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Have you ever been told that you are mature for your age? Maybe you heard it as a child or maybe your parents were praised for having a child that was “so smart” or “so mature”?
Let’s look at it from the opposite end. Have you ever looked at someone and thought “Wow, they speak so wisely” or “They have such a way with words”.
This, my dear friends, is what we call emotional intelligence.
Emotional intelligence is when someone has the ability to express themselves with clarity, wisdom, and integrity. They probably aren’t very reactive when it comes to situations that trigger or bother them. Usually in these cases, they are able to either diffuse the situation with their words or at the very least, have the awareness to see the situation for what it truly is.
Having emotional intelligence doesn’t usually mean that someone says a bunch of fancy words that make them seem intelligence. To me (and of course, this is all from my perspective), it’s the way they carry and express themselves.
My answer to this is yes, NOT because you need to sound smart for people or prove your intelligence to someone. The reason why I believe having emotional intelligence is important, is because when we have emotional intelligence, we are able to avoid miscommunications with those around us.
Often, it’s communication that determines if a relationship will work out. It’s the way we perceive and carry ourselves that can help advance us in opportunities, attract the people we desire to be around, or even save us a bunch of headaches when it comes to arguments.
My intention for this blog post is to help you find ways to gain your emotional intelligence.
Now, I do want to mention that when you do practice emotional intelligence, not everyone is going to understand it from your point of view, whether it’s your sibling, your parents, whomever this may pertain to you in your life right now. And when this does happen, I do want you to be aware (one of the keys to emotional intelligence) that each person has a set point to how much awareness they have within their emotional threshold.
You could even say that they may lash out from their ego, something that we all have as humans.
My goal for giving you these tips however, is for you to be able to control your emotions. The only control we have is within ourselves, not other people.
It is not your job to force people your perspective; however, you will be able to face confrontations, conflicts, and anything else life throws your way.
The reason why practicing mindfulness meditation works is because when you meditate, you are training yourself to bypass your thoughts and to keep the focus on your breathing.
Think about it this way.
Someone is trying to start an argument with you. You may even be facing with verbal or mental manipulation. In a situation like this, you’re going to feel yourself in flight or fight mode.
You’re going to be angry, upset, maybe you want to scream back at them, but the purpose of mindfulness is to keep the focus within yourself and your emotions.
While the person is freaking and acting out over there, you are sitting within yourself amongst the chaos and calmly thinking about the ways this argument can be diffused. You might have the courage to just walk away, express yourself in a calm manner, or say what you need to truly say.
For me, when I started meditating, people’s words didn’t seem to have much of an effect on me. It was like my mind formed a protective barrier around my mind so that I can contemplate what I needed to say (calmly of course).
And sometimes, even after the confrontation, the person who did the yelling walked away angrier than they were before vs the person who practices mindfulness doesn’t usually think about it afterwards.
This is a win for the people who practice mindfulness meditation, no matter what the other person thinks.
And the best part is, is that it’s free and even ten minutes a day can greatly increase your emotional intelligence. There are plenty of apps that do this sort of meditation.
One of my personal favorites is the Calm app which I’ve been using for years now, but I’ve also heard that Headspace is a great app also. You can also find plenty of tutorials on Youtube!
Again, even just ten minutes a day will help your emotional intelligence!
Related Post: How Meditation Improves Your Life
The more you read about the mind, the more knowledge you will have when it comes to the way people think.
After all, knowledge is power!
Ever since I have started my personal development journey, I have read quite a bit of books on the power of our minds. In a lot of those books, have taught me why people are the way they are and have also helped me gain the awareness of my own emotions.
From trauma, to the way we grew up, to our belief system, to what we are being taught in society right now in this very instance, or just even the lack of awareness of how powerful we actually are.
And when you get to know more about the mind and why people are the way they are, it becomes a lot more difficult for people to project themselves onto you and for their words to have an effect onto you.
Another way that self-regulating your emotions is called are coping mechanisms.
The biggest reason why someone may have a high level of emotional intelligence is because they know how to process and regulate their emotions in a healthy way.
Keyword there: HEALTHY way.
How many times have you heard people who drink their sorrows away? How many people do you know have to take a smoke break because of their jobs or because someone pissed them off? Are you someone who does this?
What’s the benefit of it? Bad health? Problems breathing? Ignoring process emotions? Feeling of being sick?
Here’s the thing with emotions.
Low emotions like anger, depression, sadness, or frustration cause your body feelings of uneasiness, right? Where do you think disease come from? Why does the word dis-ease have the meaning of uneasiness?
I can get so esoteric with this, but I do want to plant that thought into the back of your mind next time you reach over for that beer or cigarette because your coworker or parent or whoever pissed you off.
Regardless, having low emotions causes us to build a lot of tense energy within us. That’s why it’s important for us to self-regulate our emotions, which unfortunately, society does not do a good job at teaching us this and we end up facing more consequences into our adulthood.
Healthy ways of self-regulating your emotions can be having an intense work out, talking to someone, journaling out your feelings, breathwork, deep breathing exercises, EFT (emotional freedom technique), or just screaming into a pillow can help.
I don’t care how you do it as long as you aren’t harming yourself or other people.
My point I’m trying to get at here is for you to have better ways of self-regulating your emotions because once you have your go-to methods, you are more willing to face confrontation and conflict in a better manner.
Again, this is emotional intelligence.
That’s usually why people avoid confrontation like the plague because they’re afraid of feeling these triggers, these high tense emotions, especially when they don’t know what to do with them.
Hence the lashing out, the insults, the resentment and anger kicks in.
Find your healthy way to regulate your emotions and you will become unstoppable.
How do you practice emotional intelligence? Share your thoughts in the comment section below!
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Here To Be Inspired 2022. All rights reserved.
2 Responses
I agreed to all 3 ways you have mentioned above to gain emotional intelligence. I’ve read a book about it earlier and it triggered my mind. I started practicing self-awarness, self- compassion and self-love. I am dumbfounded after I realized about impact and the effect it had on my life. I continue to learn through E. I and better ways to practice and implement it in my life.
I like meditating, exercising and journaling. That has ultimately resulted into my progress.
Thanks a lot!
Regards
Myrah
I love that for you! I feel like if more people practiced emotional intelligence with self aware and a healthy way of regulating emotions, it would save so much miscommunication between each other! So proud of your progress. Keep it up!