The Power of Emotional Intelligence
"To feel intensely is not a symptom of weakness, it is the trademark of the truly alive and compassionate"
When I was younger, my family described me as ‘the emotional one’. Every time we were watching something sad, my family would look over to me and say “yep, she is crying”.
I can remember going to see War Horse the movie with my Dad. We went to the pensioners afternoon showing. I don’t know if you have seen this movie but OMG it is an emotional rollercoaster ride. As the final credits played, and the lights came up, all the people in the cinema got up and made their way out. Me and my dad were still sat there 10 minutes later because I could not stop crying about a relationship between a war hero and his horse. Thank goodness my Dad had a hankie with him! I can remember observing all those ‘stiff upper lip’ pensioners who could enjoy the film and yet not outwardly show those emotions as they stoically left the cinema. At the time, I thought it was admirable, and I considered myself weak.
It took me a long time to realise that the fact that I have always been able to connect with my emotions is actually my superpower and not a flaw. Emotional Intelligence is not all about regulating your emotions (although this is part of it), it is about allowing yourself to acknowledge what you (or someone else is feeling) and allowing space for that emotion to be present and worked through.
I am so pleased that society is slowly changing and becoming more accepting that we are powerful, emotional beings. I am glad the narrative is changing and that men can now feel able to fully express themselves. It matters.
So why is emotional intelligence so critical?
Our emotions leave us clues about how we are thinking. We have thousands of thoughts each day and we can’t possibly monitor every thought we have. However, our thoughts determine how we feel. It is impossible to be thinking positive thoughts and feeling depressed. It is impossible to be thinking in a continually negative way and to by happy or grateful. Our feelings then determine our behaviour.
The problem is that too often we don’t allow ourselves to fully express what we are feeling. We numb things. Every time we experience an emotion that we just swallow down and don’t allow ourselves to express it, we literally store that emotion in our body. So much research has been completed about how storing unreleased emotion impacts our cells and ultimately our health.
Emotions are meant to flow. Look at the word. Motion is right in the middle of it. It is there for a reason. The word emotion stems from the Latin word ‘emovere’ which means ‘to move’.
There is a really well-known body of work on the topic of emotional intelligence which was published by Daniel Goleman. In his work he determines there are 5 facets to emotional intelligence:
Self-awareness – your ability to recognise your own strengths and weakness, to identify your emotions and to understand how your emotions impact your behaviour and decision making.
Self-regulation – your ability to manage your emotional responses in a healthy way and to remain calm in moments of pressure.
Social awareness – being able to sense the emotions of others and being sensitive to those needs.
Relationship management – building and maintaining relationships through communication, managing conflict in a healthy way and being able to show empathy and compassion.
Motivation – our internal passion that pushes us to achieve our intentions and desires.
When you decide to become the leader of your life and step into the CEO role, your ability to see your emotional intelligence as a superpower and not a flaw becomes critical. Years ago, I was part of a small team. I can remember frequently being asked to ‘handle’ situations where the leader could not deal with a member of the team who they perceived to be ‘emotional’. At the time, I can remember being frustrated that I always had to tidy up the mess but when I look back now, I realise that this was not only strengthening my own emotional intelligence but that my superpower for EI was already recognised and appreciated.
A myth I want to bust is that emotional intelligence is born and not made. I don’t believe that at all. Neuroscience proves that we all have the capacity to continue to grow and develop, we are not limited beings. I fully believe that EI can be developed and the demands of our world is creating the space for us all to be more compassionate for each other.
Mastering Self-Awareness
We all have strengths (or power sources), and we all have flaws. It is what makes us beautifully human. Our problem is that we don’t always want to acknowledge this. We don’t want to be seen as ‘pushy’ or ‘too much’, so we hide our strengths. We dim our light. We don’t want to make others feel less by simply expressing our passion. And then we feel we have to hide our flaws or overcompensate for them for fear of being not enough. You have always been enough. You just need to choose to believe it.
We were never made to be perfect, in fact there is perfection in imperfection. Just look at the Japanese philosophy of Kintsugi (turning something broken into something beautiful by glueing it together with gold). I strongly believe we ALL have gifts and that we are here to leverage them AND I believe we all have rough edges. It took me a long time to realise and accept this, but it’s made me a stronger leader because of it.
I chose to be self-aware enough to know that I have gifts and rough edges, and I can be at peace with both.
