Emotional intelligence

Source: Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman

Aristotle's Challenge: "Anyone can become angry-that is easy. But to be angry with the right person,, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way-that i not easy." Part one: The emotional brain. [1] 1. What are emotions for? [3]

• Overview and short explanation of basic emotions (see appendix A). [6]
• The brain evolved over millions of years from the bottom up, with its higher centers developing as elaborations of lower, more ancient parts. The growth of the brain in the human embryo roughly retraces this evolutionary course. [9]
• From the most primitive root, the brainstem, emerged the emotional centers. From these areas evolved the thinking brain or neocortex, the great bulb of convoluted tissues that make up the top layers. There was an emotional brain long before there was a rational one. [10]
• The most ancient root of our emotional life is in the sense of smell (olfactory lobe). Next layer of cells analyzed smell: edible or toic, sexually available, enemy or meal. second layer of cells sends reflexive messages: bite, spit, approach, flee, chase. [10]
• These cells surrounding the brainstem looked like a bagel with a bite taken out. Because this part rings and borderd the brainstem, it is callend the limbic system. Limbus is Latin for ring. [10]
• This in turn evolved into a system that could learn and memorize. Two powerful tools to make smarter decisions for survival and adaptation. [10]
• Next, several layers were added to form the neocortex. Regions that plan, comprehend, coordinate movement. The neocortex offers an extraordinary intellectual edge. It adds to feelings what we think about it-and allows us to have feelings about ideas, art, symbols, imaginings, yes, even feelings about feelings. [11]

2. Anatomy of an emotional hijacking. [13]

• Emotional explosions are neural hijackings bij the emotional or limbic brain. You the completely lose it, cannot think straight, blowing up at someone. [14]
• Laughter too, is a limbic hijacking or takeover. [14]
• The amygdala (from the Greek word for almond) is an almond-shaped cluster of interconnected structures perched above the brainstem and is the specialist for emotional matters. If you have no amygdala, you suffer from emotional blindness. You don't even recognize friends, family. All passio also depends on the amygdala. [14]
• The amygdala extensive web of neural connections allows it, during an emotional emergency (e.g. your house is on fire and you're trapped in a room), to capture and drive much of the rest of the brain-including the rational mind. [16]
• Sensory signals from the eye, nose and ear travel first in the brain to the thalamus, and then-across a single synapse-to the amygdala. A second signal is routed to the neocortex-the thinking brain. This branching allows the amygdala to begin responde before the neoxortex! In some cases taking ovr, hijacking the rational brain. This ciscuit does much to explain the power of emotion to overwhelm rationality. The conventional view had been that sensory signals transmit to thalamus, from there to the sensory processing areas of the neocortex, where the signals are put together into objects as we percieve them. [17]
• Emotions are fast and sloppy. [22]
• Harmonizing emotion and thought is emotional intelligence. [27]

Part two: The nature of emotional intelligence. [31] 3. When smart is dumb. [33]

• Interpersonal intellegence is the ability to understand other people. Intrapersonal intelligence is a correlative ability, turned inward. [39]
• Five domains of emotional intelligence: knowing one's emotions, managing emotions, motivating oneself, recognizing emotions in others, handling relationships. [43]

4. Know thyself. [46]

• Reflection, introspection. Metacognition and metamood. Self-awareness. [46]
• The observing ego. [47]
• Distinctive styles for attending to and dealing with emotions: self-aware, engulfed, and accepting. [48]
• Passionate and indifferent. [49]
• Alexithymia-having no feelings. [51]
• Somaticizing-mistaking an emotional ache for a physical one. [51]
• Emotional self-awareness is the building block of the next fundamental of emotional intelligence:being able to shake off a bad mood. [55]

