Emotions and Types of Emotional Responses
Emotions seem to rule our
daily lives. We make decisions based on whether we are happy, angry, sad,
bored, or frustrated. We choose activities and hobbies based on the emotions
they incite.
What
Exactly Is an Emotion?
An emotion is a complex
psychological state that involves three distinct components: a subjective experience, a physiological
response, and a behavioral or expressive response."
In addition to
understanding exactly what emotions are, researchers have also tried to
identify and classify the different types of emotions. In 1972, psychologist
Paul Eckman suggested that there are six
basic emotions that are universal throughout human
cultures: fear, disgust, anger,
surprise, happiness, and sadness. In 1999, he expanded this list to include
a number of other basic emotions, including embarrassment, excitement,
contempt, shame, pride, satisfaction, and amusement.
Five
Domains of Emotional Intelligence
Emotional intelligence
can be broken down into five main domains: knowing one’s emotions, managing
emotions, motivating oneself, recognizing emotions in others, and handling
relationships.
1. Knowing one's emotions
Self-awareness is the
ability to recognize a sensation or emotion the moment it occurs. It is not
always easy to monitor one's feelings in the moment, here and now, as it
requires mindfulness. It is critical for psychological insight,
self-understanding, and self-acceptance. If we are unable to notice our true
feelings, it is harder to understand our emotions. People who are certain about
their feelings are more adept at managing their lives and having a more certain
sense of their true feelings about various decisions: what job to take, what
relationships to invest their time in, what activities to undertake, and what
goals to set.
2. Managing emotions
Once we've managed
self-awareness, we may progress to managing the emotions we become aware of,
handling them so they are appropriate. This means soothing ourselves, and
controlling anxiety, depression or anger. People who fail in this ability are
more prone to feelings of distress. Mastering the management of our emotions
allows us to recover quicker from setbacks, upsets, and failures, and to move
on towards our goals.
3.Motivating-oneself
When we channel our
emotions as a means to a goal, we are better able to pay attention, motivate
ourselves, practice discipline and devote time for creative endeavors. Emotional
self-control is displayed through delaying gratification and handling
impulsiveness, important key ingredients in any accomplishment. Moreover, the
ability to enter into a "flow" state (coined by Mihaly
Czikszentmihaly), or devoting ourselves fully to the task at hand, on the road
to mastery, requires steady attention and internal motivation.
4. Recognizing emotions
in others
Our ability to empathize
with others, a vital people skill, comes back to our self-awareness. Empathy is
our ability to feel what others feel, to understand what others have to say,
and to get attuned to subtle social signals about what others need or want.
This is a must-have ability for everyone in the caring professions, in
education, sales or management.
5.Handling-relationships
Once we have
self-awareness, and once we are capable of recognizing the emotions of others,
we can proceed to the next skill - managing others' emotions. This is the task
of leadership, popularity, and interpersonal effectiveness. It does not come
down to manipulating others, but to guiding them and helping them be more
self-aware, more adept at emotional self-management, self-motivation, empathy,
and handling relationships.
Some people are better in
some of these domains than others. One employee can be particularly good at
practicing patience and perseverance, but could find it difficult to confort a
colleague in a difficult personal situation. Luckily our brains are incredibly
plastic, capable of constantly learning new information and skills. Emotional skills
can be learned and improved, and practicing mindfulness and deliberation
through meditation and reflection, is the first step of the journey.
Reference: Goleman, D.,
(1995) Emotional Intelligence, New York, NY, England: Bantam Books, Inc.
The ability to express and
control our emotions is essential, but so
is our ability to understand, interpret, and respond to the emotions of others.
Imagine a world in which you could not understand when a friend was feeling sad
or when a co-worker was angry. Psychologists refer to this ability as emotional
intelligence, and some experts even suggest that it can be more important than IQ in
your overall success in life.
Overview
Emotional intelligence (EI) refers to the ability to
perceive, control, and evaluate emotions. Some researchers suggest that
emotional intelligence can be learned and strengthened, while others claim it's
an inborn characteristic.
Defined emotional intelligence as "the ability to
monitor one's own and others' feelings and emotions, to discriminate among them
and to use this information to guide one's thinking and actions."
The role of emotional
intelligence in daily life.
Being able to put yourself in someone else's
shoes. A large part of
emotional intelligence is being able to think about and empathize with how other people are feeling. This
often involves considering how you would respond if you were in their same
situation. People who have strong emotional intelligence are able to consider
the perspectives, experiences, and emotions of other people and use this
information to explain why people behave the way that they do.
Considering a situation before reacting. Emotionally intelligent people know
that emotions can be powerful, but also temporary. When a highly charged
emotional event happens, such as becoming angry with a co-worker over some type
of conflict, the emotionally intelligent response would be to take some time
before responding. This allows everyone to calm their emotions and think more
rationally about all the factors surrounding the argument.
Being aware of one's own emotions. Emotionally intelligent people are not
only good at thinking about how other people might feel; they are also adept at
understanding their own feelings. Self-awareness allows people to consider the
many different factors that contribute to their emotions.
Emotional
Intelligence in the Workplace
Only
in a business in which the staff is emotionally intelligent can they work
together to maximum effectiveness. This can only increase the organization’s
success, however measured. Emotional intelligence is essential for
excellence in business.
Emotional
intelligence can do wonders for your business because using it at work will
make you understand how people and relationships function. Emotionally
intelligent colleagues will consistently excel in leadership, teamwork,
partnership, and vision because they will have insight on their relationship
between the staff, organizations, directors, customers, competitors, networking
contacts, and so on.
An
organization that is emotionally intelligent will have staff that will be more
motivated, productive, efficient, effective, rewarded, likable, and their goals
and in the workplace will be more aligned with the business’s agenda. The
reason why is because emotional intelligence is applicable to every human
interaction in business. It will help with customer service, brainstorming
ideas, and company presentations.
Emotional
intelligence in the workplace will help you assess people better, understand
how relationships develop, understand how our beliefs generate our experiences
and learn to prevent power struggles, negative judgment, resistance, and so on
in order to increase vision and success.
To
further demonstrate this point, you can watch this video on the benefits of
integrating emotional intelligence in your organization or company:
Emotional
Intelligence and You
We’re
a month into the New Year, which means many people’s motivation is higher than
usual because we want to make something better of ourselves. Becoming more
emotionally intelligent will help you reduce stress, remain focused, and stay
connected to yourself, your goals, and others.
Being
able to connect to your emotions and having a present-moment awareness of them
and its influence on your thoughts and actions is a key skill that you should
begin practicing so you can remain calm and focused in stressful situations.
Usually, when people are stressed they tend to disconnect from all of their
emotions because it simply feels overwhelming, except the negative ones or they
will numb themselves by shutting down.
To
combat this, you should practice increasing your emotional awareness to
understand what you need or so you can effectively communicate with others.
A method you can try if you are particularly stressed this month is mindfulness meditation. Mindfulness meditation has been shown
to work wonders on beating your distress when faced with tense situations
Outstanding work
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