On 1/22/2011, while waiting for my daughter’s art lesson, I was reading Scientific American Mind magazine, issue Jan-Feb 2011. There is one article on habit-forming.

It is a research first published in European Journal of Social Psychology, carried out by Phillippa Lally of University College of London. She asked 96 undergraduates to form a habit in 12 weeks by repeating a healthy behavior.

The results of her study suggest that habits take much longer to form than researchers previously thought (an average of nine and a half weeks and potentially as long as several months).

Yet, as with enhancing our emotional intelligence and changing characteristic traits that are given at birth, no matter how hard it is, it is possible. A new habit can be formed as long as we keep up doing it. We just need to prepare for some hard work involved in habit-forming.

According to a Chinese saying, it is easy to change a landscape than to change a person’s nature. Though the saying is often used in a negative sense, I have for a long time inclined to accept it. The belief implies that a person’s personality and temperament come with his birth and will remain unchanged throughout his life.

The course on developing our emotional intelligence has made me a disbeliever of this age-old saying. We are more the products of nurture, our growing-up experience than of nature. Our experience can not only change the way we think and how we think, but also the physiological makeup of our brain, which will lead to the change in our temperament, making it possible to mold us into whatever human-being that we wish to be.

Second skill, harnessing emotions productively. This requires monitoring self-talk to catch any internal negative messages. It also means taking time to understand what is behind your feelings and finding ways to handle fear, anxiety, anger, sadness and any negative and energy-draining ones.

Third skill, reading emotions in others. This involves practice in taking another person’s perspective. You must first appreciate the differences in how people feel about things, work on listening effectively and asking a lot of questions, and recognizing your own reactions to what people say and do.

Being able to control the urge to focus solely on self and to control negative impulses offers a vast array of benefits to the individual and to society as a whole. These emotional intelligence skills open the path to empathy and listening, which in turn lead to caring and compassion. This dynamic combination breeds tolerance and acceptance of differences, increase mutual respect, and creates the possibility of fulfilling personal and professional relationships.

Very often people with high IQ fail in life as the result of their underdeveloped or failure to develop their emotional intelligence. They provide sad lessons for us all. After these postings, the first and final message is this: becoming emotionally intelligent is the key to lifelong success.

P.S. I love these courses offered freely by our company. As we merge with an academic institute, I look forward to more opportunities of this nature.

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Educating emotions: Key to Your Success
A person with high emotional intelligence is self-disciplined, leads a virtuous life, is able to motivate and guide himself personally and professionally, has the ability to delay gratification, control and channel his urges, will, appetites, and passions, knows how to do right by himself and others, possesses “character.”

Character is the essence of emotional intelligence. Character is made up of these three skills:
First skill, practicing emotional self-awareness is essential in educating the emotions and building character.
—recognizing and naming emotions. This requires building a vocabulary for feelings so that when an emotion is experienced, you are able to label that emotion appropriately. e.g. anger, frustration, hurt.
—understanding the causes of feelings, which means dedicating yourself to observing your own behavior and recognize the feelings that various situations elicit. e.g. when someone treats you with indifference, do you give up or try harder to get them to notice you?
—recognizing the difference between feelings and actions. There is a big difference between thought and action. To become more emotionally self-award, you must understand the relationship between your thoughts and reactions. When you examine your actions, pay attention to whether your thoughts or feelings are ruling.

Problems associated with emotional illiteracy:
The fourth problem is aggressive behavior. While admittedly withdrawal is probably the most common social problem that may be caused by emotional illiteracy, aggression is likely the most troublesome. Aggressive behavior includes the following.
(a) Interpreting neutral acts as threats. Their aggressive behavior is based on a perceptual bias that causes them to be highly sensitive to what they perceive as unfair treatment. Consequently, even neutral acts appear to be threats.

(b) Aggressive person tends to jump to judgment, causing him to pay too little attention to what is really happening. Once that assumption is made, the person moves into action.

(c) Low emotional tolerance: aggressive individuals have low emotional tolerance, and get irritated more often by little things. Once upset, they see all acts as hostile and begin concentrating on how to strike back.

