Five Small Steps: One Giant Leap For Us All

Emotional Intelligence: What we were never taught in school!

Before continuing to read this blog, please just stop for a moment to remember all the various subject matter that you learned in school - Maths, English, Geography, History, Latin, Science, French, the list goes on and on and is all very informative and potentially useful as we grow into young adults with our lives and careers ahead of us - and yet, one colossal and vitally important subject is never really touched upon, ‘Ourselves’.

If we now stop to consider the number of touch points in our daily lives where having at least some understanding of psychology and the human mind could have helped us out, how many of us would hold up our hand and say, “I”? Our guess would be quite a few.

The vast majority of us have never learned or understood how to identify and deal with our own emotions, let alone the emotions of others! These skills are highly valuable and can be employed in every walk of life.

In a working environment, just think how often you are dealing with ‘different minded’ people from your colleagues to your clients; from your suppliers to your investors and so on. In a sporting context, how often do you relate to your coaches, your team mates, your support staff etc?

What you think, what you say, how you behave and react are paramount to each of those relationships working effectively and evolving efficiently. And yet, how often does our emotional bias or balance get in the way?

Emotional Intelligence is what we were never taught in school. It is a shorthand that psychological researchers use to describe how well individuals can manage their own emotions and react to the emotions of others.

People who exhibit a high level of emotional intelligence have the less obvious skills necessary to get ahead in life, such as appraising and responding to the needs of others, managing conflict and keeping their own emotions from overflowing and disrupting their lives.

So what exactly is Emotional Intelligence and how can we work on our own?

Emotional Intelligence has five key areas:

Self Awareness - this involves knowing your own feelings. It includes having an accurate assessment of what you’re capable of, when you need help and what your emotional triggers are.

Self Management - this involves being able to keep your emotions in check when they become disruptive. It includes being able to control outbursts, calmly discussing disagreements and avoiding activities that undermine you like extended self pity or panic.

Motivation - most people are motivated to action by rewards like money or status. Importantly, there are other ways such as personal joy, curiosity or simply the satisfaction of being productive.

Empathy - while the three previous categories refer to a person’s internal emotions, this one deals with the emotions of others. It is the skill and practice of identifying and understanding the emotions of others and responding appropriately.

Social Skills - this category involves the application of empathy as well as negotiating the needs of others with your own. This can include finding common ground with others, managing others in a work environment and being persuasive.

Let’s explore each of the above in slightly more detail showing how you can use them in your own day-to-day lives.

Self Awareness

Before you can do anything else, it is very important to understand your own emotions. Here are some ways to improve your self awareness:

Keep a journal - at the end of every day write down what happened to you, how you felt and how you dealt with it. Periodically, look back at your journal and take note of any trends or any time you overreacted to something.

Ask for input from others - when dealing with self-perception, input from others can be invaluable. Ask multiple people who know you well where your strengths and weaknesses lie. Write this feedback down and compare what each says, looking for patterns. MOST IMPORTANTLY, don’t argue with them. They don’t have to be correct, you are simply looking to gauge your perception from another’s point of view.

Slow down or meditate - emotions have a habit of getting out of control when we don’t use time to process them. Next time you have an emotional reaction to someone or something, pause before you continue. Correct breathing exercises can really help.

Self Management

Once you understand how your emotions work, you can start figuring out how to handle them. This involves controlling your outbursts, distinguishing between external triggers and internal overreactions and doing what’s best for your needs.

Change your sensory input - you’ve probably heard of the ‘count from one to ten’ or ‘just take a deep breath’ advice? Well if that works for you then brilliant. However, we suggest giving your physical body a jolt to break the cycle such as a ‘snap out of it’ slap. A shock to the system or breaking the existing routine will help.

You can’t always control what makes you feel a certain way, emotions are built into us for a reason. What you can do, however, is control how you react to them. If your emotional reactions tend to be impulsive, it is possible to work closely with someone who understands the psychology and has experience of dealing with this in order to help.

