It is commonly understood as a set of skills that allow one to maintain control over one’s own emotional background and influence the behavior of surrounding individuals. Therefore, developing emotional intelligence is a process that must begin with early years in order to mature age quickly adapt to realities social life and feel confident.

The main advantage of a high EQ indicator (this is how emotional intelligence is designated in science and Everyday life) – minimization of negative emotions. Indeed, through this phenomenon, you can quickly identify the cause-and-effect relationship of their occurrence and soberly assess the current circumstances in order to respond to them wisely and take timely measures to solve the problem.

Since the 40s of the 20th century, numerous studies began to be carried out. Their basic goal was to determine the mutual connection that arose between achievements in school and success in subsequent life of students. Several conclusions were drawn, the main one being the following: in order to achieve your goals, you need to be able to interact with other people by forming agreements and establishing cooperation.

What factors hinder the development of EQ

Increasing emotional intelligence is serious and complex work that begins with preschool age. Not everyone can do it quickly. The fact is that there are several factors that prevent this phenomenon:

• lack of sensitivity to non-verbal signals (this condition is observed in approximately every tenth individual, especially in preschoolers, and is expressed in a poor sense of personal space, inability to establish visual contact, irrational interpretation of other people’s facial expressions);
• leaving conflict situation instead of resolving it (people who feel useless, lonely or burdened, as practice shows, are absolutely unable to contact the outside world and society, preferring to remain alone and sad rather than go in search of ways to solve problems);
• excessive aggressiveness (many individuals choose aggression as the main reaction to everything that happens around them, this leads to their immediate isolation from society and depletion of strength, vitality, and vigor).

To avoid the harmful effects of these factors, it is necessary to answer the question of how to increase emotional intelligence.

Why successful people in life have high EQ scores

People who have achieved success in life as individuals, as a rule, have a high level of emotional intelligence. Several factors simultaneously contribute to this circumstance.

1. The development of this skill allows an individual to get rid of numerous doubts, fears, prejudices and encourages active action to resolve the issues raised.
2. A high emotional background parameter provides a simple understanding of the motives and actions of the people around you. This means that it becomes possible to effectively interact with the “right” individuals and select an appropriate model of behavior for this.
3. The phenomenon can be developed throughout human life, which cannot be said about IQ. You can tackle this issue from infancy and complete development in old age. This guarantees the individual's harmony with himself and the people around him.

Principles for increasing EQ

Now is the time to consider how to develop emotional intelligence yourself. There are several fundamental principles for this.

1. Every emotion should be recognized, especially when talking about negative things. You can deceive everyone, but not your own personality and essence.
2. Should be expanded lexicon to express your own feelings. Emotions have not only facial accompaniment, but also verbal accompaniment. Therefore, it is important to name at least a dozen different emotions and replenish this piggy bank at every opportunity.
3. It is important to analyze other people's feelings. Once you have dealt with your own feelings, you can begin to deal with the feelings of others. You should observe what methods they use to respond to claims and demands or, conversely, to pleasant events. How do they behave in unforeseen situations, is it possible to maintain composure.
4. It is necessary to find new ways to respond to typical cases. What emotions and feelings do they evoke? Do you want to show aggression towards them or, conversely, switch to tenderness?
5. You need to monitor your own locus of control. That is, be aware of your responsibility for own life and the series of events that are observed in it.

As much as possible?

It's absolutely possible. In fact, each person’s EQ is just a set of specific skills, which in English means “soft skills”. Scientists have proven that a person’s intellectual quotient actively grows only during the first 20 years of life. Then it either stays in the same place or falls. However, it is foolish to believe that success in life is determined only by what we managed to accumulate in childhood. Otherwise, few people could become successful.

This is where EQ comes to the rescue. Unlike (indicator of intelligence), its development occurs throughout life experience received by the individual. Its increase will be observed in any case. But if you put a certain amount of effort into this process, final result will be much better. This coefficient is largely determined by the following factors:

• the individual’s “habitat” environment (mainly the conditions in which he grew and developed);
• level of awareness (awareness of oneself and the surrounding world, reality);
• a wealth of knowledge (practice shows that what smarter person in principle, the higher his EQ).

