Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ

by Daniel Goleman

Those who tune in under duress can, by the very act of attending so carefully, unwittingly amplify the magnitude of their own reactions—especially if their tuning in is devoid of the equanimity of self-awareness.

Diener finds that women, in general, feel both positive and negative emotions more strongly than do men. And, sex differences aside, emotional life is richer for those who notice more.

Ellen was not alone in being frustrated by Gary's aloofness; as he confided to his therapist, he was unable to speak openly about his feelings with anyone in his life. The reason: He did not know what he felt in the first place. So far as he could tell, he had no angers, no sadnesses, no joys.8

alexithymia,

inability to express emotion rather than from an absence of emotion altogether.

What's more, they have trouble discriminating among emotions as well as between emotion and bodily sensation, so that they might tell of having butterflies in the stomach, palpitations, sweating, and dizziness—but they would not know they are feeling anxious.

It is not that alexithymics never feel, but that they are unable to know—and especially unable to put into words—precisely what their feelings are. They are utterly lacking in the fundamental skill of emotional intelligence, self-awareness—knowing what we are feeling as emotions roil within us.

In short, though the circuits of the emotional brain may react with feelings, the neocortex is not able to sort out these feelings and add the nuance of language to them.

Elliot was virtually oblivious to his feelings about what had happened to him.13 Most strikingly, Elliot could narrate the tragic events of his life with complete dispassion, as though he were an onlooker to the losses and failures of his past—without a note of regret or sadness, frustration or anger at life's unfairness. His own tragedy brought him no pain; Damasio felt more upset by Elliot's story than did Elliot himself.

And that overly dispassionate reasoning,

too little awareness of his own feelings about things made Elliot's reasoning faulty.

The key to sounder personal decision-making, in short: being attuned to our feelings.

Those who have a natural attunement to their own heart's voice—the language of emotion—are sure to be more adept at articulating its messages, whether as a novelist, songwriter, or psychotherapist.

As Freud made clear, much of emotional life is unconscious; feelings that stir within us do not always cross the threshold into awareness.

The physiological beginnings of an emotion typically occur before a person is consciously aware of the feeling itself.

The moment of an emotion coming into awareness marks its registering as such in the frontal cortex.14

In this way emotional self-awareness is the building block of the next fundamental of emotional intelligence: being able to shake off a bad mood.

A sense of self-mastery, of being able to withstand the emotional storms that the buffeting of Fortune brings rather than being "passion's slave," has been praised as a virtue since the time of Plato. The ancient Greek word for it was sophrosyne, "care and intelligence in conducting one's life; a tempered balance and wisdom," as

temperance, the restraining of emotional excess.

The goal is balance, not emotional suppression: every feeling has its value and significance.

appropriate emotion,

Indeed, keeping our distressing emotions in check is the key to emotional well-being;

extremes—emotions that wax too intensely or for too long—undermine our stability.

Downs as well as ups spice life, but need to be in balance. In the calculus of the heart it is the ratio of positive to negative emotions that determines the sense of well-being—at least that is the verdict from studies of mood in which hundreds of men and women have carried beepers that reminded them at random times to record their emotions at that moment.

Just as there is a steady murmur of background thoughts in the mind, there is a constant emotional hum; beep someone at six A.M. or seven P.M. and he will always be in some mood or other.

Still, managing our emotions is something of a full-time job: much of what we do—especially in our free time—is an attempt to manage mood. Everything from reading a novel or watching television to the activities and companions we choose can be a way to make ourselves feel better.

The art of soothing ourselves is a fundamental life skill;

The theory holds that emotionally sound infants learn to soothe themselves by treating themselves as their caretakers have treated them, leaving them less vulnerable to the upheavals of the emotional brain.

the design of the brain means that we very often have little or no control over when we are swept by emotion, nor over what emotion it will be.

But we can have some say in how long an emo...

all emotions are "natural" and should be experienced just as they present themselves, no matter how dispiriting.

But these rare purposive cultivations of unpleasantness aside, most everyone complained of being at the mercy of their moods.

Contrast that sequence of building rage with a more charitable line of thought toward the driver who cut you off: "Maybe he didn't see me, or maybe he had some good reason for driving so carelessly, such as a medical emergency." That line of possibility tempers anger with mercy, or at least an open mind, short-circuiting the buildup of rage.

"Anger is never without a reason, but seldom a good one."

the self-righteous inner monologue that propels it along

fills the mind with the most convincing arguments for venting rage.

Anger's seductive, persuasive power may in itself explain why some views about it are so common: ...

The longer we ruminate about what has made us angry, the more "good reasons" and self-justifications for being angry we can invent.

Tice found that reframing a situation more positively was one of the most potent ways to put anger to rest.

it is no surprise that Zillmann finds that a universal trigger for anger is the sense of being endangered.

This generalized adrenal and cortical excitation can last for hours and even days, keeping the emotional brain in special readiness for arousal, and becoming a foundation on which subsequent reactions can build with particular quickness.

The intensity of their retaliation was directly proportional to how aroused they had gotten from the film they had just watched; they were angrier after seeing the unpleasant film, and gave the worst ratings.

In this sequence every successive anger-provoking thought or perception becomes a minitrigger for amygdala-driven surges of catecholamines, each building on the hormonal momentum of those that went before. A

By then rage, unhampered by reason, easily erupts in violence.

"failing cognitive guidance," falls back on the most primitive of responses.

Indeed, anger can be completely short-circuited if the mitigating information comes before the anger is acted on.

Such mitigating information allows a reappraisal of the anger-provoking events.

"cognitive incapacitation"—in

When people were already highly enraged, they dismissed the mitigating information with "That's just too bad!" or "the strongest vulgarities the English language has to offer," as Zillmann put it with delicacy.

The power of distraction is that it stops that angry train of thought.