Emotional Intelligence: Why Is It Important And Ways To Cultivate Emotional Balance
The world is big and the dreams are even bigger. These days you can be whoever you want in life: doctor, entrepreneur, football player, or actor… But, to tell you a secret, there is one crucial thing everywhere that you need to reach success. It’s called emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence is a set of personal skills we develop in life which is important to create bounds and build stronger relationships. It literally means being intelligent with emotions, the ability to understand and manage your own emotions and the emotions of others. Especially, being emotionally intelligent is a game changer for leaders, it helps regulate relationships between workers and make new deals. So, let’s dig in and “grow emotionally”.
What Is When We Feel Something?
To understand how to navigate emotions we need to know what emotions really are. To start, emotions are very different for different people. You will never know how somebody feels because feelings and emotions vary among all the individuals in our planet. But there is some ground truth we lean on. Emotions are instinctive feelings that build a relationship with the outside world. Since we were infants emotions were our wires to the outside world. Babies are used to feel anxious when they want something and they show it, that’s how the connection between inner and exterior works. There are 2 biases: interoceptive and exteroceptive, that define your focus. And to reach emotional balance you need to be able to change your focus from the inside to the outside. So, emotions and the intensity of those emotions will grow and shrink depending on how much we are intercepting.
What Is EQ And Why Is It Important?
EQ, emotional quotient or emotional intelligence, is the ability to know and understand yourself and your emotions and apply that to the world that surrounds you. You surely have noticed a kind of people who hand some awkward situations gracefully, who easily make connections with everybody and etc, etc… This is what emotional intelligence gets you. And for the leaders, high EQ is really important. If you work with people, especially if you are the one who manages, you could never go without it. Fortunately, it is a set of skills (like self-awareness, managing emotions well, empathy, and tuning into other people) you can learn throughout life, so there are ways to balance your emotional energy and steer in the proper path.
How To Become More Emotionally Intelligent
First thing first you have to do is to pay attention to your emotions. Learn more about how you feel and why you feel like that, what affects you, and how to change your mood. This defines self-awareness.
Practice active listening. Try to listen to others and walk in their shoes. You can learn more about someone while just listening, and this way study their emotions to understand the influence of feelings. Also by this, you will notice yourself becoming calmer and wiser with your own emotions and feelings.
Take some time for journaling. Sit for a few minutes and write down your thoughts and feelings about something. You can do an “overview” of the day writing about what happened and how do you feel about it.
Sleep is really important. Get a high-quality sleep that lasts from 6-9 hours. That restores your energy and you won’t feel drowned or anxious.
Practice self-regulation. If you know how to self-regulate, your emotional reactions are balanced to the circumstances. You know how to pause and control your impulses when necessary, and you think before you act and consider all the consequences that your actions bring.
The balance of emotional energy leads to harmonious and healthy relationships, success in the career path, and overall well-being. It’s the key part of mental health, so you should understand that you do it for yourself above all else. Master your emotions, be calm and happy!