Mastering Self-Regulation
When I think about this aspect of emotional intelligence, a story comes to mind. I spent a lot of my early adult life single. I didn’t find the man I would marry until I was forty and by that time, I slowly convinced myself that it was less and less likely that I would meet someone. I had been proposed to twice and, in both cases, I discovered that they were being unfaithful. I had not realised how much emotional baggage this had created in my head, heart and soul. Then I met Rob.
We met and fell in love very quickly. It was a modern-day fairytale, and I got swept off my feet. One afternoon about four months after we met, we went shopping. Rob took me to a jeweller and asked me to pick out an engagement ring. In that moment, so many emotions flooded through my body. I was excited that this moment had finally arrived and it overwhelmed me. I found myself unable to breathe and I started to panic. I knew that I wanted to marry Rob but for some reason the air had gone out of my lungs. I asked if we could step outside for a moment. In the fresh air, Rob held my hand and gave me space to breathe. I simply focused on the power of my breath. In and out. Things started to regulate. Rob looked at me and simply asked if I was ok. He then smiled and asked if I was ok to go back in because the assistant was looking at us strangely and probably thought I was breaking up with him. I never looked back, and we have been married for almost 12 years.
Self-regulation is powerful. It is about knowing yourself well enough to know when you need a moment and to determine what you head, heart and soul need. Sometimes it is as simple as breathing while someone gives you space and holds your hand. You know YOU. Trust yourself to know what you need.
Mastering social awareness.
This is one of my emotional intelligence superpowers and probably the reason why I was attracted to coaching. I can walk in a room and immediately sense the mood in the room. I can tell how someone is feeling before they say anything. I would describe myself as an empath (someone who can tune into the energy of others) and whilst this can be helpful, it can also mean I get drained by the energy of others very quickly. Emotional Intelligence means I recognise this and take steps to protect myself by giving myself space too (probably why I walk so much!)
So, if this is not a natural gift, how do you become better in this aspect of EI? It is mostly about the art of communication. The basics of asking great questions and listening with a genuine intent to understand. When we listen, and I mean truly listen, to someone we automatically make them feel heard. So many people I coach express how transformational it is to actually feel like someone is listening to them without judgement.
In our busy lives, we have become superficial listeners. We try and do more than one thing at a time and it means subtle parts of conversations get lost. How many times have you told someone that they didn’t tell you something only to have them say they did?
As you become the leader of your life, you will realise that being curious, and giving people the gift of being listened to will dramatically improve your ability to connect with others. In the words of Ted Lasso “be curious, not judgemental”
Mastering relationship management
For me, this is a build on the skills of social awareness, the key difference is the ability to manage relationships when there is conflict. Most of the communication skills you use in social awareness are the same in relationship management. But what happens when things escalate?
Blending your skills around self-awareness, self-regulation and communication are key. How are you feeling and how do you honour that? What can you do to regulate this feeling in your body? How do you help the other person feel heard and how do you respond in a way that creates space for both of you?
Relationship management is your key to building long lasting, impactful relationships. When you can disagree AND maintain a healthy relationship without either of you feeling hurt or wrong, you have mastered this aspect of emotional intelligence.
Mastering motivation
Being emotionally attuned to your desires is a powerful aspect of emotional intelligence. Last week I talked about the power in becoming the CEO of your life and having a vision linked to your life goals and desires is a critical component of this. When we feel motivated, we show up differently. We give other permission to show up for their dreams and goals tool. You become a ripple effect that inspires others around you to be motivated for their own dreams. It is powerful.
If you are not feeling motivated, something is wrong. It is time to take a step back and tap into your self-awareness. Do you still feel inspired by your vision or is it time for an upgrade? Perhaps you have taken your focus from your longer-term aspirations, and it is time to get a plan in place to create more momentum? Trust that feeling unmotivated is a clue that something needs adjusting.
Hopefully you can see that emotional intelligence is a superpower that can be developed. The components of emotional intelligence are not separate, they are inter-related.
If I get described as emotional now, I see it as a compliment. Yes. I. Am.
I am a leader who shows us with compassion for myself and others. I am unapologetic about my strengths and accepting of my flaws. I listen with intention to hear and make the other person feel heard. Ultimately, I show up with an intention to lead myself and to help others to lead themselves too.
Emotional intelligence is no longer an abstract theory that you are either gifted in or not. It is a beautiful exploration of who you are and the impact you make in this lifetime.
It is also the ability to unashamedly sob at the cinema.