The good news is that developing emotional intelligence in experienced adults is just as feasible as it is in children. Unfortunately, there is no magic pill in the world that would instantly help you become developed and happy. But there is one effective means - training, improvement and constant practice. Only through your own work can you learn the basics of self-analysis and comprehend the deepest psychological science.

Simple exercises to improve your EQ level

There are five (actually there are many more) exercises that will help you quickly increase your level of emotional intelligence.

Diary of Emotions

Any reaction to a certain event in life is the result of past experience. The more difficulties you have overcome, the more adequate the reaction to any difficulties that arise will be. This suggests that not all people react the same way to the same event.

For example, the following happened: the boss was in a bad mood and yelled at his subordinate “no way.” One employee will understand his manager and continue working in the same direction. Another will be offended and decide to take revenge (for example, “snitch” to a superior). The third one will burst into tears, deciding that he is a bad employee and not worth his position. A schoolchild, having received a remark from a teacher, can also react differently, just like a teenager to the teachings of his parents. Emotionality is characteristic of every person, so all these reactions are absolutely normal.

Your goal is to determine the one that is specific to you. And then figure out the internal mechanisms (reasons) that ensure its launch. In order to control your own emotions, you need to carefully understand this issue. It is better to select several reactions at once in order to select the most optimal one if necessary. This is called the ability to control emotions and, instead of hysteria, prefer restraint and self-control.

Records of successes should be made in a diary. If you try this practice for a month, you will change yourself and be able to have a positive impact on your own life.

Choice of words

In fact, there is no such thing that cannot be described in words. Daily on modern man an avalanche of experiences and emotions “falls”. But most individuals do not have suitable words in their vocabulary to express them easily. Agree, not every adult will choose words and phrases to describe feelings. The maximum we are capable of is to describe joy, sadness, anger. What about deep experiences? What can we say about the child? younger age. And if they were, it would be possible to effectively interact with this or that emotion.

Feedback

The problem is that the lion's share of individuals are not able to give and receive feedback, both in a positive and negative way. And even if they know how to do it, they do it wrong, making it personal, hurting the feelings of other people.

It’s one thing, when giving feedback, to tell a person: “You’re too eccentric.” And something completely different: “Yesterday I asked you how I could help you, and you yelled at me and hung up on me, in my opinion, it was too reckless, because I really want to help you.”

Accepting feedback (negative) instead of saying “Oh so. What do you think about yourself? And in general, look at yourself,” you can say: “thank you for your recommendations, I’ll think about it...”.

This is self-awareness. How can you develop emotional intelligence in an adult?

Testing

In world practice it is customary to use great amount typologies, which are accompanied by corresponding test tasks. When it comes to knowing yourself, there are several difficulties:

• not all tests are different high quality, therefore, preference should be given only to proven tasks and always original ones (the more questions they contain, the more exact result will be provided based on the results);
• correct interpretation of the result (the Internet is full of various tests that provide only brief abstracts from the description, which in reality give nothing (or almost nothing), reading a good book on the topic or familiarizing yourself with a scientific article will be much more useful, you need to read to increase the value indicator and raise it in accordance with your own wishes);
• awareness of the result, especially regarding the negative (weak) sides (it should be understood that good or bad psychological types does not exist, because each of them has positive and negative sides).

As a result, you will become an emotionally stable person who can cope with your own feelings.

The amount of emotional intelligence, abbreviated EQ in the specialized literature, determines how much a person understands, is aware of them, can recreate, manage them, and therefore apply them to solve assigned problems. A person with well-developed emotional intelligence can significantly reduce the impact of negative emotions on their life. Developing emotional intelligence promotes recognition negative impacts from the outside, a calm understanding of the situation and a normal, balanced reaction to it. A person who is emotionally developed lets go of negative emotions and does not experience them again and again, thereby destroying his psyche in particular and life in general.

You can understand in more detail what benefits the development of emotional intelligence provides using the diagram below:

If you want to find it easily mutual language even with unfamiliar people, to be friendly and open, and therefore pleasant to communicate with, if your goal is to achieve maximum success in any endeavor, then you simply need to work on developing your own EI.