(d) Perceptual biases toward hostility are in place at an early age. Aggressive children are often rejected by their peers and are unable to make friends easily. These children are most at risk for eventual committing violent crimes.

Problems associated with emotional illiteracy:
The second problem is depression. Although there are many causes for depression, including biochemical imbalances, depression may also be caused by emotional illiteracy. People with depression often suffer from
(a) being lonely
(b) having many fears and worries
(c) needing to be perfect
(d) feeling unloved
(e) feeling nervous
(f) being sad

The third problem is attention or thinking problems. These problem often display themselves through nervous or overly active behavior.
(a) They have difficulty sitting still and very often they feel too nervous to concentrate or get his mind focused on the issues at hand.
(b) Or they are daydreaming constantly, having difficulty getting his mind off a topic and often act without thinking.

Problems associated with low emotional intelligence:
The first problem is withdrawal. This is probably the most common social problem that results from a lack of emotional intelligence. While everyone needs a certain amount of ‘alone time’, people who are severely lacking in emotional intelligence take this idea to the extreme.

Here’s a person’s journey from “alone time” to more severe problem.
“I started off just preferring to be alone, but after a while, I wasn’t able to function normally when surrounded by other people. I found them bothersome, as opposed to enjoying the interaction.

Next, I noticed that I didn’t want to tell anyone anything. I was overly secretive, and I felt I couldn’t trust anyone. Consequently, I had trouble developing relationships. As a result of having no connections and being withdrawn, I began to sulk a lot. I was really feeling sorry for myself.

Then, I had an overall drop in energy. I was never up. I constantly complained of being tired or overwhelmed. Feeling unhappy became an acceptable state for me. Since I spent so little time with other people, I began to lose my perspective and viewed life with a self-imposed negative bias.

Finally, I found myself overly dependent upon drugs and alcohol, which only served to make me more withdrawn.”

Humans are primed by genetics to respond to situations in either a generally positive or generally negative way. However, innate predispositions can be molded and changed through experience.

Specific brain functions and their effects on temperament:
Brain wave patterns can classify people as tending toward a morose or upbeat temperament. e.g. Adam has a cheerful temperament and the ability to bounce back from setbacks. This is due to greater activity in the LEFT frontal lobe. Opposite to Adam, Emma has a tendency toward melancholy and negativity. This is due to higher levels of activity in the RIGHT frontal lobe.

The good thing is emotional experiences can actually change the neural circuitry in the brain, affecting ingrained temperament. e.g. a boy was fearful of water. His mom helped him overcome his fear by participating in swimming lessons. This gave his neural circuits a chance to build new pathways that superseded the existing fear-of-water ones.

Psychotherapy or emotional relearning can accomplish the same thing and transcend ingrained temperaments by reshaping brain functions.

Here’s a special note to parents: Brain patterns affecting temperament are most easily changed in childhood. That is, nurture can change nature. This is very encouraging!

The interconnection of genetics and temperament.
Genetics and temperament influence the level of one’s emotional intelligence in a variety of ways.
(1) A higher rate of activity in the amygdala is associated with timidity and fearfulness.
(2) Brain wave patterns classify individuals as tending toward cheerfulness or melancholy.
(3) Overly sensitive and fearful children often grow into shy adults.

As all parents can attest, every baby is different. Some are naturally easy and seldom cry, while others are easily upset. These early indications of temperament often stick for life — the easy and bold babies become social and popular adults, while the timid and fearful babies grow into shy, anxious and timid adults.

Genetics do affect emotional literacy. Every individual is “hard wired” with a genetic predisposition for a certain temperament. However, while temperament has a biological basis, it can be altered.

(a) Genetic response to stress:
Timid babies exhibit greater reactions to stress than bold babies; their hearts beat faster when faced with strange situations. They treat any new person or circumstance as a threat.

(b) Amygdala activity and temperament:
The amygdala of a timid baby is more easily aroused than that of a bold baby; the nervous system activates the amygdala more quickly. On the other hand, the amygdala of an outgoing baby is less excitable; the nervous system has a higher threshold before activating the amygdala.

