not alone in it. Chances are, other people have faced the same thing before too. There are almost 7 billion people in the world today, and all kinds of things have happened to all kinds of people. No matter h ow dire your situation is, know that there is someone out there right now who is

undergoing the same situation as well. Knowing it s not just you helps you to get out of a self-victimizing mindset. 4. Process your emotions When things don t go our way, unhappy emotions are triggered. Theseemotions need t o be processed, not repressed. By process, I mean to gain awareness and deal wit h them in a conscious manner. Imagine when you get a fresh cut. Immediately, bacteria enters the cut. Ifyou do n t clean the wound properly, it may heal by itself on the surface, but it ll get in fected in the future since the bacteria is still inside. Likewise, if you don t attend to your emotions, they remain unresolved. These emot ions lie inside you, ready to resurface at some point in the future. It s like a d ormant volcano it remains inactive for years, only to suddenly erupt one day. Th at s why sometimes, people who are normally well-temperedcan get agitated all of a sudden when certain topics are raised. The emotions you see are nothing to do w ith the present situation, but from their past. How do you process your emotions? Here are my 4 suggestions: 1. Journal . Write your unhappiness in aprivate diary or in your blog. It doesn t have to be formal at all it can be a brain dump on rough paper or new word docum ent. Delete afteryou are done. 2. Audio taping . Record yourself as you talk out what s on your mind. Tools inclu de tape recorder, your PC ( Audacity is a freeware for recording/editing audio) and your mobile (most mobiles today have audio recording functions). You can eve n use your voice mail for this. Justtalking helps you to gain awareness of your emotions. After recording, play back and listen to what you said.You might find it quite revealing. 3. Meditation . At its simplest form, meditation is just sitting/lying still and observing your reality as it is including your thoughts and emotions. Some thin k that it involves some complex mambo-jumbo, but it doesn t. Read: How To Meditate in 5 Simple Steps 4. Talking to someone . Talking aboutit with someone helps you work through the issue. It also gets you analternate viewpoint and consider it from a different a ngle. 5. Acknowledge your thoughts Don t resist your thoughts, but acknowledge them. This includes both positive and negative thoughts. By acknowledging, I mean accepting thesethoughts exist. Accep ting doesn t mean you agree with them. It s only tomake headway in your situation. A fter all, you have to recognize the existenceof something before you re able to wo rk on it. So if say, you have a thought that says, Wow, I m so stupid! , acknowledge that. If yo u have a thought that says, I can t believe this is happening to me again , acknowled ge that as well. Or if you have a thought that says, This is so clumsy of me , ackn owledge that too. Acknowledge every thought that arises. Now that you re aware of your thoughts, you can then deal with themaccordingly when create your action pl an (Step #9). 6. Give yourself a break If you re very stressed out by the situation, and the problem is not time-bound (m eaning situations that are time-sensitive and have to be resolved on the spot), then give yourself a break. Go take a walk, listen to some music, watch a movie, or get some sleep. When you re done, you should feel a lot more equipped to dealw ith the situation with objectivity. A little love and care for yourself will go a long way. 7. Uncover what you re really upsetabout A lot of times, the anger we feel isn t about the world. You may start off feeling angry at someone or something,but at the depth of it , it s just anger towards yo urself. When I lost the ezlink card, I was angryat the loss of my card. I was angry at h ow I didn t put the card in my bag, where it would be more secure. I was angry at why I placed the card in my jeans, which was probably how it got lost dropping o ut as I was walking. I was angry at the loss of my money. I was angry at the wor ld, in a way. I wasangry that I was always losing my card, and this time right a