Motivation

Here we are talking about your inner drive to accomplish something. There is a section of our brain that literally lights up at the mere thought of achieving a meaningful goal. When your motivation is working for you it connects with reality in tangible ways.

Want to start a family? You start dating. Want to improve your career? You start educating yourself, angling for a promotion or applying for new jobs.

In order for motivation to work, you have to first identify your own values and what is truly important to you. Often we do things that directly contradict what we actually value for so long that we end up losing motivation entirely. Sound familiar?

There are many strategies that will help you identify your values. Once again, it can often be worth using the assistance of someone with knowledge and experience in this field to help out.

Empathy

Your emotions are only one half of all your relationships. It’s the half that you focus on the most because you have to hang out with yourself every day :-)

Empathy is your most important skill when navigating relationships. It is a life-long skill but there are a few ways to focus:

Be quiet and listen - there is a reason we were given two eyes, two ears and just one mouth! You can’t physically experience anyone else’s lives to fully understand them but you can listen. Put aside your pre-conceptions or skepticism for a bit and allow the person you are with room to speak.

Take up a contrary position of your own - for the sake of the discussion, take up the view of either the second or third person perspective. If you think your boss is being unreasonable, defend their actions in your head. This can really help with your thought process.

Don’t just know, look to understand - understanding is the difference between knowing something and truly empathising with it. Take a little time to digest another person’s information or standpoint before responding.

Social Skills

Let’s look at one of the most common forms of social skills, resolving a disagreement:

Identify and deal with your emotions - when things get heated, people become emotionally worked up. It is always worth taking time out to yourself, blow off the necessary steam and then return to the problem. This may just mean sounding off to a work colleague before you reply to a particular email or chatting to a close friend before actioning something.

Address legitimate problems once you’re both calm - once you are in the right head space, establish exactly what the issue is and make sure you BOTH agree on it. Then propose solutions that are mutually beneficial.

End on a cooperative note - whether in business or pleasure, relationships work best when everyone is on the same page. Even if you can’t end on a positive note ensure that your last communication is a cooperative one. Indicate that you would like to aim towards the same goal.

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A Game Changer says…

Learning about and truly understanding Emotional Intelligence has to be one of the singularly most important and inspiring skills we can ever acquire.

Our thoughts, our language and our behaviour play such a vital part in every day life. Being able to tune into another person’s feelings and understand how they think about things, how they see the world and how their views can be different is massively important.

Our abilities as human beings know no bounds. We are often ‘beating that’ or ‘conquering this’ but in this ever changing world that we live in, it is our knowledge, understanding and generosity of spirit towards each other that surely is crucial in how we establish better rapport and communication going forward in so very many areas of society.

It can be done, it can be achieved. All these skills can be learned in life. We can improve upon any of them if we care but it takes time, effort and perseverance.

The Complexity Of Motivation

“The moment money becomes your motivation, you are immediately NOT AS GOOD as someone who is stimulated by PASSION and INTERNAL WILL”

- Sebastian Vettel, four-time Formula One World Champion

Motivation is part of daily life. We are motivated to eat when we are hungry; motivated to sleep when we are tired and motivated to work so we can pay our bills!

Motivation influences us every day. It can, however, be complicated and it can also change over time.

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Many years ago I experienced this exact scenario when playing cricket. I had been a cricketer since the age of 8 and had always loved the game. I had participated in every school team available and had then continued playing the game into my early twenties. It was a passion.

One day, following a few months injury lay off, I found that I did not have the appetite to play. I had lost the hunger, the excitement and the passion to compete; to turn up to practice early. I started to consider other things I could do with my day, like spend it with my girlfriend perhaps?!

At first I couldn’t understand why I was feeling this way. This was a sport I had loved for years, one that I was passionate about and was reasonably good at. After a few weeks churning it all around in my head, I suddenly understood how this feeling had come about.

