Emotional Intelligence

Conflict between our thinking and our feelings makes things complicated.   

Instincts, feelings and personal values take over and become a major part of our actions and behaviour. 

Gut instincts or intuition rely a great deal on emotion and feelings.  

Both feelings and instincts are major influences on our behaviour in the real world.

How can you benefit from improving your emotional intelligence?   

Doing so, will also make life easier for those who have to interact with you.  

Emotional intelligence is a valuable set of ideas you can use everyday and everywhere:  in the workplace and in the home; as a parent, teacher or manager.

It is about being aware of feelings in yourself and in others, understanding them and managing their impact.

It is about being in control, interpreting body language, coping with negativity, working with others and building psychological well-being.

Emotional Intelligence

Emotional Intelligence is an assortment of mental abilities and skills that can help you to successfully manage both yourself and the demands of working with others.

Developing your own emotional intelligence enables you to:

• Know yourself reasonably well
• Control your own emotions
• Show empathy with the feelings of others 
• Use social skills in an effective as well as simply pleasant way.

How to develop your own emotional intelligence?

This involves:

• Mindfulness: being aware - understanding yourself and others
• Being in control of your own thoughts, emotions and needs
• Being positive and self motivated particularly in the face of setbacks
• Using empathy:  being able to put yourself in others' shoes
• Communicating effectively to build productive and positive relationships
• Using emotional reasoning:  being able to use emotions to enhance rather than restrict your thinking.

What are the components of emotional intelligence?

Emotional intelligence incorporates at least these two:

Cognitive intelligence - the ability to think rationally, act in a purposeful way and manage your environment.  It is your intellectual, analytical, logical and rational skill set.

Social intelligence - the ability to understand and manage situations which involve other people.  It is your ability to be aware of yourself, to understand yourself, to manage relationships and understand the emotional content of behaviour.

Importance of emotional intelligence for our own mental health

In everyday life, people universally experience the difficulties of both coping with their own emotions and the practical difficulties created by those of others.

Emotional disorders affect huge numbers of people.  

• It is estimated that 15% of people will have a bout of severe depression at some point in their lives.
• 2% of teenagers are diagnosed with emotional disorders before the age of 18.
• Emotional disorders in old age is also a major and increasing problem.

Emotional intelligence is important for our own mental health and gives us the capacity to understand both ourselves and how we deal with the pressures we face.