Emotional Smart

Forget IQ. EQ is the new buzzword!

You’ve got an intellectual resume to die for–a    university degree,  perhaps even a    Master’s and an open membership to elite high-intelligence quotient (IQ) club, Mensa. However, just how bright are you when dealing with life’s stickier moments and trying relationships? Today’s world calls for a different kind of intelligence. In other words, what’s your emotional quotient (EQ), mate?

What is EQ?

According to Steve Hein, EQ or emotional intelligence is the “mental ability we are born with, which gives us our emotional sensitivity and our potential for emotional learning-management skills”. It also helps us maximise our long-term health, happiness and survival, adds the author of EQ for Everybody.

      Harvard psychologist, Daniel Goleman, the first to propagate the concept in the book, Emotional Intelligence, states that even the most academically brilliant are vulnerable to being undone by unruly emotions.

      “The price we pay for emotional literacy is in failed marriages and troubled families, in stunted social and work lives, in deteriorating physical health and mental anguish and, as a society, in tragedies such as killings,” adds Goleman.

      He insists that the best remedy for battling our emotional shortcomings is preventive medicine. Therefore, we need to place as much importance on teaching children essential EQ skills as we do on the more traditional yardsticks such as IQ and school grades.

      Essentially, emotional intelligence gives you a competitive edge, adds Goleman in an article that appeared in the alternative Webzine Utne Magazine.

      “Even at Bell Labs, where everyone is smart, studies find that the most valued and productive engineers are those with the traits of emotional intelligence–not necessarily the highest IQ,” he adds.

Building up EQ

To develop you emotional intelligence, you can refer to Hein’s suggestions:

1 Label your feelings, not people or  situations.

Example: “I feel impatient” versus “This is ridiculous” and “I feel hurt and bitter” versus “You are an insensitive jerk.”

2 Distinguish between thoughts and    feelings.

Example: Thoughts are expressed by
“I feel like…” or “I feel as if…” and feelings are expressed by “I feel sad” or “I feel angry.”

3 Be responsible for your feelings.

Example: “I feel jealous” versus “You are making me jealous.”

4 Use your feelings to help yourself   make decisions

Example: “How will I feel if I do this?” or “How will I feel if I don’t?”

5 Show respect for other people’s feelings. Ask: “How will you feel if I do this?” or “How will you feel if I don’t?”

6 Feel energised, not angry. Use anger to feel energised enough to take productive action.

7 Validate other people’s feelings. Show empathy, understanding and acceptance.

8 Practice getting positive values by asking: “How do I/you feel?” and “What would help me/you feel better?”

9 Don’t advice, command, control,       criticise, judge or lecture others. Instead, try to listen with empathy and avoid
being judgmental.

10  Avoid people who tend to invalidate •