5. Passion's slaves. [56]

• Anger is never without a reason, but seldom a good one-Benjamin Franklin. [59]
• Unlike sadness, anger is energizing, even exhilarating. [59]
• Anger is the most seductive of the negative emotions. [59]
• Stress of all sorts creates adrenocortical arousal, lowering the threshold for what provokes anger. Thus smeone who has had a hard day at work is especiay vulnerable to becoming enraged later at home by something-the kids being too noisy or messy, say-that under other circumstances would not be powerful enough to trigger ab emotional hijacking. [60]
• Anger builds on anger. [61]
• Failing cognitive guidance, falling back on the most primitive of responses. The limbic urge is ascendant; the rawest lessons of life's brutality become guides to action. [62]
• Balm for anger: seize on and challenge the thoughts that trigger the surges of anger (at moderate levels of anger). The second way of de-escalating anger is cooling off physiologically by waiting out the adrenal surge. Most effective when beinng alone. [63]
• The most popular tactic of fighting depression is socializing. [70]
• Completely unaware of negativities, so adept to buffering themselves against negative feelings: the unflappables. A kind of upbeat denial. [75]

6. The master aptitude. [78]

• Motivation: enthusiasm and persistence to have success. [80]
• The root meaning of the word emotion is "to move".
• The marhsmellow test: If you wait until after he runs an errand, you can have two marshmellows for a treat. If you can't wait until then, you can only have one-but you can hae it right now. The result is a telling test. It offers a quick reading not just of character, but of the trajectory that child will probably take through life. [81]
• Emotional intelligenge is a meta-ability. [83]
• A good laugh has sriking intellectual benefits when it comes to olving a problem that demands a creative solution. [85]
• Optimism: the great motivator. [87]
• Optimism, like hope, means having a strong expectation that, in general, things will turn out all right in life, despite setbacks and frustrations. [88]
• Flow: the neurobiology of excellence. [90]
• You yourself are in an ecstatic state to such a point that you fe as though you almost don't exist. I've experiened this time and time again. My hands seems devoid of myself, and I have nothing to do with what is happening. I just sit there watching in a state of awe and wonderment. And it just flows out by itself. [90]
• During state of flow, excellence becomes effortless. [90]
• Being able to enter flow is emotional intelligence at best. Flow represents perhaps the ultimate in harnessing the emotions in service of performance and learning. In flow the emotions are not just contained and channeled, but positive, energized, and aligned with the tsk at hand. [90]
• Because flow feels so good, it is intrinsically rewarding. [91]
• Flow is a state of self-forgetfulness, the opposite of rumintion and worry. [91]
• Ways to enter flow: intentionally focus a sharp attention on the task at hand-a highly concentratedd state is the essence of flow; get calm and focussed enough to do the task; getting calm takes some discipline. But once focus starts to lock in, it takes on a force of its own. Or find a task you're skilled at, and engage in it at a level that slightly taxes your ability. If there is too little demand, you get bored. If there is too much to handle, you'll get anxious. [91]
• Flow occurs in that delicate one between boredom and anxiety. [91]
• Flow is a state devoid of emotional static, save for a complling, highly motivating feling of mild ecstasy. [92]
• atching someone in flow gives the impression that the difficult is easy; peak performance is natural and ordinary. [92]
• In flow, the brain is in a "cool" state. Your brain "quiets down". [92]
• Key to flow is that it occurs only within reach of the summit of ability, where skills are well-rehearsed and neural circuits are most efficient. [92]

7. The roots of empathy. [96]

• Empathy, to ability to know how another feels. [96]
• Key is the ability to read nonverbal channels: tone of voice, gesture, facial expression, and the like. [96]
• The emotional truth is in how someone says something rather than in what someone says. [97]
• 90 percent of an emotional message is nonverbal. [97]
• Attunement, meet someoone else's emotions with empathy, acceptaance. [100]

8. The social arts. [111]

• People skills allow one to shape an encounter, to mobilize and inspire others, to thrive in intmate relationships, to persuade and infuence, to put others at ease. [113]
• Display rules: miminimze, exaggerate or substitute feelings. [113]
• The forcefulness of a good speaker-a politician or an evangelist, say-works to entertain the emotions of the audience. That is what me mean by, "He had them in the palm of his hand." Emotional entrainment is the heart of influence. [117]
• Components of interpersonal intelligence: organiing groups; negotiating solutions; personal connection; social analysis. [118]