During my absence with injury, I had been receiving regular phone calls checking up and encouraging me to come back as soon as possible. Whilst this is totally understandable, what had happened in my head was I had started to believe that it was the club’s external influence that was now in control of me playing and that the decision wasn’t mine any more. I had lost all motivation to play.

Following my recovery from injury, it took a further two months before going back to playing again. I had to rediscover that it was still my choice to play before I was ready to return. I needed to remind myself of my love for the game and re-connect with my inner drive.

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Motivation is complex because there are many factors that can influence it. What motivates one person might be different to what motivates another. One person may play rugby because all their older siblings played; another person may play rugby because it’s who they are and their love of the sport.

One triathlete races because having a race to train for is incentive to get in their workouts. Another triathlete races because of their love of the culture, identification of being a triathlete and want of shaving minutes off their time.

Most of us have multiple motivational factors that compel us to participate in something.

Motivation affects every part of our performance. When we are feeling unmotivated it can affect everything. Here are a few examples:

- it can affect your desire to practice, making you less prepared

- it can be a strain on relationships, making it difficult to communicate effectively

- it can knock you off course, derailing your goals and your performance

- it can make you feel like you can’t handle any obstacles in your way

- it can stunt your creativity

- it can severely affect how you feel about yourself

- it can affect your enjoyment levels

Motivation drives our behaviour. It forces us to act because we either want something or we don’t want something. We want good grades so we can arrive at the college of our choice; so we are motivated to go to class. We want to win that next big pitch; so we are motivated to research, prepare and rehearse thoroughly for it. We want to perform well in competition; so we are motivated to practice and train well.

In a sporting context, athletes often become romanticised by the notion that having enough ‘love for the game’ can overcome anything. However, there are many factors that contribute to an athlete’s level of motivation and it is not quite as simple as that.

Motivation fluctuates, and that is normal, but being aware of when our motivational level is low is important.

There are two sources that underlie motivation and three factors that influence motivation. Let’s take a look at the sources first.

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Internal versus External

Internal motivation is the desire that comes from inside us.

Internal motivation is our inner drive. This is where our love and passion comes from. This is what causes our eyes to light up and our body to sharpen when asked about our love of our job; our family; our sport or our hobby. 

When we have internal motivation we participate because we enjoy the activity. We participate because we like the process of learning about our activity and improving our skills and abilities. We enjoy the way it feels to overcome challenges and we even learn to embrace the things we don’t like about our activity because it’s all part of the journey.

When our inner drive is strong, we can still become frustrated by mistakes or a ‘bad day,’ but those disappointments don’t last long and they fuel us to work harder instead of derailing us and taking away our belief in ourselves.

External motivation is when we are influenced to participate by things outside of us. When we are externally motivated we are often driven because of positive feedback we received or negative consequences we want to avoid.

We may participate for external rewards such as receiving compliments or recognition; winning championships and trophies; making friends; receiving scholarships or salaries etc.

We may also participate to avoid a negative consequence such as being dropped from the team if we don’t go to practice; being pulled up by our company if we don’t stay in the office beyond 6pm; doing our rehab exercises so not to re-injure ourselves etc.

External motivation is what originates outside of us. External motivators are all the other reasons you want to do something other than for the pure joy of participating.

Playing a sport because it is something we love doing is internal motivation; playing a sport because it can keep us fit is external motivation; starting up our own business because we love the concept of being our own boss and challenging ourselves to succeed is internal motivation; starting up our own business because our three best friends have done it is external motivation; practising our hobby because we wish to improve is internal motivation; practising our hobby because we should be ‘seen to be doing one’ is external motivation.

Now you may be thinking, “Well I have some of both.” This is perfectly normal and the vast majority of us do.

The relationship between our internal and external motivation can be tricky. There are times when external motivators can be beneficial to our internal motivation and times when those same external motivators can end up negatively impacting our internal motivation.

