EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE

Emotional intelligence, or emotional quotient is the measure of how well a person can take
control of one’s emotions and handle interpersonal relationships judiciously and empathetically.
A similar concept, IQ, intelligence quotient which measures one’s ability to solve problems and
critical thinking is a popular way of judging how well a person’s mind works. Emotional
intelligence however is a new concept but yet very important, sometimes even more than IQ
itself. When it comes to shaping our decisions and our actions, feeling counts every bit as much,
and often more than thought itself.

What are emotions

So what is emotion? In the most literal sense, as defined by the Oxford English dictionary,
emotion is any agitation or disturbance of mind, feeling, passion; any distinctive thoughts,
psychological and biological states, and range of pro-variation, mutations and nuances. Emotions
can be categorized in different families, such as anger, sadness, fear, excitement, love, surprise
and disgust. However, this doesn’t categorize emotions accurately. For example, jealousy, which
is a blend of anger, sadness and fear. Or some other unexplainable mix of emotions like doubt
and competence. There are no clear answers and the scientific argument on how to classify
emotions continues.
Emotion is just a state of mind, the state one can change and control regardless of the situations
that are beyond one’s control. Emotions are an inevitable part of our lives and the people who are
able to control it have reached great heights. Emotions is not just something man-made, they
ignite certain parts of the brain, often referred to as the Emotional Brain. The way we feel on a
daily basis is just the average of the thoughts we think on the daily basis. Regulating and
managing the things we think greatly affects our emotions, even in our day to day life. Even
subconsciously, we feel happy or sad or anger or any other emotions without knowing the cause
of such emotions. Some people are optimistic and charismatic, and some people are gloomy and
not so outgoing in general because their thought process affects their character and emotions
subconsciously.
Intelligence, often taken as academic success, is rather vast. It not only includes academic
knowledge but also the ability to live a life of abundance. The excellence of a person is very
often measured by grades. But it tells you nothing about how they react to the difficulties of life.
And that is the problem, academic intelligence offers virtually no preparation whatsoever for the
turmoil or opportunities that one encounters. We should spend less time ranking children and
more time helping them to identify their natural competencies and gifts and cultivate those. IQ is
no guarantee of prosperity, prestige or happiness of life. However, emotional life is a domain
that, as surely as a math or reading, can be handled with greater or lesser skill, and requires its
unique set of competencies. But the hard journey brings about a surety on designing the life a
person wants. Emotional amplitude, is a meta-ability determining how well we can use whatever
skills we have, including raw intellectual knowledge. Much evidence testifies that people who
are emotionally adapt, who know and manage their own feeling well, and who read and deal
effectively with other people’s feelings, are at advantage in any domain of life.(source:
Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman).

The Emotional Brain

In a very real sense, we have two minds, one that thinks and one that feels. These two
fundamentally different ways of knowing interact to construct our life. One, the rational mind, is
the part of the brain we are typically conscious of and is more prominent in awareness. But
alongside there is another system of knowing, impulsive and powerful and sometimes even
illogical, our emotional brain.
In simple terms, we portray these in parts “head” and “heart”. Sometimes, something just feels
right “in our heart” and that is a deeper form of certainty than thinking so with the rational mind.
These two minds share equal shares for the most parts but however a person may tweak the
dominant part to be either rational or the emotional mind. For example, a person may lay out the
reasons to do a task and start doing it shortly but if a person’s will to do a task is filled by
passion, emotional brain takes over and the person works more efficiently because no limits exist
in the emotional mind.
If we look at the course of development of human brain, the brain started developing with a
brainstem, surrounding the top of the spinal cord, which was able to regulate basic life functions
like breathing, reactions and movements. From the most primitive root, the brainstem, the
emotional centers emerged. Millions of years later into the evolution, from these emotional areas
evolved the thinking brain, now called the neocortex. The fact that the thinking brain grew from
the emotional brain reveals much about the relationship between thought and feeling. It is
important to note that there as an emotional brain long before there was a rational one.
The neocortex in human is so much larger than in any other species and it is one of the most
distinctive features of homo sapiens. The neocortex is the seat of thought. It contains the centre
that put together and comprehend what the senses perceive. It adds a feeling to what we think
about, and allows us to have feelings about ideas, art, and imaginings. The same neocortex and
its connections with the limbic structures allowed for the mother-child bond that is the basis of
the family unit and the long-term commitment to childrearing that makes human development
possible. Species that have no neocortex, such as reptiles, lack maternal affection.