Part three: Emotional intelligenge applied. [127] 9.Intimate enemies. [129]

• Men prefer to talk about "things", while women seek emotional connection. [132]
• Women are more emotional than men. [132]
• Better to complain than to critisize personally. {146}[135]
• Stonewalling is the ultimate defense: going blank, in effect withdrawing from the conversation in a demonstrative way. Stonewalling is an icy distance, superiority and distaste.[136]
• Flooding: being overwhelmed by your partner's negativity and your own reactions to it that you are swamped by dreadful, out-of-control feelings. You cannot think straight and fall back on primitive reactions. [139]
• Stonewalling can protect against flooding. [140]
• Stonewalling can cause the other to distress. [140]
• When a husband stonewalls, it triggers flooding in their wives. [141]
• Men should not offer a practical solution too early on-she may this advice as a way of dismissing her feelings as inconsequential. [142]
• When a woman feels her view is heard and her feelings registered, she calms down. [142]
• Wives need to make a purposeful effort to be careful not to attack their husbands-to complain about what they did, but not criticize them as a person. Personal attacks almost always lead to a defensive action, or stonewalling. [142]
• Overall strategy concentrates not on specific issues-childcare, sex money, housework-but rather to cultivate a couple's shared emotional intelligence. [143]
• Calming down is an immensely constructive step during an emotional dispute. Whithout it, there can be no further progress in settling what's at issue. Calming down requires a time-out period of at least twenty minutes. [144]
• Listening is a skill that keeps couples together. Empathy tops this: actually hearing the feelings behind what is being said. [145]
• One method of emotional listening is "mirroring": repeat back in your own words not just the thoughts, but also the feelings that go with it, until you get it right. This adds the sense of being emotional attuned. [146]
• Best formula for a complaint is XYZ: "When you did X, it made me feel Y, and I'd rather you did Z instead. E.g. "When you didn't call to tell me you were going to be late for that dinner appointment, I felt unapreciated and angry. I wish you'd call to let me know you'll be late." [146]

10. Managing with heart. [148]

• Stress makes people stupid. When emotionally upset, people cannot remember, attend, learn, or make decisions clearly.
• Leadership is not domination, but the art of persuading people toward a common goal. [149]
• In terms of managing your own career, there may be nothing more essential than recognizing our deepest feelings about what we do-and what changes might make us more truly satisfied eith our work. [149]
• Three aplications of emotional intelligence: being able to air grievances as helpful critiques; creating an atmosphere in which diversity is valued rather than a source of friction;networking effectively [150]
• Feedback is the exchange of data about how one part of a system is working, with the understanding that one part affects all others in the system. [150]
• In a company everyone is part of the system, so feedback is the lifeblood of the organization. [151]
• Critisism is one of the most important tasks a manager has. The emotional health of people depends on the art of critisism. [151]
• Give feedback promptly, so the other can correct the problem. Don't delay feedback for long periods, as it may build up frustration that will boil over eventually. [152]
• Artful critique focuses on what someone has done and can do rather than reading a mark of character in a job poorly done. [153]
• The art of critique: be specific; offer a solution; be present and personal; be sensitive, i.e. show empathy, attune to the effect that your critique has on the other. [153]
• People who receive critisism should try and see it as valuable information about how to do better, not as a personal attack, and see it as an opportunity to work together to resolve the critique. [154]
• Take advantage of the creative and entrepreneurial possibilities that a diverse workforce can offer. [159]
• Emotional intelligence, the skills that help people harmonize, should beome increasingly valued as a workplace asset in the years to come.
• The key to a high group IQ is social harmony, or emotional intelligence (EG). [160]
• Avoid people that are to eager (too controlling or domineering) or ho are dead weight (do not participate) in a team, they will slow it down. [160]
• Highly adaptive, informal networks move diagonally and elliptically, skipping entire functions to get things done. [162]
• Three variaties of networks: communications webs; expertise networks; trust networks. [162]
• The stars of an organization are often those who have thick connections on all networks. [162]
• As knowledge-based services and intelectual capital become more central to corporations, improving the way people work together will be a major way to leverage intellectual capital, making a critical competitive difference. [163]
• To thrive, if not survive, corporations would do well to boost their collective emotional intelligence. [163]