(c) Parental influence on temperament:
Parents can moderate a timid baby’s fearfulness by settling firm limits and insisting on obedience. Parents who are lenient and indirect with timid babies tend to reinforce their fearfulness, making it more difficult for them to become outgoing adults. This is so true, as I have witnessed cases of timid babies being pampered into timid, shy and unhappy adults.

Hope and optimism: the third and fourth characteristics that contribute to emotional competence. Recent research shows that hope is a crucial element in a vast array of abilities. In everything from taking tests to handling a difficult boss, hope is more than just a vague belief. It has been discovered that hope gives people confidence that they have the will and the means to achieve the goals. In terms of emotional intelligence, hope plays a role in not giving into defeat, depression, setbacks, or anxiety. People with hope have less emotional stress.

Optimism is an extension of hope. If hope is not giving into defeat, depression, setbacks, or anxiety, then optimism is the attitude that goes along with it.
–Optimism protects people from apathy and depression.
–Optimistic people see failure as an event they can overcome
–Optimism prevents people from blaming failures on person traits

Martin Seligman’s study of insurance salesmen is one of the greatest examples of the power of optimism. Seligman discovered that new salesmen who were naturally optimistic sold 37% more than those who were pessimistic. The difference was attributed to what happened when rejected. The pessimistic salesman interprets “no” personally–”I’m a failure.” The optimistic one interprets “no” quite differently–”I need to try a new approach.”

Mood manipulation: the second characteristic that contribute to emotional competence.
Even small mood changes can color a person’s ability to think clearly.
(1) Good moods actually enhance a person’s ability to think and solve problem. Laughing frees up one’s creativity and promotes one’s ability to see complex relationships and consequences. Joking can actually help one think through a problem.

(2) Studies show that problems are more likely to be solved by someone who’s just had a good laugh. After watching a show about television bloopers, a person is better able to find alternative solutions to a problem that was weighing heavily on his mind before.

(3) When making important decisions, it is preferable to be in a good mood. It helps one think more positively and comprehensively. One considers the pros and cons, recalls positive events, and is more likely to make a sound decision when one is upbeat.

(4) When a person is in a bad mood and try to make decisions, he can only recall the negative. He finds that he is overly cautious, and his emotions cause him to make decisions based on his fear.

Continue with marshmallow experiment and impulse control:
The interest part about the experiment is its follow-up phase.

First of all, there is a behavior difference– when researchers followed up on Mischel’s test group 14 years later, there was a marked difference between the group that took the marshmallow and the group that was able to delay gratification. The children who had been able to control their impulses at age 4 were found to be more socially competent adolescents. These children were also more self-assertive and demonstrated more competence in handling frustration, stress, and pressure.

Secondly, on their ability to face challenge, this research found that the group of children with gratification-delay ability were better able to face challenges and were more likely to be relentless in their pursuit of valued goals. On the other hand, the children without impulse control were more easily upset and put off by frustrations.

Thirdly, regarding personal traits, the 4-year-olds who resisted the treat displayed more personal integrity than those who couldn’t wait. Qualities like trustworthiness, self-assertiveness, dependability, social competence, and self-reliance were evident in these individuals. The marshmallow-grabbing group had fewer of these qualities.

Fourthly, even more significant is the fact that impulse control is a strong predictor of lifelong success, signifying the ability to identify situations in which delay and resisting temptation would be beneficial in achieving goals.

Lastly, on their mental ability– Mischel’s research proved that the ability to control impulses when focusing on a goal is the essence of emotional competency. His findings clearly identify emotional intelligence as a critical factor in using other mental abilities to the greatest capacity.

Impulse Control: Key to Emotional Competency
Characteristics that contribute to emotional competency include
(a) impulse control
(b) mood manipulation
(c) hope
(d) optimism

Psychologist Walter Mischel started the famous Stanford marshmallow experiment in 1972. Working with 4-year-old children on the Stanford University campus preschool, he used a model to evaluate the importance of emotional intelligence. The children were promised two marshmallow as a treat if they could wait until someone returned from an errand. If the child couldn’t wait until then, the child could have only one immediately.

The choice made by these children became a telling tale about emotional intelligence and about one of the basic characteristics associated with emotional intelligence — impulse control.

