Relationship Advice/Life Lesson/Lifestyle
How Understanding Pareto Principle Can Positively Improve All Your Relationships
Understanding this concept will alter your attitude and mindset and help you focus on the right issue for healthy relationships
What Is Pareto Concept?
Vilfredo Federico Damaso Pareto was an Italian Philosopher and Economist. He was relaxing in his garden one day when he noticed that only 20% of his pea pods produce 80% of the healthy peas. He thought deeply about this and started looking at other issues of life. He noticed that in Italy, only 20% of the wealthy citizens owned 80% of the land. Things are never evenly distributed.
He started to observe this principle in all areas of life, business, relationships, investments, manufacturing etc. This principle is so glaring that he developed it as the 80/20 Concept, which later becomes Pareto Principle after his name.
How To Apply Pareto Principle For Healthy & Happy Relationships
We all grow up believing in fairy tales of a perfect partner, a perfect friend, perfect parents, perfect job, the perfect house in a perfect area etc. Yet, life is completely different from our fairy tales, and sooner we will realise that.
Rather life is full of hiccups, headaches, dramas, burdens and difficulties that make life more teachable and meaningful. If these dramas of life are not treated in an understandable manner, it can make us miserable for life. Understanding the Pareto Principle can make a huge difference in how these dramas are handled, culminating in a change of mindset, and subsequently our happiness.
A good example is no matter how good our partner is, they have habits that upset us, why our good boss sometimes irritates us, how our son has his occasional nasty tantrums, and the neighbour next door, although helpful most of the time, is a bit of a nuisance sometimes.
You probably only wear 20% of the clothes in your wardrobe 80% of the time.
In our individual lives, we have our favourite restaurant, our favourite suit, favourite shoe and bag, favourite room in our house that we use most of the time. These are all examples of the Pareto principle. I remember my sister always call my favourite black skirt āāONE NATIONā because it is the black skirt I wear 80% of the time while only changing the tops and jackets to match.
It all means that we cannot find complete happiness from one single person in our life, whoever that person is. The Pareto Principle says you will get 80% happiness while contending with the remaining 20% without getting unnecessarily frustrated about the missing 20%.
This is because 80% of the frustration and complaints are caused by 20% of the problems. These problems can be little issues like spending too much time in the bathroom, chatting up friends and acquaintances at the wrong time in the house, not putting dirty clothes in the laundry baskets etc.
Understanding Relationships Through The Pareto Principle
It is NOT understanding and accepting of the trivals that cause the unhappiness in our relationship. Pareto Principle states that 80% of relationship problems are caused by 20% of each otherās actions or inaction. Do not, therefore, try to fix everything all at once. Identify the 20% and try to manage what you can put up with, what you can overlook and what needs to be addressed.
āThe 80/20 rule in relationships is fascinating and can help you understand what matters in a relationship. But itās up to your judgment to find and focus on the right details and take a passing glance at the smaller issues that crop up now and thenāā Natalia Avdeeva
In business relationships, 20% of our clients give us 80% of our revenue, so we need to know these clients and focus more on them and strengthen those relationships.
In strategic plans and goals, we must focus on what gives us the most revenue, and stop chasing endless new opportunities that will amount to nothing in the end.
So, here are some Pareto 80 20 rule examples:
- 20% of criminals commit 80% of crimes
- 20% of drivers cause 80% of all traffic accidents
- 80% of the pollution originates from 20% of all factories
- 20% of a companies products represent 80% of sales
- 20% of employees are responsible for 80% of the results
- 20% of students have grades 80% or higher
- 20% of marketing effort represent 80% of results
- 80% of customers only use 20% of software features
- 80% of success is showing up (Woody Allen says showing up is 20% effort)
The 80/20 Principle asserts that a minority of causes, inputs, or efforts usually lead to a majority of the results, outputs, or rewards. Taken literally, this means that, for example, 80 per cent of what you achieve in your job comes from 20 per cent of the time spent. Thus for all practical purposes, four-fifths of the effort ā a dominant part of it ā is largely irrelevantā¦ Every person I have known who has taken the 80/20 Principle seriously has emerged with useful, and in some cases life-changing, insights. Richard Koch
The Takeaways
80% of results come from just 20% of the action, but you have to know which action to focus on. So spend 20% of your effort constructively to give you an 80% result.
Success in life and especially in relationships is NOT about working hard or meeting the right person. It is about your mindset, about WHO you work with or WHAT you work on.
Talents are not evenly distributed. The most generous and understanding husband might not be that loving and affectionate.
Use Pareto Principle to work smarter, not harder, working on the right people, the right effort or action that produces the optimum result.
āWork hard,
and you will earn good rewards.
Work smart,
and you will earn great rewards.
Work hard and work smart,
and you will earn extraordinary rewards.ā Matshona Dhliwayo
A minority of things in our lives create outcomes that are vitally important and meaningful to us in the majority of situations.
āāThe Pareto principle is not a mere mathematical proposition. Itās a philosophy of life. It teaches us to focus on the significant and ignore the insignificant.āā Mukundarajan V. N.