11. Mind and medicine. [164]

• Your immune system can, like the brain, learn. The field that studies this is called psychoneuroimmunology (PNI). [166]
• There are direct connections between the nerve system and the cardiovascular and immune systems, bypassing the hormone system. So emotions are linked to the immune system. [167]
• Emotions matter clinically. [168]
• Stress can accelerate the onset of Type I diabetes and the course of Type II diabetes. [173]
• Stress makes one more vulnerable for virus infections. [173]
• Hope (optimism) has healing power. [177]
• Social isolation doubles the chances of sickness or death. [178]
• Close ties and emotional support have healing power. [179]
• Relationships buffer stress. [179]
• Write off (make confessions to paper) those troubles and traumatic experiences, it really helps and improves your immune system and resistance level. [180]

Part four: Windows of opportunity. [187] 12. The family crucible

• Familiy life is our first schoo of emotional learning. [189]
• Parents' behaviour have deep and lasting consequences for a child's emotionl life. [190]
• The payoff for children whose parents are emotionally adept is a surprising-almost astounding-range of advantages across, and beyond, the spectrum of emotional inteligence. [192]
• The seven key ingredients of a child's readiness for school, all related to emotional intelligence: 1. confidence; 2. curiousity; 3. intentionality; 4. self-control; 5. relatedness; 6. capacity to communicate; 7. cooperativeness. [193]
• Emotional learning takes place more readily during the first four years of life and has a profound impact on e person's emotional intelligence. [195]

13. Trauma and emotional relearning. [200]

• Psychotherapy helps us learn to deal skillfully with the loaded reactions, and here emotional intelligence comes into play. [213]
• We cannot decide when we have our emotional outbursts, but we have more control over how long they will last. [213]
• Deep craving to be accepted, or finding intimacy, or a fear of being a failure, or being overy dependent bring people to psychotherapy. Responses to this are always self-defeating: feelings of being too demanding-which creats a backlasg of anger or coldness in the other person, or withdrawing in self-defense from anticipated slight, leaving the other person miffed by the seeming rebuff. Patients feel flooded by upsetting geelings-hopelessness, sadness, resentment, anger, tension, fear, guilt and self-blame. [214]
• Psychotherapy helps making the emotional reactions to triggering events less distressing, and overt responses became more effective in getting what they truly wanted from the relationship. What does not change is the particular sensitivity at the root of these needs. [214]
• In short, emotional lessons-even the most deeply implanted basis of the heart learned in childhood-can be reshaped. Emotional larning is lifelong. [214]

14. Temperament is not destiny. [215]

• Four temperamental types: timd, bold, upbeat, and melancholy. [215]
• Childhood: a window of opportunity. Children are born with many more neurons tha their mature brain will retain. Excess neurons are pruned to improve the signal-to-noise ratio-the cause of the "noise" is removed. Experience, especially in childhood, sculpts the brain. [224]
• Psychotherapy is systematcal emotional relearning. [225]
• Obsessive-compulsive disorder, e.g. hand washing can be done so often,, even hundreds of ties in a day, that the perons skin cracks. [225]

Part five: Emotional literacy. [229] 15. The cost of emotional literacy. [231]

• This part is almost completely about emotional intellegance as integral part of scholarship. Bullies, violence, drugs, sexual abuses, bad boys and girls, anti-social behaviour, dellinquents, eating disorders (anorexia nervosa and bulimia), drugs, drinking, etc. and what we can do in our educational system to prevent it. I.e.

