Emotional Intelligence. Another "it" theory of the moment. The media's panacea of the week. Another great thing we all need - that nobody seems to be able to clearly define. I swear I'm going to do a book of psychology buzzword mad libs ("My mindful grit is emotionally intelligent due to the oxytocin in my mirror neurons"). But I digress... Here's the thing: emotional intelligence is real - but that vague 2-sentence summary you read in an inflight magazine isn't accurate and won't give you what you need to improve this curious little skill set.

So what is it really? (I'm so glad you asked.) It's a concept that John Mayer of the University of New Hampshire and Yale professor Peter Salovey came up with in the early 90's that was subsequently studied and popularized by Daniel Goleman. Here's Mayer's definition. From <a href="http://geni.us/HBRGEI">Harvard Business Review Guide to Emotional Intelligence </a>: From a scientific standpoint, emotional intelligence is the ability to accurately perceive your own and others' emotions; to understand the signals that emotions send about relationships; and to manage your own and others' emotions.

So what is it really? (I'm so glad you asked.) It's a concept that John Mayer of the University of New Hampshire and Yale professor Peter Salovey came up with in the early 90's that was subsequently studied and popularized by Daniel Goleman. Here's Mayer's definition. From <a href="http://geni.us/HBRGEI">Harvard Business Review Guide to Emotional Intelligence </a>: Now most of the work on emotional intelligence has been done around its effects in the workplace but it'll quickly become obvious how it can improve most any area of your life. And, for the record, yeah, EI does work.

From <a href="http://geni.us/HBRMREI">HBR's 10 Must Reads on Emotional Intelligence </a>: In a 1996 study of a global food and beverage company, McClelland found that when senior managers had a critical mass of emotional intelligence capabilities, their divisions outperformed yearly earnings goals by 20%. Meanwhile, division leaders without that critical mass underperformed by almost the same amount. McClelland's findings, interestingly, held as true in the company's U.S. divisions as in its divisions in Asia and Europe.

From <a href="http://geni.us/HBRMREI">HBR's 10 Must Reads on Emotional Intelligence </a>: And what's most interesting about EI is that as you move up the corporate ladder its importance increases dramatically. From <a href="http://geni.us/HBRMREI">HBR's 10 Must Reads on Emotional Intelligence </a>: When I compared star performers with average ones in senior leadership positions, nearly 90% of the difference in their profiles was attributable to emotional intelligence factors rather than cognitive abilities. Research has shown EI has 5 component parts. Let's learn how to develop each one so that we can leverage its tremendous power to achieve global domination improve our lives at home and at work...

This one is first and that's not random. Self-awareness is the most essential of emotional intelligence skills. Why? Because without this guy you've got no way to evaluate what skills you have, what you lack and what you need to work on. You're flying blind. So what's the formal definition? From <a href="http://geni.us/HBRMREI">HBR's 10 Must Reads on Emotional Intelligence </a>:

Self-awareness means having a deep understanding of one's emotions, strengths, weaknesses, needs, and drives. People with strong self-awareness are neither overly critical nor unrealistically hopeful. Rather, they are honest with themselves and with others. People who have a high degree of self-awareness recognize how their feelings affect them, other people, and their job performance.

Want to know the best shortcut for identifying if someone is high in self-awareness or not? From <a href="http://geni.us/HBRMREI">HBR's 10 Must Reads on Emotional Intelligence </a>: One of the hallmarks of self-awareness is a self-deprecating sense of humor. To make fun of yourself - and get a laugh - you have to know yourself and how you are perceived. So how do you increase self-awareness? <a href="https://www.bakadesuyo.com/2017/06/how-to-be-more-self-aware/">Get feedback </a>. You don't always see yourself accurately. And this friend or that friend doesn't always see you accurately. But if you survey five or ten pals, you're going see some very accurate trends.

From <a href="http://geni.us/insight">Insight </a>: ...other people generally see us more objectively than we see ourselves. Psychologist Timothy Smith and his colleagues powerfully demonstrated this in a study with 300 married couples in which both partners were being tested for heart disease. They asked each participant to rate both their own and their partner's levels of anger, hostility, and argumentativeness- all strong predictors of the illness- and found that people's self-ratings were infinitely less accurate than those of their spouses. Another study asked more than 150 Navy officers and their subordinates to rate the officers' leadership style, and found that only the subordinates could accurately assess their bosses' performance and promotability.

From <a href="http://geni.us/insight">Insight </a>: (To learn more about the science of a successful life, check out my bestselling book <a href="http://geni.us/butwt">here </a>.) So you see yourself more accurately. That's great, but we all know someone who is aware they're a jerk - and yet keeps acting like a jerk. So what do we need to complement our new self-knowledge? I love when people say, "I'm very emotional. I must have very high emotional intelligence." Sorry, being very emotional doesn't make you high in EI; it just makes you a drama queen.

However, being able to regulate your emotions is a big part of EI. People who are wise and warm don't impulsively respond to things or act without thinking. From <a href="http://geni.us/HBRMREI">HBR's 10 Must Reads on Emotional Intelligence </a>: Biological impulses drive our emotions. We cannot do away with them - but we can do much to manage them. Self-regulation, which is like an ongoing inner conversation, is the component of emotional intelligence that frees us from being prisoners of our feelings. People engaged in such a conversation feel bad moods and emotional impulses just as everyone else does, but they find ways to control them and even to channel them in useful ways.

However, being able to regulate your emotions is a big part of EI. People who are wise and warm don't impulsively respond to things or act without thinking. From <a href="http://geni.us/HBRMREI">HBR's 10 Must Reads on Emotional Intelligence </a>: People who can self-regulate make better decisions, are more resilient, and act with more integrity. (They also tend not to eat an entire box of donuts in one sitting while obsessively checking Instagram, but this finding has yet to be supported by the literature.) <a href="https://www.bakadesuyo.com/2017/10/more-mindful/">Mindfulness </a>is an excellent, science-backed way to self-regulate. And while a full explanation of it is wayyyy beyond the scope of this post (you can get more info <a href="https://www.bakadesuyo.com/2017/10/more-mindful/">here </a>) a little "mini-meditation" can be a big help.

Next time you feel your emotions surging, turn your attention to your breath. Focus on it going in and out. When your mind wanders, return your attention to your breath. Give it 10-20 seconds at first. Neuroscience says even a little bit can calm those feelings and get your head on straight. From <a href="http://geni.us/altered">Altered Traits: Science Reveals How Meditation Changes Your Mind, Brain, and Body </a>:

As these stressful thoughts were presented, the patients used either of two different attentional stances: mindful awareness of their breath or distraction by doing mental arithmetic. Only mindfulness of their breath both lowered activity in the amygdala- mainly via a faster recovery- and strengthened it in the brain's attentional networks, while the patients reported less stress reactivity.

Before we commence with the festivities, I wanted to thank everyone for helping my first book become a Wall Street Journal bestseller. To check it out, click here. *** Emotional Intelligence. Another "it" theory of the moment. The media's panacea of the week.

This Is How To Increase Emotional Intelligence

Soma Bala