fter I topped it up. Deep down, I was really angry at myself. I didn t know why I was such a klutz. I w as just pissed off with how careless I was that I lose things so easily. I was a ngry at how I made things difficult for myself because I wasn t conscientious enou gh. I was angry at how I was doing my best to be a good person in this world, ye t there I was, self-sabotaging my efforts with these trivialities. I was angry f or being a loser. After you uncover the root of your anger, what can you do about it? How can you improve the situation? Go to Step #9, where you define your actionable steps. Ou r anger comes fromnot having control on the situation. Sitting there and feeling infuriated is not going to change the situation. Themore action we take, the mo re we will regain control over the situation, the better we will feel. 8. See this as an obstacle to be overcome Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experiences of tri al and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired and success achieved. Helen Adams Keller Whatever you re facing right now, see it as an obstacle to be overcome. In every w orthy endeavor, there ll always be countless obstacles that emerge along the way. These obstacles are what separate the people who make it,and those who don t. If y ou re able to push through and overcome them, you ll emerge a stronger person than b efore. It ll be harder for anything to get you down in the future. 9. Analyze the situation Focus onactionable steps In every setback, there are going to bethings that can t be reversed since they ha ve already occurred. You want to focus on things that can still be changed (salv ageable) vs. things that have already happened and can t be changed. The only time the situation changes is when you take steps to improve it. Rather than cry ove r spilt milk, work through your situation: 1. What s the situation? 2. What s stressing you about this situation? 3. What are the next steps that ll help you resolve them? 4. Take action on your next steps! Applying this to the situation where I lost my card, this was what I got: What s the situation? What can be changed vs. cannot be changed? *. The card is lost. *. I did not know where I lost the card. *. I m already on the bus and well on my way home. What s stressing/annoying me about the situation? 1. Losing $50 because of my carelessness. My parents have cultivated the value o f thriftiness in me, so it feels lousy to lose good money that could be used for better purposes. 2. Inconvenience I caused for myself forlosing my card I have to pay cash for my fares until I get my new card. I also have to make my way to the station just t o buy a new card, and that s one additional thing to do in my long list of to-dos. 3. Losing my card even though I ve been making conscious effort not to let history repeat itself What are the next steps that ll help me resolve them? 1. Get my new card as soon as possible tomorrow, so as to minimize my inconvenie nces. 2. Work harder and recover the $50 lossvia 1-2 more ebook sales on my blog. 3. Ensure the new card doesn t get lostagain next time. I ll make sure to stash the card securely in my bag every time, every time I board/alight the bus basically, during the times when the card is used. After you have identified your next steps, act on them. The key here is to focus on the actionable steps, not the inactionable steps. Doing this will help you r egain control over the situation, which will make you feel better. 10. Identify how it occurred (so it won t occur again next time) A lot of times we deal reactively with our problems. The problem occurs, andwe t ry to make the best out of what has happened within the context. While developin g a healthy coping mechanism is important (which is what the other helping point s are on), it s also equally important, if not more, to understand how the problem

arose. This way, you can work on preventing it from taking place next time, vs. dealing reactively with it. Most of us probably think the problem is outside of our control, but reality is most of the times it s fully preventable. It s just a matter of how much responsibil ity you take over the problem. For example, for someone who can t get a cab for wo rk in the morning, he/she may see the problem as a lack of cabs in the country, or bad luck. However, if you trace to the root of the problem, it s probably more to do with (a) Having unrealistic expectations of the length of time to get a ca b. He/she should budget more time for waiting for a cab next time. (b) Oversleep ing, because he/she was too tired from working late the previous day. He/she sho uld allocate enough time for rest next time. He/sheshould also pick up better ti me management skills, so as to finish work in lesser time. So for my problem, it occurred becauseI play down on the importance of looking a fter my personal belongings all the time. By being more careful with my items fr om now on, I can better prevent such a situation from occurring next time. 11. Realize the situation can be a lot worse No matter how bad the situation is, it can always be much worse. A plus point vs . negative point analysis will help you realize that. For example, when I applie d this to my lost card: What s bad about the situation: *. I just lost $50 of good money that could be used for other purposes. *. I need to buy a new card asap to replace the old one. It s a hassle and additio nal thing to do. *. My traveling will be inconvenienced until I get my new card. The upside: *. The situation could have been worse I could have lost my wallet, which would be terrible, because it would be a serious pain to replace my identification car d, credit card, membership cards, etc inside. Moreover, that means losing more t han just $50 too. *. Or, there could have been more money inside the ezlink, say $100 or$150, whic h would be a bigger loss. *. I learned the importance of taking care of my possessions And not to be compl acent about them. *. I ve become a more careful and conscientious person. This activity helped me see (1) Things could be a lot worse. This wasn t as bad as I thought it was. (2) There s a silver lining in every cloud and it s up to what yo u make out of it. 12. Do your best, but don t kill yourself over it Do your best to address the problem, but don t feel bad when things don t pan out th e way you want. When I was in my previous company, I was handling a huge amount of responsibilit ies. Every day felt like a firefighting session. Everyone was constantly stresse d out , and the atmosphere was sometimes high strung. However after a while, I realized no matter what happens, even in the most dire of situations, there is always away to address it. It s just a matter of how you d eal with it. Things will run, and life will still go on. Hence, no matter how bad your situation may seem, do your best, but don t kill you rself over it. Life is too beautiful to worry so much over daily issues. Take a step back (#1), give yourself a break if you need to (#6), and do what you can w ithin your means (#9). Everything else will unfold accordingly. Worrying too muc h about the outcome isn t going to change things or make your life any better. 13. Pick out the learning points from the encounter There s something to learn from every encounter. What have you learned from this s ituation? What lessons have you taken away? From my situation, I learned: *. To be more careful when it comes tomy personal possessions *. There is an upside to taking better care of my possessions. In the past I wou ld not think that there is any point to do so, since I assumed they d be there all the time. *. How to handle my emotions better

*. How to tackle similar situations next time *. That if I link my ezlink to my bank account in the future, it will allow meto get a refund the next time (thanks to reader Alice who informedme about it!) After you identify your learning points, think about how you re going to apply the m moving forward. With this, you veclearly gained something from this encounter. Y ou ve walked away a stronger, wiser, better person, with more life lessons to draw from in the future.