16. Schooling the emotions. [261]

• The six basic emotions: happy, sad, angry, surprised, afraid, disgusted. Try and combine this with the dicription of the facial muscle activity, e.g.afraid: the mouth is open and drawn back; the eyes are open and the inner corners go up; the eyebrows are raised and drawn together; there are wrinkels in the middle of the forehead. [271]
• For impulse conrol try the Emotional Stoplight: red: 1. stop, cam down, and think before you act; yellow: 2. say the problem and how you feel; 3. set a positive goal; 4. think of lot of solutions; 5. think ahead to the consequences; green: 6. go ahead and try the best plan. [276]
• Emotional self-awareness: improvement in recognizing and namin own emotions; better able to understand the causes of feelings; recognizing the difference between feelings and actions. [283]
• Managing motions: better frustration toerance and anger management; fewer erbal put-downs, fights and classroom disruptions; better able to express anger apppropriately, without fighting; fewer suspensions and expulsions; less aggressive or self-destructive behaviour; more positive feelings about sef, work or school, and family; better at handling stress; less loneliness and social anxiety. [283]
• Harnessinf emotions productively: more responsible; better able to focus on the task at hand and pay attention; less imulsive, more self-control; improved scores on achievement tests. [284]
• Empathy-reading emotions: better able to take another person's perspective; improved empathy and sensitivity to others' feelings; better listening to others. [284]
• Handling relationships: increased ability to analyze and understand relationships; better at resolving conflicts and negotiating disagreements; better at solving problems in relationships; more assertive and skilled at communicating; more popular and outgoing-friendly and involved with peers; more sought out by peers; more concerned and considerate; more "pro-social" and harmonious in groups; more sharing, cooperation, and helpfuness; more democratic in dealing with others. [284]

Appendix A-What is an emotion? [289]

• Anger {fury...violence}, sadness {grief...sever depression}, fear {anxiety...panic}, enjoyment {hapiness...mania}, love {acceptance...agape}, surprise {shock...wonder}, disgust {contempt...revulsion}, shame {guilt...contrition}. [290]
• Blends: jealousy [290]
• Virtues: hope, faith, courage, forgiveness, certainty, equenimiy. [290]
• Vices: doubt, complacency, sloth, torpor, boredom. [290]
• The outer ripples of emotions are moods. Beyond moods are temperaments. Still beyond temperaments are outright disorders of emotion. [290]

Appendix B-Hallmarks of the emotional mind. [291]

• A quick but sloppy response. The emotional mind is far quicker than the rational mind, springing into action without pausing even a moment to consider what it is doing. Its quickness precludes the deliberate, analytic refllections that is the hallmark of the thinking mind. [291]
• First feelings, second thoughts. Implusive reaction. We cannot choose the emotions which we have. [293]
• A symbolic, childlike reaction. The logic of the emotional mind is associative. It takes elements that symbolize a reality, or trigger a memory of it, to be the same as reality. That is why similes, metaphores, and images speak directly to the emotional mind, as do the arts-film, novels, poetry, song, theater, opera. Great spritual leaders and teachers , like Buddha and Jeses, have touched their disciples' hearts be speaking the language of emotion, teaching in parables, fables, and stories. [294]
• Joseph Cambell: Dreams are private myths; myth are shared dreams. [294]
• What matters is how things are perceived. Perception i reality. [294]

Appendix C-The neural circuitry of fear. [297]

• {skipped}

Appendix D-W.T. Grant Consortium: Active ingredients of prevention programs. [301]

• Good overview (list) of emotional, cognitive, and behavioral skills. [301]

Appendix E-The self science curriculum. [303]

• Self-awareness, personl decision-making, managing feelings, handling stress, empathy, communications, self-disclosure, insight, self-acceptance, personl responsibility, assertiveness, group dynamics, and conflict resolution. [303]

Appendix F-Social and emotional learning: results. [305]

• Overview of various programs at schools and their results. [305]