Search Inside Yourself: The Unexpected Path to Achieving Success, Happiness (And World Peace)

by Chade-Meng Tan

showed that insurance agents who are optimists outsell their pessimist counterparts by 8 percent in their first year and 31 percent in their second year.4 (Yes, I am optimistic about writing a bestseller. Thank you for asking.) This was not surprising to me. After all, there are many jobs such as those in sales and customer service in which emotional competencies obviously make a big difference.

According to a study, the top six competencies that distinguish star performers from average performers in the tech sector are (in this order): 1. Strong achievement drive and high achievement standards 2. Ability to influence 3. Conceptual thinking 4. Analytical ability 5. Initiative in taking on challenges 6. Self-confidence5 Of the top six, only two (conceptual thinking and analytical ability) are purely intellectual competencies. The other four, including the top two, are emotional competencies.

Matthieu Ricard defines happiness as “a deep sense of flourishing that arises from an exceptionally healthy mind … not a mere pleasurable feeling, a fleeting emotion, or a mood, but an optimal state of being.”8 And that optimal state of being is “a profound emotional balance struck by a subtle understanding of how the mind functions.”

If there is a one-word summary of everything I just said (hint: there is), that word is optimize. The aim of developing emotional intelligence is to help you optimize yourself and function at an even higher level than what you are already capable of.

The answer is that a strong, stable, and perceptive attention that affords you calmness and clarity is the foundation upon which emotional intelligence is built. For example, self-awareness depends on being able to see ourselves objectively, and that requires the ability to examine our thoughts and emotions from a third-person perspective, not getting swept up in the emotion, not identifying with it,

Zen joke. A large group of people gathered to listen to a talk by a Zen teacher. One guy in the audience got distracted by a fluttering flag and said, “Flag is moving.” Another guy said, “No, wind is moving.” The third guy, the wisest person in the audience said, “No, my friends, mind is moving.” A fourth guy, getting really annoyed, said, “Mouths are moving.”

PREPARING FOR A DIFFICULT CONVERSATION You may do this as either a writing exercise or a speaking exercise. If you do this as a speaking exercise, you may speak to a friend. Instructions 1. Think of a difficult conversation you had in the past, or one that you intend to have in the near future, or one that you should have had but did not. 2. Either in writing or spoken in a monologue, describe the “three conversations” from your own point of view. The three conversations are: the content conversation (“What happened?”), the feelings conversation (“What emotions are involved?”), and the identity conversation (“What does this say about me?”). The identity conversation almost always involves one of these three questions: • Am I competent? • Am I a good person? • Am I worthy of love? 3. Now, pretend that you are the other person and describe the three conversations from his or her point of view to the best of your abilities. If you did this as a speaking exercise with a friend, discuss what it felt like for you in a free-flow conversation.

EI has two more important features. First, beyond helping you succeed, the greatest side effect of EI is increased inner happiness, empathy, and compassion for people, precisely what we need for world peace. Second, a very good way (and I suspect the only way) to truly develop EI is with contemplative practices starting with Mindfulness Meditation.

Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen, Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most (New York: Penguin, 1999).

Daniel Goleman, Working with Emotional Intelligence (New York: Bantam, 1998).

Daniel Goleman on emotional intelligence: http://siybook.com/v/gtalk_dgoleman