Applications for the development of emotional intelligence. What does it consist of? Exercises to develop individual EQ components

Yesterday Vita, my 4-year-old daughter, drew bright picture of many colored shapes, and said that it was called "The Labyrinth of Happiness." We have been walking through this maze since childhood, and emotional intelligence can become one of the main assistants on the way.

EQ - basis positive thinking, foundation successful life and personal happiness. That is why it is so important to develop it. Understanding emotions, the ability to recognize the feelings, intentions and motivations of others opens up more opportunities, does not allow you to give up in a difficult situation.

Only what you see can be controlled. And a developed EQ makes it possible to manage not only your own experiences, but also the feelings of others.

Children see the world through the lens of emotions. For a child with an underdeveloped EQ, failure becomes a personal tragedy and a reason to doubt himself. And an emotionally stable child is distinguished by friendliness and responsiveness, self-confidence and calmness, purposefulness and focus on results. He can become a successful diplomat or businessman, a loving spouse and a happy parent.

Women have more control over emotions than men. Girl with early childhood learns compassion, responsiveness and understanding. Each doll game allows you to imagine yourself as a wife, daughter and mother.

EQ Development Techniques for Adults and Children

It is not so important what we teach children as what example we set. And the most important example is the ability to be happy.

1. Box of emotions

It is useful to create your own box of happiness in your imagination. “Add” into it everything that you associate with happiness visually, aurally, taste, smell and touch. And then create the same box with your child, discussing his emotions with him in detail. Example:

• Vision: a happy smile of a child.
• Rumor: the sound of the sea wave.
• Taste: sweet strawberry.
• Smell: the scents of the forest after the rain.
• Touch: the embrace of a loved one.

2. Language of emotions

It will help not only understand your own feelings, but also allow others to understand you better. Such communication with a partner, colleagues and especially with a child will become the basis of mutual understanding in the family and at work. To do this, enter the formula into your speech: "I feel ... because ..., and I would like to...".

Using the example of communicating with a child, this formula may sound like this: “I'm upset that you spilled water with paints. I wish you were more careful. Now let's get together."

3. How do I feel today

The essence of the game is that every evening the child himself chooses an emotion today. “Today I felt joy (sadness, curiosity, anger…) when…” To do this, print out all the emotions of the child's favorite character, which he will choose to indicate his experiences. This game teaches awareness and acceptance of one's own feelings.

4. Emotional photo album-journey

It is interesting to take pictures not only in the style of “me and the sights”. Try taking emotional photos: “Ah! This palm tree is like a huge cactus - you have to try it”, “The tower does not fall ?!”, “Zhuuuuk!”.

Believe me, such photos are very pleasant to look at with the whole family. And they can also tell stories about the journey. Print multiple photos, mix and create new history your trip.

5. Emotions in colors

You can make your own gallery of emotions, where each picture is an emotion expressed by the colors and composition that the child chooses. It's great to draw at the same time and compare how you get joy, sadness, anger.

6. Compass of emotions

A unique game that not only introduces the child to emotions, but also shows what feelings a person feels in a given situation. The essence of the game: everyone receives a set of 8 cards: joy, fear, interest, inspiration, doubt, surprise, trust, anger. The list can be supplemented.

The guessing player comes up with a word-concept-situation and, choosing a suitable emotion for it, puts the card in a closed circle. The rest of the players must guess: what kind of emotion does the player feel about the situation.

For example, a mother can choose a “joy” card for the concept of “September 1”, and a daughter can choose “fear”. It is difficult for children to talk about their emotions. And in the game they reveal them.

And don't forget to read books and good music. These are timeless resources for knowing yourself, others and the whole world.

About the expert

About emotional intelligence began to write actively and many years ago. There was even a common meme that " good man"In the XXI century - quite a" profession ".

When your emotional intelligence is high, you perceive reality more adequately, react to it more effectively and interact with others. Emotional intelligence has become one of the new tools for business management, building effective communications and finding happiness.

But the question immediately arises: is it possible to develop emotional competencies in the same way as ordinary intelligence, logic, thinking and creativity?

Do you feel that the business environment is sometimes hostile to you? For example, does your boss not appreciate you, or does the client treat you like an empty space?

Regardless of which level career ladder you are now, I am sure that you have at least once encountered a misunderstanding. You felt left out, not appreciated enough, not treated properly. And as a consequence, you experienced suffering.

Let's face it, business isn't always fun. Some may argue that "that's how it works." However, I am sure that we can improve our situation by developing one useful skill - emotional intelligence (EI).

Darius Foroux
Entrepreneur, author of three books, podcast host https://soundcloud.com/dariusforoux. "I write about how to be more productive to build a better life, career, and business."

What is emotional intelligence, how to improve it and how to use it in a business environment?

