Self Development Research

Numerous studies show that emotional intelligence is more vital than intelligence in virtual every role. Besides playing an integral role towards self-understanding, emotional intelligence has the potential to aid people understand the emotions of those around them and make compromises when the situations require them to do so. Salovey and Mayer jointly tabled a framework for emotional intelligence and marked the beginning of decades of academic exploration, development and debate on the question of emotional intelligence. A vast majority of previous study has attempted to establish the relationship between emotional intelligence and leadership effectiveness. Indeed, emotional intelligence has been a contentious topic of the social sciences for years. Such people also know how to employ emotional occurrences in their lives to stimulate a particular type of reasoning.

For instance, they understand that sadness prompts analytical thinking hence they prefer to analyze highly complex things when in a sad mood. People with high emotional intelligence also know how to respond to various situations in life: They understand that angry people present potential danger and that some sad people prefer to be left alone to deal with their issues alone. They also understand that a person is more likely to honour an invitation to a social gathering when happy than when annoyed. This understanding of EI has over the years helped assess the significance of a leader’s awareness of his or her own emotions and the resulting ability to influence employees or staff emotions. Other than its potential to improve organisational performance and worker’s productivity, emotional intelligence has the ability to enhance an individual's understanding of self popularly referred to self-awareness.

Last but not least, emotional intelligence has a strong connection to spirituality and love. This is mainly because emotionally intelligent individuals have the ability to connect with their inner selves and make important compromises in life. The term emotional intelligence was coined by Michael Boldoch, a psychologist at Cornel University in the early 60’s. It is imperative to note that the first model of emotional intelligence was developed by John Mayer and Peter Salvoes who were both psychologists. While this sounds like a beautiful thing, the fat of the matter is that many scholars and writers have exaggerated or overemphasised the importance of emotional intelligence. While being self-aware, empathetic and social consciousness are important virtues, not many people would like to surround themselves or work with individuals with such abilities.

The hype around emotional intelligence has resulted to EI being lined to everything from leadership performance and business accomplishment to reduced stress and personal satisfaction. This has, in turn, created many misconceptions around emotional intelligence. Many psychologists contend that the buzz around emotional intelligence has distorted not only the meaning of emotional intelligence but also abilities associated with emotional intelligence. 0 asserts that highly accomplished individuals are capable of circumventing nearly every human behavioural imperfection. Moreover, claims that such individuals are typically calm, collected and never permit negative thoughts to penetrate their minds is just ludicrous. In fact, accomplished people are just like the rest of us and they too possess behavioural flaws. Emotional Awareness does not Result to Behavioral Change One of the major doctrines of EI advocates is that awareness can potentially lead to behavioural change.

They argue that by simply reading an article, a book, attending a seminar or seating for test, a person becomes more aware of his or her emotions and with continuous practice, they become more successful at their various jobs. Their study involved asking participants to identify emotions expressed in pictures and answering a set of questions. In his article titled “What emotional Intelligence Is and Is Not”, Goleman argues that a participant's ability to answer the questions proved his/her EI prowess. There many limitations in this particular research. For instance, it is limited to people with no disabilities. Additionally, it is imprudent to consider people who are not able to identify emotions expressed in a picture as not emotionally intelligent.

Goleman and Salovey should have spent more time studying the relationship or link between emotional intelligence and managerialism. In the recent years many authors and researchers have made EI be perceived as the ability to control emotions. The proponents of these ideas pay more emphasis on avoiding heated discussions and conflicts. In contrast, EI is more about the ability to control your emotions and how you react when confronted with such situations. It is impossible to live in a world devoid of conflicts. Goleman states that emotional intelligence is not optimism, happiness or motivation as has been claimed by many journalistic articles in the past. Although such qualities are essential, it is imperative to note that qualities such as optimism and happiness have absolutely nothing to do with emotional intelligence.

In his article, Goleman calls out trained psychologists who have played a leading role in creating the misconception. He notes that it is unfortunate that renewed psychologists have confused EI with such traits. Emotional Intelligence Measures of Assessment One of the main criticisms that have been long been labeled against theoretical foundation of emotional intelligence is that EI is a true form of intelligence. I realized that nothing comes easy and I had to make a couple of sacrifices to succeed. B3: Summary and Reflection I experienced a lot of difficulties adhering to the timeline during the first week. For instance, concluding certain activities during the stipulated timeline was not only grueling but also challenging. Typically, I was used to doing things at my paced without having to worry about deadlines.

Although I experienced a couple of challenges, I was not going to give up. Other than decision making, self-awareness is critical in forming long lasting relationships in the workplace. Through this, a manger can negotiate relationships and drive employees towards achieving desired results. Appendix Comprehensive Journal detailing Experiences Reflections and Observations Week 1 What a week! I never had a moments rest. The first day of the week started my alarm clock blaring at exactly six in the morning. Although I did not want to wake up early, I was very excited about writing my morning pages. Healthy eating, regular exercise and mediation helped keep both my body and mind healthy. Mentoring! During my sessions with students at my former high school, they opened up to me how they react to various issues.