How important is your Emotional Intelligence?

Some people think emotions play a role only in romantic situations or in the heat of a physical fight. Yet in fact, emotions are everywhere: They form our decisions, help us understand the world and are crucial in any interactions with others. Emotional Intelligence is one of most crucial part or sections in your lifecycle. However, this is not given much importance as to how much importance given to your Job, Studies, or even Lifestyle. Many of us think that having or practicing a healthy lifestyle often sums up as a whole and leading towards a successful living, the truth is a big NO. Emotional Intelligence contributes to your well-being in your Workplace, Family, and other social elements in your life.

This article helps you understand how emotional intelligence makes it possible to create a balanced interaction between the emotional brain and the rational brain.

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What is Emotional Intelligence?

Emotional Intelligence is often defined as the ability to perceive, use, manage, understand and handle your emotions. Although, this may sound as simple as handling your emotions “wisely & carefully”. However, that is not the case at all times. Handling or managing your emotions could lead play a major role towards cultivating how you understand yours, and the people around you to embark a healthy social circle. Always remember, it is not always about you.

According to an article by Lindsay Kolowich, the four categories of Emotional Intelligence are: Self Awareness, Self Management, Social Awareness and Relationship Management.

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Emotions are important

Why are emotions important?
They help us to learn new things, and to understand others.

Let’s put it this way, does your emotions hold you back? Would we do better if our emotions were removed so we can become more logical creatures with no feelings? I guess not.

In fact, emotions are vital to us as they provide us with advantages that help us lead fulfilled lives. One such advantage is the way emotions help us learn from our memories. Think about it, when our brain stores experiences, it doesn’t just collect facts. It also records our feelings and these feelings help us to learn from our experiences.

For example:
If a little boy touches a hot stove, he will experience intense pain which is often triggering his pain receptors. When a reaction is exerted from our body, it stores in our brain. So the next time the boy tries to touch the stove, all he remembers is the pain.

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Another value of emotions is the way they help us to interpret the feelings of others, which can aid in predicting their actions.

For example:
Imagine that you met an angry man. You may be able to tell this emotional state from his body language. Learning how to understand this, can help you to predict his future actions. Although, be aware that he “might” be ready to hit someone, and that could be you. :D

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The final advantage that our emotions give us is the drive to act. We require them in order to react quickly to a situation. Let’s look at the angry man once again, if we feel that he may be close to violent outburst, or even angry, thus preparing ourselves to react quickly if he looked like he was about to attack us.

As such, people who have lost their capacity for emotion also lose this drive to act. For example, in the previous century, many psychiatric patients went through a brain surgery called labotomy, which basically separates two regions of the brain that are vital for emotional processing. The result of the surgery was that the patients lost their drive to act according to situations.

So, once again, are Emotions important?
I’d say yes.

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Can over emotion lead us to making mistakes?

As per the famous sayings, something too much is never good.

Our emotions are important tools for understanding and interacting with our environment. However, always live by the line saying “No one is perfect”. Often times, our emotions are also flawed and can lead us to make mistakes.

One such mistake occurs when we become overly emotional. In order to make sound judgements we need to think clearly. Like a juggler, our minds can handle only so many items are once. However, when we are in a state of heightened emotion, our minds are bombarded with alarming thoughts and disturbing images. Thus, there is no room for rational thought and our judgement is clouded.

For example:
We as humans, we often find ourselves overreacting to situations, thinking they’re more dangerous than they actually are. This happens when you’re scared, you might mistake a sheet on the washing line for a ghost. Interesting, right?

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Another mistake caused by our emotions is when we act suddenly before we have the change to judge a situation clearly. When an information enters into our brain, a faction of it bypasses the region responsible for rational thought which is called “Neocortex” and making it’s way to the emotional brain. If it perceives that the information is a threat to us, the emotional can trigger us to act suddenly, without consulting our thinking brain.

If you’re wondering, this is exactly when you jump in conclusions without thinking twice. The power of assumption consumes the information and sadly, you.

So although, emotions are important, they can take control of our minds completely and disrupt rational thinking. We therefore require something to help us manage them effectively. Some may have suggested doing “Yoga”, I’d agree. Yoga helps our brain to calm, which therefore opens more room for rational thinking.

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Why Emotional Intelligence?

So, what is it?
Well, just another set of Emotions. Not really, but what it really means is How you identify and understand it.

Every person needs Emotional Intelligence (EI), which allows you to recognize and manage your feelings without being controlled by them.

The first aspect of emotional intelligence is being able to recognize and name your feelings. This step is vital to being able to manage you emotions. Studies has shown that people that who aren’t able to recognize their own feelings are more prone to violent outbursts. It may sound astonishing, but this is the reality.

If you notice closely, our emotions are often depending on how we think about it.

For example:
A friend passes you on the street, and doesn’t acknowledge you, you’d immediately think that you’re being ignored on purpose. This may make you upset or even angry.

But, what if you thought about it differently? The friend might, for example, not seen you because they were lost in their own thoughts or weren’t concentrating on their surroundings? Think….

When you begin to recognize and manage your feelings, emotional intelligence can help you concentrate on achieving certain goals.

For an instance, Students who manage their workloads in this way tend to do well at School even if they have average IQs.

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Can Emotional Intelligence help me?

Unless you live on an island, it is unlikely that you’ll develop a happy life just by managing your mind. The people around you play a large role in your existence and only by managing your social interactions with them can you hope to live a fulfilled life. Once again, Emotional Intelligence can help you in achieving this.

Your Emotional Intelligence also helps you to discover the emotions of others by analyzing their nonverbal signs. This means you can judge a person’s mood by looking at cues like their facing expression or body language.

For Example:
Someone with a face as white as a sheet, and mouth wide open. You’d conclude that they have been shocked.

Because it allows you to empathize with others, Emotional Intelligence enables you to behave in ways which evoke favorable reactions from others.

Another Example:
Imagine that you are the Manager of a company where one Member of Staff is constantly making the same mistakes. You’ll need to tell them about this and get them to change, but you have to do it in the right way.

If you hurt their feelings, they may become angry of defensive, and less likely to make the changes you desire. However, if you empathize with him and imagine how he will feel, you can act in a way which makes him more willing to change.

In conclusion, people with Emotional Intelligence can develop social aptitudes such as ability to teach others, resolve conflicts or manage teams of Staff. And these aptitudes help them to maintain relationships in the social environment.

Emotional Intelligence is often what you perceive and understand, within yourself and others. This allows you to make decisions rationally and empathize with the people around you effectively.