Emotional Centers in the brain

There is a major part of the brain that handles the emotions related to any walks of life. In
humans, the amygdala is an almond-shaped cluster of interconnected structures perched above
the brainstem, near the bottom of the limbic ring. There are 2 amygdala, one on each side of the
brain, nestled toward the side of the head. The hippocampus and the amygdala were the two key
parts of the primitive brain that gave rise to the cortex and then the neocortex. The amygdala acts
as a storehouse of emotional memory and thus gives emotional meanings to the things that are
similar in feels. For example, we remember a certain thing with a certain smell because some
emotions are attached to the smell and the event.
Amygdala is not only the site for affection and happiness, it is the crucial site for the origin of
passion. The animals that have their amygdala removed lack fear and rage, lose the urge to
compete or cooperate and no longer have any sense of their place in the animal kingdom. Tears,
an emotional signal unique to humans are also triggered by the amygdala itself.
Amygdala can take control over what we do even as thinking brain, the neocortex, is still coming
to a decision. In situations of great danger, amygdala takes decisions before the information even
reaches the rational mind. For example, when a person hears a loud noise while asleep, the
individual immediately seeks for a safe shelter before even analyzing the situation properly. This
is because the information reached the amygdala first and the emotional memory of running
away from a potential danger acted took charge over the rational thinking. The amygdala mainly
processes 3 questions, “Is this something I hate? That hurts me? Something I fear?” and if the
answer is yes and the situation in hand draws a positive response towards the questions,
amygdala reacts instantaneously, distributing the message of crisis to all parts of the brain. As
LeDoux points out, “ You don’t need to know what it is to know it’s dangerous”. This
phenomenon is usually known as the Neural Tripwire where the situation in hand may set of the
tripwire that causes the announcement of crisis all over the brain even before analyzing the
situation with the rational mind.
The conventional view in neuroscience had been that the sensory organs transmit signals to the
thalamus, and from there to the thalamus, and from there to sensory processing areas of the
neocortex, where the signals are put together into objects as we perceive them. From the
neocortex, according to the old theory, the signals are sent to the limbic brain and rest of the
body. That is the way it works most of the time but LeDoux discovered a small bundle of
neurons that directly lead from the thalamus to the amygdala. This smaller and shorter pathway
allows amygdala to receive some direct inputs from the senses and start a response before they
are fully registered by the neocortex.
The shorter path goes as follows. A visual signal first goes from the retina to the thalamus. Most
of the message then goes to the visual cortex, where it is analyzed and assessed for meaning and
response. If that response is emotional, a signal goes to the amygdala to activate the emotional
centers. But a smaller portion of the original signal goes straight from the thalamus to the
amygdala in quicker transmission, allowing a faster but less precise response. Thus the amygdala
can trigger an emotional response before the cortical centers have fully understood what is
happening.
The amygdala seems to imprint in memory of the moments most of the time in which there were
emotional arousal with an added degree of strength. This is the reason why we remember our
first bicycle rides and first dangerous experiences such as bungee or skiing. The more intense the
amygdala arousal, the stronger the imprint. The experiences that scare or thrill us the most are
the most prominent memories.
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 Using Emotions Intelligently
The abilities one must possess to be emotionally intelligent are divided into five main domains:
1. Knowing One’s Emotions: Recognizing a feeling as it happens is the keystone of emotional
intelligence. The ability to monitor feelings from moment to moment is crucial to psychological
insight and self-understanding. Many people remain sad or frustrated for a long period of time
without even knowing the real reason behind it. Later they realize the reason for their anger and
frustration was merely one small action which, after realization, usually goes away. Telling
oneself “ This is anger that I am feeling” or laying out the reasons for one’s sorrow and
frustration helps to eliminate the negative feelings and promotes a good mood overall.
2. Managing emotions: Handling emotions is as important as recognizing one’s emotions. After
knowing what one is feeling, one must know the thing they could do to manage the emotions
they are feeling. For example, anger can be managed by going on a long walk or doing an
intensive exercise because the blood flow is maximum when someone is angry. People who are
poor in this ability are constantly battling feelings of distress, while those who excel in it can
bounce back far more quickly from life’ setbacks and upsetting events.
3. Motivating oneself: Concentrating emotions in the service of goal is essential for paying
attention and for self-motivation, and mastery and creativity. Emotional self-control helps to get
people in the extreme state of concentration which leads to much efficient work and make them
highly productive in whatever they undertake.
4. Recognizing emotions in others: Empathy, an important emotional skill that builds on
emotional self-awareness is the fundamental intrapersonal skill. People who are empathetic are
more attuned to the subtle social signals that indicate what others need or want. This makes them
better at every walk of life that includes communications with people.
5. Handling relationship: The main skill in relationships is to know how to handle the other
person’s emotions. These are the abilities that underlie popularity, leadership and interpersonal
effectiveness. People who excel in these skills do well at anything that relies on interacting
smoothly and maintaining a deeper relationship with people.
Being emotional intelligent and sound requires practice and patience. Habit is a way of doing
something, and emotional habit is the way of thinking subconsciously. The people that practice
recognizing the emotions of oneself and others, managing the emotions and relationships tend to
be in a better mental state overall for the rest of their life. Unlike academic knowledge which
fails to show much implications in real life, the art of managing emotions is crucial and needed
in every step of life.
The people with higher emotional intelligence are found to be able to motivate themselves, feel
resourceful, reassure themselves while in a tight spot, be flexible to find different ways to
complete their goals and have the sense to give up one when it is appropriate to do so. They are
also able to use distressing emotions such as stress and worries in a positive manner to be more
productive and achieve better things. Emotional intelligence prepares a person for their life and
might be considered even more important that IQ itself.
 Breathing And Emotions

