Emotional Intelligence, what is it and how do I get it?

How many times have you heard someone say, “So and so has good or bad EQ”? EQ or Emotional Intelligence is a critical success factor. The first step to increasing your EQ is to recognize your emotions and controlling your emotional response to any given situation.

The skill of emotional self-control is perhaps the most valuable skill you can EVER acquire. However, it can be difficult at times to identify your emotion for a variety of reasons:

• We were made to think our feelings don’t matter
• We were made to fear expressing our emotions
• We were made to feel guilty if our emotions (or desires) were an inconvenience on others
• We were discouraged from feeling or expressing specific emotions

Many of us are conditioned from an early age to stop expressing our emotions and often repress them (hold them in). Other people go a step further and stop allowing themselves to have them. In either case, this can lead to a reduced ability to recognize how we feel.

Even those of us who didn’t learn to repress our emotions and feel things deeply, may not have learning how to clearly identify them.

To better control or direct your own emotional state, you must first learn to:

• Notice you’re experiencing an emotional state
• Identify what it is
• Know what to expect
• Know how to influence a new emotional state

Emotional States

Emotional states are actually two distinctly different things:

• The STATE is the physiological “feelings” you experience
• The EMOTION is the psychological interpretation or “label” you put on the state

We experience complex states made up of chemical and hormone interactions that cause a variety of reactions in the body. Our emotions are the interpretations we make of these experiences or the labels we give them. What this means is the body responds to the thought first, then our minds interpret the reaction, label it, and an emotion is born.

We also have physiological feelings, these aren’t emotions. A physiological feeling is when we physically feel something, for example, hot, cold, nauseous. When we interpret these feeling to have meaning and then turn them into emotions.

Emotions literally mean action: e-MOTION. Each emotional state is designed to get us to do something, and often we do. Our emotional state affects our behavior, but it does not cause it. When we’re angry we’re more likely to be aggressive, but our cognitive (thought) processes allow us to make those decisions. When we are able to recognize emotion early in the process, we have power over it and are in better control of our responses.

Below are six common emotions a description of the emotion, physiological state, and common resulting behaviors. This chart will help you get a general idea of the signs and symptoms of each emotion to make them easier to identify; specifically, easier to identify early. Keep in mind everyone experiences each emotion somewhat differently and you may not experience all of the characteristics.  

Next time you catch yourself experiencing an emotion that is distinct, ask yourself: “

• What do I observe in my body language, vocal tone, thoughts, behavior?
• Is it appropriate for this situation?
• How will the recipient of my actions going to respond?
• Will my actions help or distract from accomplishing the goal?

Remember, learning or developing any skill takes time and practice so be patient and mindful and overtime this will help you increase your EQ.