Impulse control is one of the several characteristics that predict and measure emotional intelligence. It is often considered the core of emotional self-management. This is probably because emotions by nature call for action or response. For up to 20 minutes, some children hid their eyes, sang, played games, and talked to themselves while waiting for the two-marshmallow reward. However, other children took the one marshmallow almost immediately after the facilitator left the room.
More on this experiment tomorrow…

Negative effects of anxiety
Anxiety is a strictly negative experience. Anxiety focuses attention solely on the issue at hand and drives the mind to obsession. This leads to an endless cycle with no hope of resolution, causing inflexibility and unrealistic perceptions. Just imagine yourself trapped in the narrow corner of a cow’s horn.

Characteristic, damages and ending of anxiety
(a) Physiological reactions: sweating, a racing heart, and muscle tension
(b) Limits creative solutions: it prevents a worried person from shifting his mind away from his worries, limiting his ability to develop creative solutions.
(c) Ruminate on danger: causes a person to review again and again dangers of all kinds–even things that have no chance of happening. They see trouble or opponents at every corner.
(d) Addicted to anxiety: if a person chronically worries about problems that rarely happen, he may attribute their nonoccurrence to his obsessing about them.

Self-awareness:
The first step in minimizing anxiety is self-awareness, which means training yourself to identify situations that trigger worry, images that prompt worry, and sensations that signal anxiety in the body.

Challenge troubling thoughts:
Once aware of anxious thoughts, the next step in eliminating anxiety is to actively challenge troubling thoughts. This involves questioning assumptions and maintaining a healthy skepticism toward the probability of occurrence.

Positive effects of worry
Sometimes, worry can serve a very useful purpose. Some of the aspects of worry that at first seem negative can actually produce positive results. Worries usually escalate from thought to thought within seconds. These thoughts are a steady progression of verbal expressions of concern, but seldom include images.

(a) When danger is sensed, worry allows you to assess your options, rehearse methods for dealing with them, and reflect upon desired outcomes

(b) Catastrophizing is the process of imagining a worst-case scenario; it produces a series of terrible thoughts without a visual component. Because catastrophizing is expressed only as thoughts, not images, it does not leave a lasting impression.

(c) Worry can suppress the physiological effects of anxiety. When faced with anxiety, an individual launches into a train of distressing thoughts. Meanwhile, anxious sensations, like a racing heartbeat, can be lessened because the mind is distracted from the original triggering thought.

Worry and anxiety
If at some point you have been obsessed with a minor issue, making a mountain out of a molehill and you cannot get it out of your mind, you are being consumed and controlled by energy-draining anxiety. Ability to handle and free yourself from your consuming anxiety will not only enhance your productivity but also improve your social relations.

Although the perception of worry has been quite negative, not all worry is bad. Worrying can assist you in reflecting upon and developing positive solutions to problems. On the other hand, chronic worry creates a cycle of anxiety and unproductive obsessive thoughts.

Difference between worry and anxiety
Worry and anxiety are two points on a continuum. When a troublesome thought triggers the emotional brain, worry kicks in. Initially, this may generate constructive reflection. However, further down the continuum, it becomes chronic. Your worry functions as a rehearsal for what may go wrong and provides a risk-free opportunity to evaluate solutions. Your anxiety produces tunnel vision, causing you to be obsessed with a single negative outcome for the problem at hand, which often leads to a dead end.

Anger Management, part II
There are some common misconceptions about anger. Contrary to popular belief, venting anger does little or nothing to dissipate it. Actually, venting is one of the worst ways to cool off after an outburst. It fuels the brain’s emotional arousal and leaves people feeling more angry, not less. The right anger management is to defuse it by early intervention.

There are three types of intervention that can lessen or eliminate anger. In fact, any anger mood can be sidestepped altogether if caught in its earliest stage. Don’t wait till it is too late. For example, a man has just blown up at his boss. As his anger escalated, he couldn’t think straight and was oblivious to the consequences of any actions he might take. At this point, it became very difficult for him to defuse.

(1) Challenge the thoughts that spark the anger. This is most effective when undertaken at early or moderate levels of anger. Once enraged, a person is no longer capable of rational thought–only of revenge and reprisal.