Breathing, an involuntary task, often neglected may have a great impact on our emotions. It is
the one of the few involuntary actions that we can control and hence even change the pattern of.
We cannot regulate the pattern of heartbeat nor can we tweak our digestive process but we can
change the way we breathe, even subconsciously and this in turn changes the way we feel on a
daily basis.
In this monotonous world, we are in a constant breathing pattern of fear and anger. Short breaths
causes the symphatatic nervous system to activate causing nervousness, increase in blood
pressure, and increase in heartbeat in humans. Imagine what you’d do if a car passes by almost
hitting you. One inhales, one gasps, one’s breathing becomes short and rapid. We are so used to
this breathing pattern that our normal breathing is short and rapid breaths. If we were to regulate
our breathing pattern, we may, to a great extent, control our emotions and steer them to whatever
we want.
Imagine you are with your significant other, and s/he tells you that they love you. Notice the
breath, the breath is slow exhale. Slow exhale gives a sign of relief to the human body and
therefore relaxing the body and releasing the hormones that are responsible for happiness, like
dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin. This can be used by an individual at their own will whenever
they like to change their emotions from nervousness to calmness or to whatever one may desire.
If we remember a life event, one filled with emotional charge which is stored in the amygdala
region of the brain, we can remember our breath work at that particular timeframe. If we try
recreating the breath pattern that we had whilst imagining the scenario of the past, we can feel
almost the same that we felt when we were actually in that moment. Breath patterns bring back
memories and moreover the actual joy, happiness or even sadness that was bound with that
memory. Breath patterns are like radio frequencies, when one matches with the signal provided,
we can hear, feel and even re-live the moments in the past.

Using Breath and Emotions Relations

We can manipulate emotions by simply changing our breathing patterns. The patterns either help
by bringing back the happy memories we already lived in the past or by physically calming our
nervous system down making us calm and stationed.
Whenever angry, our blood flow is maximum in our hands and legs for the fight and flight
response. During this period, our breath is rapid and short allowing more oxygen to enter the
body and hence excessive glucose to be burnt. But if one realizes that anger is the state they are
in and change their breathing pattern to a slower and longer inhalation and exhalation, the flight
or fight response turns off making the person less likely to take an action solely based upon
emotions. The majority of information then passes to the neocortex rather than amygdala making
the person more likely to take rational and informed decisions.
When a person feels sad or depressed, one can imagine a happy moment one lived. Focusing
mainly on the breath pattern at that particular moment, and recreating the pattern of breathe as
the one in that situation, the brain can’t physically distinguish if that person is living that moment
or simply imagining it. Therefore, it releases the hormones that lift a person up, like dopamine
and serotonin. This can be used in whatever situations to help the body to come back to natural
state.
An individual can also create a trigger point for a certain emotion with nothing more than 2-3
happy moments of their life. To do this, one must imagine the situation they were really happy
in. After the image has appeared in one’s mind, one must be aware of the 5 senses they felt
during that event. One must note mentally what they could see, what they could hear, what they
could taste, what they could smell and what they could feel. Once these senses are taken into
considerations, a trigger point must be created. A trigger can be as simple as joining the thumb
and index finger together. With the image and senses in mind, one should join the two fingers
together while applying nominal force for not less than 5 seconds. This simple technique can be
done multiple times to strengthen the effect of the trigger point. Now whenever a person feels
anger, grief or sorrow, when they press these 2 fingers together, it tricks the mind into thinking
they are in a happy state forcing it to release dopamine. (Source: Ted Talk, Timon Krause)
 Manipulating the breathing
Breathing can be easily manipulated giving us the kind of emotions we want. We may use 3
different breathing patterns to induce 3 different emotions in whatever condition we are. Those
breathing patterns include:
1. 4-4 Breathing Pattern
This is the breathing pattern where one inhales for 4 seconds, holds for 4 seconds and exhales for
4 seconds. This works best for calming the body down and bringing it back to a normal and
balanced state. When we inhale for 4 seconds and hold for 4 seconds, the inhalation is slow and
long which makes the body’s flight and fight response to turn off. The long exhalation helps the
body to further calm down. When angry, if this pattern is used, the person can think rationally
rather acting on the emotionally raged state. By manipulating the breathing pattern to slow and
long breaths, feelings of nervousness, anger, over-excitement can be controlled as per one’s will.

