Top 10 Ways to Improve Emotional Intelligence

“Feelings are something you have; not something you are.” -Shannon L. Alder

Emotional intelligence can be defined as the ability to recognize and manage one emotion as well as understand and influence the emotions of people near you. Emotional intelligence was first recognized by researchers Peter Salovey and John Mayer in 1990 and was later popularized by Daniel Goleman, a famous psychologist.

The five key areas of emotional intelligence are self-regulation, empty motivation, self-awareness, and social skills. Emotional intelligence, also called emotional quotient, can be defined as the ability to interpret, control, evaluate, and receive emotions and use them to communicate effectively and constructively. It is highly important to work on emotional intelligence to be successful in life.

Key signs of emotional intelligence are:

The ability to recognize and understand someone’s feelings.
Awareness of one’s own strengths and weaknesses
Having self-confidence and self-acceptance
Ability to feel empathy and concern for others
Ability to accept responsibility for one’s own mistake and to let go of that mistake.

Below, we have created a list of the top 10 ways that will help you improve your emotional intelligence.

The Top 10 Ways to Improve Your Emotional Intelligence

Practice active listening.
Learn to empathize with others.
Respond rather than react.
Cultivate self-awareness.
Apologize directly if at fault.
Use an assertive style of communicating.
Practice emotional self-control.
Be approachable and sociable.
Cultivate resilience.
Take the critique well.

Practice active listening.

One of the top 10 ways to improve emotional intelligence is to practice active listening. Effective communication is an important part of emotional intelligence. It is said that one must listen twice as much as one speaks. It is important to practice active listening so that one can pay full attention to others, ensure healthy eye contact, and showcase a genuine interest in communication. This will help to recognize individual emotions.

Learn to empathize with others.

The next thing on our list regarding what an individual can do to improve emotional intelligence is to learn to empathize with others. Emotionally intelligent people show a great trait of emotional strength when it comes to understanding someone else’s feelings. It helps in creating mutual respect between two individuals with different opinions. It also helps in navigating conflict, strengthening relationships, and clearing consciousness, so it is very important to put oneself in someone else’s shoes for better perspective.

Respond rather than react.

One has to know that there is a difference between reacting and responding, and an emotionally intelligent person will always respond thoughtfully rather than react impulsively. It is highly important to stay calm during a stressful situation, take a few moments, understand your end goal, and respond after processing all the emotions consciously.

Cultivate self-awareness.

Another important thing on our list of the top 10 ways to improve your emotional intelligence is to cultivate self-awareness. An emotionally intelligent individual should first identify their own strengths, weaknesses, emotions, and triggers and take action to improve and channel those in a positive direction. This helps them gain knowledge regarding better management of emotion that will reflect on one’s thoughts and behavior.

Apologize directly if at fault.

Learn to accept mistakes and take responsibility for them, and an emotionally intelligent person will understand the importance of apologizing, as it helps to quickly build trust and resolve issues. When people blame others for their own mistakes, this tends to negatively impact trust and relationships. Admitting mistakes and apologizing directly for them is a sign of an emotionally intelligent person.

Use an assertive style of communicating.

Learning to communicate in an assertive style is a sign of an emotionally intelligent person, as assertive communication implies expressing your views in a very clear and direct form while respecting the views of the other party. It helps to reduce conflict while communicating.

Practice emotional self-control.

The next thing in the top 10 ways to improve your emotional intelligence is to practice emotional self-control. Learn to manage your emotions so that they do not impact your behavior. Recognizing negative emotions and finding a positive way to counter them. It will help to think rationally and to maintain composure even during hard times.

Be approachable and sociable.

The next thing on our list is to be approachable and sociable. A highly approachable individual has a positive smile and a healthy presence. They know how to utilize their social skills by understanding the feelings and perspectives of the people they are surrounded by.

Cultivate resilience.

Cultivating resilience is highly crucial to practice in order to maintain a positive attitude towards all situations. Emotionally intelligent people are very careful with their attitude towards a situation. Furthermore, they are highly skilled at controlling their attitude to ensure an optimistic outcome. Understanding the value of failures and learning from them rather than dwelling on them is the mindset of an emotionally intelligent individual. Resilience allows an individual to maintain a healthy and productive mindset.

Take the critique well.

The final way on our list of the top 10 ways to improve your emotional intelligence is to seek feedback and take it positively. It is important to accept and positively react to feedback, as this helps to grow your emotional intelligence. People with higher emotional intelligence believe in understanding the critics and how the feedback could positively contribute to their growth. Constructive criticism helps an individual gain knowledge about self-improvement and pushes them towards emotional growth.