Term emotional intellect was popularized by John Mayer of the University of New Hampshire and Peter Salovey of Yale University.

Mayer defines EI (also called EQ) as follows:

In the current economic situation, the skill of solving problems related to emotions is very important. Plus, we often have to work together to find a solution. So success in business is not based on your diploma, IQ test scores, or any other grade-based metrics.

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If you want to achieve meaningful results, you will have to learn how to work with other people. From this point of view, EI is a key skill that will bring you better results and greater success.

In addition, studies show that high EI is an indicator of mental health. Therefore, it affects not only your success rate, but also your level of happiness.

Better self-awareness leads to higher emotional intelligence, which in turn brings more happiness.

EI characterizes a person's ability to recognize emotions. And not only others, but also their own. I believe that before you manage and direct others, you need to understand your emotions. Therefore, EI dough is associated with self-knowledge.

Thus, emotional intelligence is important factor that determines our success in life and in business:

• The result of high EI is self-knowledge.
• Self-awareness leads to greater happiness.
• A high level of happiness is an indicator of job satisfaction.
• Getting the joy of work, you show the best results.
• Good results lead to recognition.
• Recognition of our successes makes us feel important.
• This feeling leads us to greater happiness best results etc.

Step one. Recognize your emotions.

Daniel Goleman, another pioneer in research emotional intelligence, author of the book "Emotional Intelligence. Why it might mean more than IQ” states that we have two minds: “We literally have two minds. One thinks, the other feels.

In order to develop the part of the brain that is responsible for feelings, I like to write in a diary about my daily emotions. If you're not already journaling, start for the sake of your emotional intelligence.

Taking the first step, it is important to determine what you feel, what is the trigger for you experiences. Don't think why. Ask yourself some helpful questions:

What do you feel in different situations?

Do you get angry when you are criticized?

Do you get upset when people ignore you?

Do you freeze when all attention is on you?

Step two. Interpret your emotions

Once you've got it best performance about how you react to different situations, it's time to figure out your reaction. Find answers to the following questions:

How do you respond to people when you're angry?

What do you really think of them?

What is the primary source of your feelings, what upsets you, makes you happy, sad, angry?

Don't judge yourself. Your goal is to understand your emotions. No more, no less.

Step three. Manage your emotions.

This most of business success. The leader does not go with the flow or follow the energy of the group. The leader sets the atmosphere. But before you can determine the mood of the whole group, you need to learn how to maintain an internal mood. Answer yourself a few questions:

Can you get out of being sad?

Can you cheer yourself up?

Can you hold yourself back if you get too excited?

If not, work on it. Before you can control your emotions, you must learn to control them.

I used a three-step method to better identify my emotions. After trying these steps for yourself, you will learn to recognize your emotions and identify the emotions of other people. This is exactly what constitutes emotional intelligence.

Among other aspects related to the formation of social and emotional intelligence, we highlight ability to refuse requests and delegate tasks, and the ability not to dwell on problems and try to perceive failure as feedback , space for improvement and new opportunities.

For example, remember more often that you can't change the past, which means that instead of thinking over and over again about what should have been done in this or that situation, think about what to do now and how you can improve the future. Also remember that, in principle, you don’t owe anything to anyone, which means you don’t have to agree with everyone, even if it causes some inconvenience to someone. As paradoxical as it may sound, the ability to refuse is also a skill and it can be learned. After a couple of rejections, you will realize that the world doesn't turn upside down when you say, "No, I can't." If you feel guilty or remorseful, then remember that after some time will pass and this. Thus, after a few "exercises" you will understand that it is normal to refuse.

As we said, a person with a developed EQ is characterized by empathy, but such individuals are more likely to manipulate themselves than be manipulated. Most importantly, they accurately identify the manipulators and decide for themselves whether to succumb to their tricks or not. If you feel that someone is trying to manipulate you, use the old one, but effective technique: Imagine this person with a trash can on his head. This will change your attitude towards the interlocutor, and, consequently, the reaction to his words and requests. This technique is useful in other situations as well.

5. Emotions

Another direction - work on own emotions . To learn how to control them, it is important to know what exactly you control. Observe yourself - what events evoke what feelings; what emotions interfere with concentration, and which give efficiency; which are easy to manage and which are not.
Don't get angry at your reactions, don't deny them, don't repress, don't judge yourself, and most of all, don't lie to yourself.: if you do all of the above, you will not be able to control them. You feel what you feel, but all feelings have a reason. It is important to understand it - and then you can correct emotions.

And finally one more helpful advice. Increasing and developing social and emotional intelligence, it is very important to stay who you are and not try to become someone else. The purpose of increasing the level of EQ and SQ is self-improvement, that is, self-improvement, and not an attempt to put on someone else's mask and walk in it.