How to develop emotional intelligence

1. Recognize emotions and identify critical moments.

Lose control over your own behavior, explode because of someone's words, lose calm at empty space? Oh, how familiar this is! Everyone has certain point boiling caused by a situation leading to loss of self-control - the so-called emotional trigger. People who know how to recognize them, and therefore accept them, can stop in time and not succumb to destructive emotions.

How to learn such control? Analyze your emotions, record them on paper, highlight your own emotional triggers.

2. Repeat over and over again mentally those situations that lead to emotional breakdowns.

Constantly replaying this or that situation in your head helps you find the right decision and not react as violently as could happen in real life. When considering an event that could lead to an emotional breakdown, come up with a different course of action than your usual one. This exercise will allow you to correctly accept the emotional trigger. This means that you will get a chance to act differently when a real explosive situation occurs.

3.Exercise your brain.

Anyone can control their consciousness and... As soon as you feel anger creeping in, switch to something else, for example, solving difficult problems. mathematical problems. Agree, it’s hard to get angry and nervous when you’re multiplying three-digit numbers in your head!

Whether you solve the problem correctly or not is irrelevant. The main thing is that you tried, used your brain to the fullest and did not let your emotions overcome you.

4. Escape from reality into memories.

If in Hard time If you find it difficult to concentrate, then use another technique: abstract from what is happening and immerse yourself in pleasant memories. Surely there is something in your life that brings a smile to your face. It could be a favorite song or a book you recently read. Remember them, quote your favorite lines to yourself. Such thoughts will help you avoid an emotional breakdown, as they will switch your brain to another situation.

The main thing is not to perceive this technique as a cowardly escape from reality. This is done for your benefit.

5. Before sending an angry letter to the recipient, re-read what you wrote.

This way, you will take a time-out for at least a few minutes, once again relive what you experienced while writing, and be able to rethink your overflowing emotions. You take a break - and it's wonderful. You have a chance to change your mind and fix everything. If after reading this you still want to send a letter, ask a friend or loved one read it. Listen to outside advice and think twice about whether it’s worth offending the recipient. Learn to keep your emotions in check!

Research confirms that everyone thinks differently. A rather neutral message can actually cause aggression on the part of the recipient. To understand how the addressee will react to your letter, remember the character of the person to whom you are writing. Adjust the message so as not to offend your recipient.

6. Avoid immediate answers.

Modern life sometimes requires us to make lightning-fast decisions. But often you can not force things and take a minute to think. Do they require a clear answer from you? Avoid having to answer right away. Say that you will return to this conversation and take a break to think. This will allow you to understand what is really important and not let your emotions prevail over your reason.

7.Respect your interlocutor in any situation.

Remember that in any situation you need to remain well-mannered, educated person, express your thoughts clearly and clearly, avoiding profanity. This will characterize you as a serious, respectable person with whom it is pleasant to do business. Emotions may rage in your soul, but you shouldn’t show them. To curb them, it is better to think about your vocabulary in advance and highlight those words that it is better not to say out loud.

Once you decide to be calm and composed in any situation, you will take a big step towards controlling your emotions and developing emotional intelligence.

Emotional intellect- a phenomenon that, at first glance, contains a contradiction. Intelligence is usually understood as the thinking, cognitive sphere of a person, and emotions are something irrational that cannot be controlled by the mind.

But emotions and feelings can be controlled by the individual, fully realized, and controlled by willpower. The ability to understand and manage one’s own emotional experiences, as well as the experiences of other people, is defined as"emotional intellect".

Developing emotional intelligence is useful both for the internal harmony of the individual and for harmony in relationships with other people, in the family and at work. Developed emotional intelligence helps maintain physical and mental health.