(2) Distraction–it is useful for diminishing an angry mood. TV, movie or reading can take your mind off the hostile thoughts. But shopping or eating may worsen anger by allowing you to dwell on the triggering situation.

(3) Physical activity–you can deflate anger by engaging in a physical activity, especially by yourself. Deep breathing and relaxation exercises are also effective.

Anger Management, part I
With the exception of people with high emotional intelligence, most people have the hardest time controlling their anger. When you let anger get the best of you, anger fuels actions which you will soon regret. You let angry feelings overtake rational thought and escalate out of control.

Anger creates a dual response in the body with short-term but lasting effects. The initial reaction is the “fight or flight” syndrome–the body senses a threat and prepares itself for possible attack. At the same time, the brain sends a signal that heightens sensitivity to subsequent events.

Physiologically, when angry feelings are triggered, the brain sends a rush of energy throughout the body. This surge lasts several minutes while the brain assesses the situation. Meanwhile, the nervous system is put on general alert–a state of readiness that lasts for hours or even days. This persistent state of arousal explains why people get angry more quickly if they have already been provoked. The nervous system remains ready for any subsequent threats. Thus, anger builds on anger.

In order to be self-aware, you can try the following:
(1) Step back from the situation or the provoking experience and observe what is happening. Very often, distance yourself from it provides you the space and time to take a fresh look at the situation.

(2) Gain control over ourselves so that we will not be controlled by our emotion. It takes a lot of constant efforts to control our urge to act stupidly when in anger. But you will see the benefit of these efforts as soon as your stormy anger is over.

(3) Remain positive. When you are clear about your own boundaries and options, you will feel good psychologically and can maintain an overall positive outlook on life. Always try to put things in a long range perspective.

(4) Recognize your own feeling. This recognition signifies that you want to feel otherwise.

There are varying degrees of self-awareness. However, when taken to extremes, emotional awareness can be troubling. For some people, awareness is overwhelming; for others, it barely exists. People who are overly tuned to their emotions can increase the intensity and severity of their reactions to stressful situations and easily become engulfed and going to the first style.

People who use distraction to avoid tuning in to their emotions tend to be less aware of how they react to stressful situations. Therefore, their experiences tend to be less significant. Keep in mind that some degrees of emotional self-awareness is crucial to emotional intelligence.

There are three distinctive styles that people use for dealing with their emotions, ranging from low to high emotional intelligence.

(1) Feeling engulfed, the style of people with low emotional intelligence
When people are engulfed by their emotions, they often feel like they have no control over their mood. They surrender to their emotion and let their emotions run wild and are prone to overacting and thinking the worst. They are the ones who will freak out, be frustrated, going crazy, with blood flooding to their heads, leaving no room or any possibility of clear thinking.

(2) Being accepting
People who accept their emotions passively do little to change how they feel. They are aware of their feelings, but they either don’t believe they can or aren’t willing to do anything about them. There are two types of acceptors: Type I is the person who is always in a good mood and has no need or motivation to change. Whatever will happen happens and I don’t care. Type II is the person who is always in a bad mood. Though he accepts it, he does nothing about it.

(3) Being self-aware, the most desirable style, the style of people with high emotional intelligence
They are self-aware and have conscious thoughts about their moods as they experience them and has the ability to get out of a bad mood.

Life is by nature full of ups and downs, beyond our control, with people in our lives as diverse as birds in forests. Like it or not, you spend much of your life attempting to manage your moods and feelings.

High emotional intelligence equals to emotional balance and well-managed appropriate emotional response. The essence of managing emotions is the ability to cultivate emotional responses in a variety of settings and to keep your emotions balanced by restraining excess emotions. People with high emotional intelligence are able to deal with situations that provoke highly intensive emotions so that these situations can be solved successfully and crisis can be defused.

The take-home message is we need to understand the value and necessity of achieving emotional balance.
(1) Ability to manage emotion is a critical skill in becoming emotionally intelligent.
(2) Managed emotion enables you to limit the effects of anger and worry.
(3) Managed emotion helps you achieve balance.

Anger and fear are part of a spectrum of emotions. Other emotions that trigger different physiological responses are love and happiness, surprise, disgust, and sadness. Keep in mind that although people don’t always display their emotions, the underlying physiological reaction is present.

