Have you ever known someone or looked at someone and thought “how did they get there, what is it they do that sets them apart and makes them seem like a leader or at the very least like they have everything figured out?” You know there’s something there, something that you can’t put your finger on but it’s definitely there. They seem to have everything under control, bad situations seem to be so utterly repairable no matter though despair. Which makes it seem so nonchalant for them to just progressed in life.

Well, not everything is as easy as it looks, but there is something that does that these people apart. It’s there EQ or emotional quotient. Sometimes also known as their EI or emotional intelligence.

If you haven’t met someone with a high EQ, then you are missing out. And you aren’t living your life in the right circles. So spread your wings a little bit and find and meet new people. If you don’t have a high EQ and you’re not hanging around people that might have a high EQ, things are going to be a lot more difficult. Because I’ll tell you what if you get in with someone that has a high EQ they will help you and lift you. That’s what they do. And that’s what we should all aspire to do and be.

EQ is the capacity of individuals to recognize their own, and other people’s emotions, to discriminate between different feelings and label them appropriately, and to use emotional information to guide thinking and behavior. It’s the ability to understand yourself and what you’re feeling in a way that is measurable and you understand how to react to it. This is indeed a very rare ability these days. Don’t get me wrong we have our moments, but very very rarely do people live this way on a consistent basis. I’m not saying it’s not possible, I’m only saying that unfortunately nowadays most people live in slavery to their emotions. And you only see high EQ in the great leaders in our communities.

Maybe you work somewhere where the boss wasn’t that a leader rather than boss. And that person was always able to not only contain himself and articulate their feelings in such a way that made it comprehendible for all parties, but they also are able to translate other people’s feelings very well. They’re able to help that person articulate their feelings. Because if you’ve ever tried to express what you’re feeling, especially when you’re upset, it can be very hard to communicate it in a way that makes sense to another person’s mind. Because we only make sense to ourselves when we are upset 99% of the time.

It’s sad that we seem to be headed in the opposite direction of valuing this type of intelligence. So many people are caught up get too much behind theirs and others IQ. But I’ll tell you right now you could be the smartest person on the planet and it will do you no good if you can’t communicate with other people on an emotional level. We are emotional beings we need it I seem to be losing it.

Don’t get me wrong, we still spray our emotions like a sprinkler in every direction. It’s that we don’t know what to do with them or what to do with the onslaught of other people’s emotions that is the problem.

And it seems to be getting worse and now we have this depression and anxiety epidemic sweeping the world. And nothing can cause you to lose control of your emotions more than an unhealthy dose of anxiety and depression. Because so many years I wanted to become a master of my emotions, and it drove me and saying that I couldn’t figure out why it was so hard to wrap my head around. It wasn’t till I learned the about the effects that anxiety and depression has on your mental and emotional state that I realized in order to become emotionally intelligent I had to First engage the issue of anxiety and depression.

One of the hardest things I’ve ever been through is the onslaught of anxiety I went through for years. So needless to say, overcoming it was insanely hard. But very worth it, and now I’m working on my emotional intelligence and it’s paying off massively and I’ve only begun.

So I guess the point of this article was to give you something to examine about yourself. Maybe you’ve been trying to figure out your process of growth or how to get out of a rut that you’re in and you can’t seem to figure out what tools you’re going to need to get their. Well I can tell you right now one of the most important tools you can wield is emotional intelligence.

We all have an innate ability to sense things in other people, in fact we do it all the time but it seems more and more that we disregard it because we don’t want to bother people or judge them. And we don’t want to deal with our own emotions so we set them aside and they come out in some negative form of external expression that hurts other people’s feelings and our character.

From now on work on your emotional intelligence, when you feel yourself engaging with an emotion whether it’s yours or someone else’s coming at you stop for a second and analyze it. Our emotions can be extremely important in guiding us and sharing important insights about the world around us. But they can also be misleading, it’s one of those paradox that we have to find a balance with. So engage with your emotions and use them to your advantage comma use other people’s emotions to to theirs and your advantage. Pay attention.