Emotional intelligence needs to be developed because it:

• promotes awareness, understanding and self-acceptance, without self-flagellation and soul-searching,
• develops intuition, the ability to understand non-verbal signals in communication,
• balances emotional reactions in stressful situations,
• develops stress resistance,
• teaches you to better understand other people, their emotions and feelings,
• helps resolve communication difficulties, find compromises,
• promotes conflict resolution through cooperation,
• protects from manipulation, does not allow the individual to become a victim of a manipulator,
• promotes making thoughtful rather than impulsive decisions,
• prevents emotional burnout at work,
• increases sensitivity to signals from your own body, develops understanding of the psychosomatic aspect of the development of diseases,
• develops the ability to relax and rest, turning off the “internal dialogue”.

Ways to develop emotional intelligence

For some people, emotional intelligence is quite developed already in childhood due to the characteristics of their upbringing, while other people experience significant difficulties and need tips on how to develop the ability to understand others and themselves. Emotional intelligence develops in the process of personality development, during socialization and the accumulation of life experience.

To develop emotional intelligenceyou need to systematically work on yourselfin the following directions:

Widespread simple technique control over emotions called “count to ten”. A person, before expressing his opinion and emotions to another individual, mentally counts from one to ten. The essence of this technique is not in counting, but in the fact that you should think first, and then speak or do!

The wonderful proverb “Measure twice, cut once” perfectly characterizes developed emotional intelligence!

“Emotions lead to delusions and this is their value, the value of science is in its unemotionality.”

"The Picture of Dorian Grey".

Have you ever noticed how emotions distort or transform reality? In psychology there is special term“Emotional intelligence” and it has a special designation - EQ. People started talking about him again at the beginning of the 2000s. Let's talk about what this concept is and how to develop emotional intelligence.

Managing emotional intelligence became of interest to me long before I heard this term. It was an intuitive understanding that the development of the situation, or the lack of results, is influenced not only by my thoughts, but also by my reaction to them, my emotional state. Rather, it is emotions that shape thoughts, and not vice versa. Negative thoughts appear precisely because a person does not have complete information about current events, worries, feels fear, resentment, anger and from certain expectations. Agree, most conflicts arise because our loved ones do not behave the way we expect them to. Psychologists note that clarification of relationships, or who is right, occurs because a person does not receive strong, bright, positive feelings from reality and the struggle is designed to compensate for this deficiency.

Stressful situations become a goldmine for a certain circle of people. This includes fortune tellers, magicians, and psychics. Various sessions act like morphine; they remove negativity for a while, leaving positive experiences and a feeling of relaxation. As a result, the client comes again to receive not the prediction itself, but the confidence that everything will be okay. This is the best case scenario.

Some of the psychics and magicians deliberately increase the level of anxiety of clients in order to instill even greater fear and, in this way, lure large sums money. They cling to what is important to a person: relationships with a loved one, health, and so on. Emotional intelligence exercises helped me move away from constant feelings of fear and anxiety, think clearly and look for constructive solutions to problems without turning to third parties for help. I will tell you about several effective techniques.

Concept of emotional intelligence

Psychologists Kahneman and Smith conducted research in the field of behavioral psychology, for which they were awarded Nobel Prize. They managed to prove that most people, when making decisions, are guided by emotions, not logic.

Emotional intelligence is the ability to see one’s strengths and weaknesses and accept them in other people, the ability to separate personal feelings and facts. There are low and high level emotional intelligence. Low level emotional intelligence is characterized by the following emotions:

• envy;
• criticism;
• condemnation;
• tunnel vision of the situation (a person sees only one possible variant developments and, most often, in negative tones);
• suppression of feelings;
• a high level of emotional intelligence is characterized by:
• flexibility of mind;
• variability of thinking (a person can find many options for the development of events and work through each of them in detail);

EQ - intelligence helps to find a common language with people of different social groups and ages. Managing emotional intelligence is useful in business, sales, and any team work that requires organizing and inspiring people.

Why is this necessary?

Not everyone understands why it is necessary to develop EQ - intelligence. There are several reasons for this:

1. Adequate assessment of one’s own capabilities, acceptance of strengths and weaknesses your personality, effective use of internal resources.
2. Understanding the causes of certain emotions.
3. Understanding and careful attitude feelings of surrounding people, family.
4. Understanding the needs of other people and building a line of behavior based on them.
5. Acceptance and understanding of the conditions of objective reality.
6. Managing emotions, quickly finding solutions in a given situation.