Core emotions and their impacts on us are:
(1) Love and happiness–are exhibited by a general sense of calmness and contentment. Brain signals inhibit negative feelings and foster an increase in energy.

(2) Disgust–is the primitive human’s attempt to resist a noxious odor or spit out a poisonous food.

(3) Sadness–produces a decrease in energy and enthusiasm and slows the body’s metabolism. It is often accompanied by a flow of fears.

(4) Surprise–the body responds to surprise by lifting the eyebrows to permit more light to reach the retina and allow a wide range of view.

This met primitive humans’ needs to assess the unexpected event and create a plan for action. Physical reactions have been implanted in the nervous system since primitive times. While they originally served as a survival mechanism, in modern society these emotions can obscure rational thinking and cloud judgment.

Here’s how emotions function and the physiological responses to anger, fear, love, happiness, surprise, and disgust and sadness. Each emotion is an impulse to act, to either “fight or flight.” Every emotion has a unique role in preparing the body for some type of response.

One of the strongest ones people feel is anger. When a person is angry, blood flows to the hands. The original purpose in primitive time was to facilitate grasping a weapon–the “fight” response. Also, in anger, the heart rate increase, and there is a rush of adrenaline that creates a surge of energy for intense action–the adrenaline response.

Closely aligned with anger is fear–the “flight” response. A rush of hormones puts the body on general alert, causing it to freeze temporarily and then making it ready for action. Blood flows away from the face and to the large muscles, making it easier to run.

Responses like these allowed primitive humans to concentrate on the threat at hand and decide whether to hide or flee. These physiological responses still occur, even though modern culture doesn’t normally require such actions.

To identify your “fight or flight” response, consider how you might react if someone unexpectedly started banging on your car window while you were waiting at a stoplight. You’d probably freeze momentarily, grip the wheel a little tighter, and quickly begin evaluating your options.

This is a course provided by our company, with the purpose of enhancing our emotional intelligence. I found the course specially useful for parents. Many Chinese parents tend to emphasize the weight of IQ in their children and neglect the development of their emotional intelligence. I remember one Chinese parent telling me that her son had a very high IQ, yet that son of hers has been unsuccessful whichever way you look at, all because of his under-developed emotional intelligence. Hence I have taken lengthy notes and will share with my readers in the days to come.

IQ includes verbal comprehension, number facility, spatial ability, memory, perception, and reasoning. IQ measures a person’s intellectual ability and generally remains steady throughout life. It contributes to about 20 percent of the factors that determine life success. Traits exhibited by a person with a high IQ include a wide intellectual capacity and range of interests, confidence and fluency in expressing thoughts and opinions, a tendency to be anxious and to worry, and a critical nature.

Emotional intelligence is comprised of a broad range of abilities including awareness of one’s own emotions, the ability to regulate moods, the recognition of emotions in others, the abilities to motivate oneself in the face of frustration, the ability to control impulses and delay gratification, and the ability to empathize. Emotional intelligence contributes to about 80 percent of the factors that predict life success.

A person with high emotional intelligence is poised, outgoing, and cheerful, and has empathy for others, expresses his feelings directly but appropriately, and has a capacity for developing relationships. Emotional intelligence is a more accurate predictor of life success than IQ is. Fortunately, it is a skill that can be developed more readily than pure intellectual abilities.

I am going to devote 22 postings on this topic, all in the month of March. Hence, call it emotional intelligence month.

CNN’s Rick Sanchez, “I’m telling you that everybody who runs CNN is a lot like Stewart, and a lot of people who run all the other networks are a lot like Stewart, and to imply that somehow they, the people in this country who are Jewish, are an oppressed minority? Yeah.”

Now, he got to pay a heavy price for such inflammatory comment. CNN responded with this a statement saying Sanchez “is no longer with the company. We thank Rick for his years of service and we wish him well.”

Of course, Sanches put up a fight defending himself by blaming it to a transient state of extreme emotion and exhaustion from overwork. This will not buy him any sympathy.