External motivators aren’t ‘bad’; it’s when they compromise our internal motivation that we can run into trouble.

For an athlete who loves participating in their sport but doesn’t like going to weight training, external motivation can be a great tool for getting there. The athlete may not be internally motivated to lift weights but they will be externally motivated to do so, due to the positive impact it will have on their performance and continued participation.

External motivation starts to cause trouble when:

A. We are only externally motivated

B. We perceive our external motivators to be controlling

If we only participate because of the recognition we get, what happens if that recognition isn’t forthcoming?

In music and in sport there are certain roles that tend to receive more spotlight than others. If we are bass guitarist in a band or a defender in a football team, we may not get as much attention as the lead singer or striker.

If the only reason we play music or football is for the glory and accolades and we’re not getting them, guess what happens to our motivation? If, however, we play bass guitar or play defence because we enjoy it and want to improve, then guess what happens to our motivation when we aren’t getting any love?

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So if Internal and External are the two main sources of motivation, the three main factors that influence it are:

- feeling we are skilled or unskilled at something

- feeling in control or out of control of our decision making

- feeling we belong or don’t belong

These three factors can either facilitate or wreak havoc with our motivation.

Do I Feel Capable?

Our feelings about our capability will strongly influence our level of motivation. If we believe that we are good at or can be good at something, then that belief will positively affect our motivation.

Our motivation is firmly tied to our beliefs, therefore our beliefs influence which direction we choose to go.

Often, when people assume that someone has a lack of motivation, what they actually lack is confidence. We all want to be good at something so if we try a new activity and manage to improve, our brain sends the signal ‘Hey I’m good at this, I worked at it and I got better.’

Seeing ourselves improve means we will be far more motivated to continue.

Do I Feel In Control?

When we perceive that involvement in something is not through choice, it also affects our motivation.

We need to know that we are free to do as we choose. Take away that control and we compromise our internal motivation.

Nothing stresses us out more than the feeling of being powerless. It is important, however, to assess whether we truly are powerless or if it’s just our perception of having no control.

Once the power is in your own hands your motivation will be stronger.

Do I Feel Connected?

The final factor is a social one. Feeling like you belong or that you are part of something is important. On a basic level, as humans we have an innate desire to be connected to others.

We want to have a value and a reason to be.

There are different elements that influence whether or not we feel connected - receiving positive and evaluative feedback; having friends around; being surrounded by others who are motivated; having a support system in place.

All of these can help facilitate our own internal motivation. If we don’t feel connected, we won’t be as motivated to play a part.

A Game Changer Says…

If we have passion for what we do but feel there are other motivational influences controlling us, it can be detrimental to our overall motivation.

Feeling controlled by external motivators can make us feel angry and resentful, frustrated and concerned, taking all the motivation out of us.

However, those same external motivators can also be complimentary to our motivation so long as we have a strong internal drive and belief in our ability and/or what we want to do!

The key questions to ask ourselves whenever we want to know if we have any internal motivation for something are ‘Am I having fun?’ ‘Do I enjoy what I’m doing?’

The purpose of this blog is to explain exactly what motivation is and the complexities of it. It is there to be referred to and utilised going forward for any department of life.

For businesses, think of how and who you may employ or why you do or don't perform certain actions; for athletes think of which sport(s) gives you that ultimate thrill and drive to be better; for individuals think of what makes you tick or makes you happy.

There are so many areas in life where careful consideration around motivation can help us with our choices.

Remember, whatever the situation or task at hand, if we can say to ourselves “Yes I feel capable. Yes, I feel in control. Yes, I feel connected” then it will positively impact our internal motivation and ultimately our success.

When our internal motivation is strong, our external motivators will be more likely to compliment our motivation. When our internal motivation is high, we are less likely to be derailed by various thoughts, challenges or setbacks.

At times it can be difficult for us to ascertain precisely why our motivation is low, however, there are various exercises and tools available to help with this.