You will gain not only emotional stability, but also the respect of other people, both in the team and from management. A person who can understand others can grow into a good leader. You can, for example, write your own book on managing emotions, or become the head of a company, or maybe in the future you will conduct training yourself personal growth? Today this direction is very popular, the experience of people who, without special education were able to understand themselves and rise to the occasion new level welfare.

Such masters include, for example, Joe Vitale, who became a multimillionaire after several years of living on the street, or Niko Bauman, who wrote a series of books about the power of mental focusing without any special education. The young author founded own internet school, conducts webinars and intensive courses in which he teaches people to control their attention and direct emotions in the right direction.

Stages

Experts distinguish 4 stages of development of emotional intelligence:

1. Communicate clearly and clearly with others, listen well, and communicate expectations. Ability to motivate people to take action teamwork, leadership of a small group of people, the ability not to get involved in open conflict.
2. A comfortable sense of self among a large group of people, regardless of whether you consider yourself an introvert or an extrovert, the ability to understand the emotions of other people, rare cases of misunderstanding with someone.
3. Knowledge and acceptance of all positive and negative aspects their personality, a comfortable existence with them, understanding their emotions and their influence on current events.
4. Skillful management of emotions, limiting their destructive influence, ability to fulfill promises and responsibilities, maintaining long-term relationships, acting according to circumstances.

Development methods

Let's look at 7 main ways to develop emotional intelligence in adults.

1. Refuse to share feelings. From an early age, we are taught to divide things into categories: this is good, this is bad, there is black and white. But such a division is very subjective, because in general you don’t know what prompted a person to do something bad. good deed from the point of view of society. Maybe if you found yourself in such a situation, you would do worse. What I mean is that there are halftones in the world. Anger, for example, is considered a bad emotion, but it contains a hidden desire for everything to become better than it is, and this is already a positive side. For many people, during an attack of anger, a source opens up. inner strength. Refusal to divide emotions into “good” and “bad” helps to understand the reason for the occurrence of those that are commonly called negative.
2. Write down the emotions you experienced during the day. By keeping a journal, you can easily track what triggered the experience. In addition, over time, you will be able to track how your reaction to a similar situation has changed. Write down without limiting yourself and you will understand what makes you worry, how you react, for example, to fear, and what makes you move on.
3. Observe people and situations that make you feel excited strong emotions. Describe in your diary the physical sensations of the emotions you experienced.
4. If you find it difficult to track and write down your emotions, observe your preferences: what you prefer to watch, listen to, what you read about, what fills your consciousness day after day. What songs or films do you feel an inner connection with, why did you make this particular choice? Which characters do you have an inner sympathy for and why? Answering these questions will help you start tracking your emotions.
5. Sometimes our emotions and words are spoken by other people, in the lines of a song, in a performance, in a film. They experience the same emotions as you, which makes you feel a kind of euphoria. You can remember several catchy episodes.
6. The most proven way to understand another person is to put yourself in their place. Think about how you would feel in those circumstances or if another person said to you what you said.
7. Think through the worst-case scenario, what will you do in this case, how can you get out of the situation? This will help you calm down.

Own your emotions, don’t let them control you, you are the masters of your life. Even the most unpleasant situation can be changed simply by looking at it from a different perspective. By addressing what makes you uncomfortable, you can become strong personality, because the internal state does not depend on the money in your pocket, or on your position, or on the presence or absence of a partner nearby. You are the creator of everything that happens; you have the power to fly or fall.

Emotions can help or hinder you, but you won't know until you understand them. The book "Emotional Intelligence 2.0" will help you understand your emotional states and learn to cope with them.

We have chosen five tips for you that will help you perceive your own emotions correctly.

Stop perceiving feelings as good and bad

It is human nature to divide our emotions into two simple groups: good and bad. For example, most people automatically classify guilt as a bad emotion. You don’t want to experience this feeling and are ready to fight with all your might, wanting to get rid of it. In other situations, you release your excitement. Sometimes you pump yourself with energy, and sometimes you spray it in all directions.