A Chinese saying goes, “When in drunk, whatever a man utters is true.” Why? Because he is off guard and is not careful about what he should and should not say. The same can be said of the moment when Sanchez babbled out statements of high ineptness.

When we are sober, we have a well-functioning filtering system so that we can consciously say and do the right thing. But our true self will come out when the filter system is down. Isn’t that scary?

The only sure way to avoid Sanchez’ embarrassment is this — never let the thought take root deep down inside you.

Last Friday, 10/1, while I was waiting for my daughter’s skating lesson, I had a nice chat with a friend of mine, which once again emphasized the importance of being considerate. Here are two points that I want my children to learn.

(1) Never argue with a driver. Remember your life is hinged on the hands of the driver. Anything unexpected could happen if the driver gets mad and excited beyond self-control during an argument.

(2) Give other person a chance to let off steam, if there is a legitimate reason for him to feel so. Do not focus on the way he expresses himself or attempt to illegitimate his expression. Remember it gives him an unspeakably ill feeling if he feels wronged and is not allowed to express it the way he is justified.

This is part of the leadership workshop that I attended from workplace. I can’t agreed more with what I have learned regarding the significance of emotional intelligence. Here are the notes from the lesson.

For many years, people have believed that your IQ determines your destiny. Not so according to a new behavioral research. The research shows that IQ provides, at best, a narrow view of human intelligence. Factors such as self-awareness, impulse control, persistence, zeal, self-motivation, empathy, and social deftness contribute greatly to an individual’s success. These qualities, termed “emotional intelligence,” often determine if people excel in life, relationships, and the workplace.

In nearly all cases, emotional intelligence determines a person’s up and down in life as EI contributes to an individual’s ability to self-motivate, self-control, and self-discipline, the key elements to success. This explains why some people with high IQ remain all their lives trapped at the bottom of the social ladder because they suffer from low EI.

Emotional Intelligence plays a significant role in impulse control and ability to delay gratification. Emotions override logic in highly emotional moments. Realizing the key role played by EI, parents with every good intentions now know not to ignore the development of a high emotional intelligence in their children.

Have a wonderful Friday.

Recently I learned of a medical news on stammering, that is, scientists now say they have identified three genes which may cause stammering in some people and they believe that mutations which have already been tied to metabolic disorders may also affect the way in which parts of the brain function.

Like ADD (attention deficit disorder), I would think this kind of speech abnormalities is more a behavioral problem than a physical one, the product of bad habits. I remember I was lucky enough to have experienced both during my early school years and then, unaided by any medicine, emerged into adulthood free from both and without any sequela.

For those whose brains run faster than their tongues, among other things, they need to learn to control their tongues and manage to have their voices smoothly heard. It is true that behavioral change demands more efforts and will power than medical intervention. That’s why people tend to look for easy solution.

Same can be said of quitting smoking. Instead of relying on any magic medicine or shortcuts, people should realize the final solution is never easy to get by. They have to deal with it the hard with tons of efforts and will power.

Yesterday afternoon, right before my daughter started skating, I asked her to set a goal for this practice session. I was thinking of my 10/7 posting on “Task-Oriented vs Time Oriented.” I asked her to focuse on one particular task as her goal for that afternoon. After an hour’s practice she came out of the rink, feeling a bit frustrated over her lack of progress. I could see the same pattern reappear — practice, frustration, practice again, … finally giving up.

I told her life could be seen as a constant process of goal-setting, reaching, re-setting, and reaching again. That is how we progress and how we jump and leap to a higher order of existence. Failure to reach your goal or giving up half-way without reaching the destination, even if it is a minor one, is very symbolic and significant. Because if you do not have the steel in your character to carry you through a minor goal, how can you expect to achieve something big? In fact, these daily minor goals are like the building block for the bigger goal in life. The accumulated effect of minor failure will lead to a major one. Don’t take it lightly, no matter how minor it may seem.

My children are all very familiar with a person that I have told them many times. He started Ph.D program the same time as I did in 1986, but gave it up after spending 11 years on it. You can make it a classic example of many things — procrastination, lack of self-discipline, poor time management, lack of efficient study method, and failure in goal-setting. I am sure he would have a totally different result if he had set goals and followed them through religiously.