Neuroscience Reveals 3 Simple Ways to Dramatically Improve Your Emotional Intelligence

Say you feel "stressed." (Who doesn't?) "Stressed" has meaning, but it's too vague.

Instead, you're stressed about a specific version of the future. Or about a certain decision you think may come back to haunt you. Or an upcoming presentation, or a conversation you dread having with an underperforming employee ...

While it might sound odd -- especially since we're often told not to dwell on our emotions -- taking the time to think about the reasons why you feel the way you feel helps you better deal with that emotion. 

"It's just really cool to get the opportunity to have all that pressure on you," Joey told me before the season-ending race at Homestead in 2016, where he had a shot to win that year's championship. "A lot of people don't get the opportunity to have pressure. To work hard and get to a certain level and then have pressure ... it's a privilege to feel pressure ." (My italics.)

Logano reframed "pressure" into a positive. 

Pressure is a sign you're pushing yourself. And that's a good thing. You can't achieve more unless you try to do more.

When you feel pressured, when you feel nervous or stressed or anxious, reframe the emotion. If you feel pressure, that means you're in a position to make things happen. That's a good thing. If you feel nervous, that means you care. That's a good thing.

According to research on achievement and success by Stanford psychologist Carol Dweck, most people tend to have one of two mental perspectives where talent is concerned. 

Surprisingly, the same applies to emotions. As Lisa Feldman Barrett writes in How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain :

Which means we can work to unlearn and relearn some of our emotional responses.

Say you feel "stressed." (Who doesn't?) "Stressed" has meaning, but it's too vague.

Instead, you're stressed about a specific version of the future. Or about a certain decision you think may come back to haunt you. Or an upcoming presentation, or a conversation you dread having with an underperforming employee ...

While it might sound odd -- especially since we're often told not to dwell on our emotions -- taking the time to think about the reasons why you feel the way you feel helps you better deal with that emotion. 

For them, "stress" is a negative.

"It's just really cool to get the opportunity to have all that pressure on you," Joey told me before the season-ending race at Homestead in 2016, where he had a shot to win that year's championship. "A lot of people don't get the opportunity to have pressure. To work hard and get to a certain level and then have pressure ... it's a privilege to feel pressure ." (My italics.)

Logano reframed "pressure" into a positive. 

But you can control, at least to some degree, how you respond to and manage those emotions.