The downside to labeling emotions is that by labeling them you can't truly understand what you're feeling.

When you give yourself the opportunity to calmly deal with an emotion and understand what it is, you get a chance to find out what causes it. Relinquishing judgment about emotions will allow them to do their job and disappear without a trace. And constantly thinking about whether you should feel what you feel awakens new emotions to life and does not allow the original feeling to be realized.

Therefore, immediately pay attention to situations when you begin to develop certain emotions. Refrain from labeling your emotion as “good” or “bad,” and then you can understand something important.

Record your emotions

The main problem in developing self-perception is objectivity. It is quite difficult to gain perspective on your emotions and tendencies when you are trying to start climbing the mountain from the very bottom every day. By writing down your thoughts, you can document what events triggered your emotions and how you responded to them.

You can write about what happened to you at home or at work - there are no restrictions. In just a month, you will notice a consistent pattern in your behavior and emotions, and this will allow you to better understand your tendencies. You will begin to better understand what emotions make you feel depressed, what makes you feel uplifted, and what emotions are most difficult for you to cope with.

Carefully observe the people and situations that push your buttons and release your strongest emotions.

Describe the emotions you experience every day. Don't forget to also describe the physical manifestations that accompany them. You gain the ability to see more clearly because putting your emotions on paper makes it easier to determine where your tendencies lie. Your journal can be a great resource to use when evaluating your self-perception.

Notice the presence of your emotions in books, films and music

If you find it difficult to look within yourself to understand your emotional patterns and tendencies, you can discover the same information through movies, music, and books that you feel intrinsically connected to. If the lyrics of a song or its mood resonate with your feelings, then this can say a lot about your inner feeling, and if you constantly remember a certain character from a book or movie, this may indicate that his thoughts and feelings parallel yours. Carefully studying these points can teach you a lot about yourself. Moreover, with this tool you can tell a lot about your feelings to other people.

Finding your emotions reflected in the performance of artists allows you to learn a lot about yourself and discover feelings within yourself that are difficult to express in words.

Sometimes you simply cannot find the right words to express the right emotions... and suddenly you hear exactly how the hero of the film pronounces them. Listening to music, reading books, watching movies, and even looking at an artist's painting can open the door to your deepest emotions. Next time a movie or book catches your attention, try digging deeper—you never know what you'll find in your search.

Don't let your bad mood fool you

We constantly succumb to a bad mood when it seems to us that the whole world is against us. This state covers our thoughts, feelings and everything that happens to us with a thick and dark fog. There is one focus in how your brain works. Once you fall into the grip of a bad mood, you lose all the good things in your life. Suddenly you begin to hate your job, your friends and family irritate you, you are dissatisfied with your achievements, and your optimism about the future goes up in smoke. Somewhere deep down you know that everything is not as bad as it seems now, but your brain remains deaf to it.

Part of our self-perception is recognizing what we're going through, even if we can't escape it. Admit to yourself that your Bad mood is a kind of cloud that covers everything you see. Remind yourself that your mood is temporary. Emotions change constantly, and a bad mood will pass - you just need to wait a little.

Bad mood - no best time to make important decisions.

You must constantly be aware of what mood you are in. If you think that you can make good decisions regardless of your mood, you will end up facing even more serious problems. It is important not only to reflect on what events led you to your current mood. Sometimes these thoughts themselves (if you don’t focus too much on them) can be enough reason for a bad mood to go away on its own.

Understand how you behave under stress

If you learn to recognize the early signs of stress, you will be doing yourself a huge favor. The human mind and body speak to you in their own language (at least when stress is involved). They use emotional and psychological responses to let you know when it's time to slow down and take a break. For example, an upset stomach may indicate that you are feeling nervous and anxious. Indigestion and fatigue are your body's way of asking for time to rest. An upset stomach may indicate tension and anxiety, and symptoms such as headache, sore throat or back pain may be an expression of other internal problems.

Your self-perception during times of stress and tension should serve as a third ear, listening intently to your body's voice or cries for help.

When you push too hard, your body has a lot to say. Take the time to listen to these signals and recharge your emotional batteries before emotional stress causes permanent damage to your internal system.