- ?A few years ago, I used to be a very brash individual at the workplace and in my personal life. I used to lash out at my colleagues and even got into some unpleasant situations on the road.?I didn’t have a good relationship with anyone. This became a significant impediment to my advancement in both my professional and personal life.?
- ?After getting some tough love from my employers, and parents I decided to take a deeper dive into how I could develop myself. In other words, I wanted to know how to handle my emotions better.
- ?Emotions are something we all have. In my humble opinion, getting rid of emotions is not something practical. Instead, I focused my energy on how I could regulate them.
- ?This is when I discovered "Emotional Intelligence."
- ?According to Psychology Today, Emotional Intelligence is the ability to identify and manage one’s own emotions, as well as the emotions of others.
- ?As you can see, the definition of EI can be divided into two sections.
- ?The first half of the definition is about you. The term stresses "your own emotions" in this case. This demonstrates the significance of recognizing and managing one's own emotions.
- ?Secondly, the definition iterates on the emotion of others. Here, we are told about the importance of understanding and addressing the emotions of others.
?Now that we know what EI is, let me take you through the 3 steps I followed in order to be more Emotionally Intelligent. (I'm still a work in progress, but I'm managing my emotions better than before.)
- Identify emotions and triggers
- ?The first thing I did was identify my negative and positive emotions and their respective triggers. For this, I maintained an excel with data on the emotions I feel, the triggers, and the people who caused these emotions.
- ?One thing that I was surprised to learn was how some negative emotions had a short-term positive effect. As an example, the fear of failure at times was a driving force for me to do better at work and in my personal endeavors. However, this resulted in me overworking and overthinking.
- ?After a lot of thought (which took me roughly 3 to 4 months) I set my eyes on developing a strategy to handle these emotions.
- ?The easiest way to avoid negative emotions is to avoid the people and the scenarios that are your triggers. This was the first course of action I took. However, this resulted in more problems and issues as I had to avoid some individuals that are crucial to both my work and personal life. Instead, I did my level best to change how I would react to these triggers.
- ?This was one of the toughest tasks I had to undertake. This required a lot of discipline and data collection. I went back to the excel I maintained and wrote a note for each emotion I had. The note included how I SHOULD react. But this did not help me control my emotions. When you are angry or irritated it's very hard to slam the breaks on your mind.?
- ?However, I eventually discovered that the most crucial aspect is to comprehend the rationale behind these triggers. For example, if a coworker or a horrible driver on the road triggers unpleasant feelings, it is crucial to recognize that they may be carrying more emotional baggage than you. In other words, cultivating "empathy" for others?gave me a new?perspective. Having this awareness prior to adopting the discipline to not react to triggers assisted me in rationalizing why I should not react.
- ?In addition to being a great strategy to handle your own emotions, empathy has become a key tactic in handling others.
- ?In both my personal and office life, I have to handle and direct people to get things done from time to time. When things don’t go according to plan, or when people don’t perform at the level they should, my typical reaction was to reprimand them. But this resulted in me being labeled as an individual who is difficult to work with.
- ?Instead, developing a genuine interest in people has really helped me understand my colleagues better. Taking time to ask them "Hey how are you doing today?" helps you better understand what is happening behind the scenes.
- ?This helps you understand their emotions and state of mind. And when they are not able to get things done or if they are not performing at their best reframing the purpose of the task at hand really has helped me increase the productivity of the people I work with.
- ?Furthermore, paying attention to the body language of people helps you get a glimpse of their state of mind. Not everyone is open and willing to talk, and when that happens reading their body language can be the only way to get some insights into others.
?I hope this helps you in your path to developing Emotional Intelligence. Since I am not an expert in this field, please feel free to conduct more research on this subject. The sources listed below are those that I have utilized. I hope they will guide you as they have guided me.