Emotional intelligence is a phenomenon that, at first glance, contains a contradiction. The intellect is usually understood as the mental, 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, controlled by an effort of will. 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 good for both inner harmony personality, and for harmony in relationships with other people, in the family and at work. Developed emotional intelligence contributes to the maintenance of physical and mental health.

Emotional intelligence needs to be developed because it:

• promotes awareness, understanding and acceptance of oneself, without self-flagellation and self-digging,
• develops intuition, the ability to understand non-verbal signals in communication,
• balances emotional reactions in stressful situations,
• develops stress tolerance
• teaches you to better understand other people, their emotions and feelings,
• helps to resolve communication difficulties, find compromises,
• promotes conflict resolution through cooperation,
• protects against manipulation, does not allow a person to become a victim of a manipulator,
• promotes the adoption of deliberate, rather than impulsive decisions,
• prevents emotional burnout At work,
• increases susceptibility to the signals of one's own body, develops an 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 sufficiently developed already in childhood due to the peculiarities of 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, in the course of socialization and the accumulation of life experience.

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

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

The wonderful proverb “Measure seven times - cut one” is the best way to characterize a developed emotional intelligence!

Integrals, theorems, chemical formulas and little known historical dates- a complicated thing, but completely useless in ordinary everyday life. How much time is devoted to memorizing practically unnecessary material for school desk while the really important things are missed. But the realization of a person in life depends much more on the ability to manage one's own than on mental abilities.

Take examples of any successful entrepreneurs– Jack Welsh, Richard Branson, Reed Hoffman, Larry Page. All of them have achieved tremendous success not only thanks to the mind, but also the ability to gather around them the right people, to organize their work correctly, to direct their abilities in the right direction. How did they do it? The great merit of such personalities lies in the effective use of emotional intelligence! Let's develop emotional intelligence!

In essence, emotional intelligence is the ability to manage, understand, and manipulate one's own and others' emotions; the ability to recognize intentions and a person, using them to achieve personal goals. So, D. Wexler and K. Steiner proved in their own way that high career achievements and success in society are achieved precisely by those individuals who have a well-developed ability to find mutual language with others who have learned to effectively interact in society thanks to emotional connections.

Emotional intellect

Professor D. Goleman identified the following components of emotional intelligence.

1. The ability to recognize emotions by external behavior, gestures and voice, without which it is impossible to easily make contacts.

2. The ability to empathize as the ability to hear and understand the feelings of other people, to respond to them correctly, showing care and empathy in time. This quality helps build trust.

3. The ability to motivate yourself not only with material (monetary) rewards, but also enjoy the very fact of conquering.

4. The ability to self-awareness, analysis of oneself and one's feelings, understanding the causes of conflicts in relationships, goals, one's strengths and weaknesses.

5. The ability to self-control, which is manifested in the ability to flexibly manage own feelings and emotions, restraining negative impulses.

6. The ability to manipulate other people, the ability to be convincing in the eyes of the interlocutor, urging him to work for the benefit of his own professional interests.

How to develop emotional intelligence?

Knowing the practical value of skillful management of emotions, we now come to the main question: how to develop emotional intelligence? Here are 6 simple, but no less effective ways.

1. Keeping a self-observation diary. To learn how to manage others, you need to study yourself and your own well. Start, in which write down the conflicts of the day, what did you feel at that moment, and how did you manage to cope with a dangerous situation? What dominated you? What conclusions did you draw?

2. Lessons of communication and interaction. Even if you do not like to be in a large team, or do not burn with the desire to communicate a lot, try to overpower yourself and build a dialogue with the most different people your circle. Try to find out their opinion about you and your abilities, weak and strengths Look at yourself through their eyes. You will discover many new things!

3. The view of all parties to the conflict. It is very important to be flexible in communication, especially if the interlocutor has a bright temperament and defends the opposite point of view. Try to look at the subject through his eyes, give up the old way of thinking to reach a compromise.

4. Ability to pause. Before you react in the usual way to the next offer or accusation, pause and consider the reaction that has arisen, is it good? Is it possible to express a thought in some other way so as not to offend the interlocutor and better convey your own to him?

5. An adviser with an opposite opinion. Very often, people who are different from us can give such good advice that we would never have thought of. Make friends with your opposite and consult with him in difficult situations, this will avoid many unpleasant moments in the future.

6. - as a result. If something makes you angry or nervous, don't give up or flood your stress with alcohol. Most correct solution- direct the energy of destruction to achieve results. That is, do not let it drift, but once again indicate the direction.

By developing emotional intelligence, you learn not only to solve problems, but also to manage the thoughts and feelings of others for the benefit of your own interests. This ability will make you an informal leader of any team, preparing a good springboard for future success.