2. 4-8 Breathing Pattern

In this breathing pattern, the inhalation period is 4 seconds, however the exhalation is made
longer by 4 seconds than normal, making it a total of 8 seconds. To follow this pattern, one must
inhale for 4 seconds, hold for 7 seconds and exhale for a count of 8 seconds. This kind of
breathing helps to deactivate the sympathetic nervous system and activating the parasympathetic
nervous system. This leads to decrease in blood pressure, increase in regularity of heartbeat,
releasing strains in muscles and overall helping the body to relax and prepare for sleep.
Whenever the emotions of sorrow and grief takes over, this pattern is used to calm the body
down and bring it to a sleepy state. Mostly used by the people in military, people with insomnia
are advised to use this pattern to aid falling asleep. Emotions of rage, frustration and grief can be
suppressed with this pattern of breathing.

3. Constant exhalation
In this pattern of breathing, one must constantly exhale without thinking about inhaling. Mainly
the abdominal muscles are used in this method of breathing. Short bursts of air are thrown from
the nostrils without inhalation for 20 repetitions. This pattern of breathing helps activate
sympathetic nervous system that enhances blood flow and oxygen supply to different parts of the
body. When one feels depressed, overwhelmed or extremely fatigue, one may use this pattern for
a maximum of 3 times a day to induce the emotions of happiness and joy.

The 4-4 pattern breathing helps bring calmness and balance in the body, whereas the 4-8
breathing pattern makes a person extremely relaxed and the Constant Exhalation breathing
energizes a person inducing joy and happiness in the individual’s body. We may manipulate our
breathing pattern as we may see fit, but with extreme care.
 The Placebo Effect

The placebo effect is a popular phenomenon where a person’s expectations makes certain
changes in the body without any external medication or substance. Placebo works on the
principle of emotions. When one receives a medication from a medical professional, one sets an
expectation of being cured, which is processed by the amygdala rather than the rational brain. So
without thinking for the reasons like “How will this medicine cure me”, the emotional part of the
brain sets a strong passion to be cured which in most cases cures the patient.
The placebo effect is still used in testing the efficiency of a new medicine. The “gold standard”
for testing interventions in people is the “randomized, placebo-controlled” clinical trial, in which
volunteers are randomly assigned to a test group receiving the experimental intervention or a
control group receiving a placebo (an inactive substance that looks like the drug or treatment
being tested). Comparing results from the two groups suggests whether changes in the test group
result from the treatment or occur by chance. The placebo effect is a beneficial health outcome
resulting from a person’s anticipation that an intervention will help. How a health care provider
interacts with a patient also may bring about a positive response that’s independent of any
specific treatment. This treatment still works on 2/3rd people even when they know they are receiving
placebos.

Using Placebo
An individual may use the placebo effect to manipulate and change their emotions towards
something. For example, when in time of distress, the person can expect the beautiful sky to
make them happy. So whenever they look at the sky, the brain expects one to be happy and
therefore releasing the happy hormones. The entire concept of placebo revolves around the
phrase “supposed to” and hence it is very easy to use while being really efficient as well.
During the times of anger, one may think the anger is supposed to provide them with extra
energy and hence they feel more energized to do something, mainly exercise. Even drinking
water in the morning daily thinking it is supposed to be good for your health has proven to have
a positive effect in health of people.
Placebos can be set however one may desire. But it should be something rather hard to do to
work more efficiently. For example, not using mobile phones early in the morning. If a person
keeps conscious efforts into not using smartphone as soon as s/he wakes up, expecting that action
to give a better overall mood throughout the day, their mood will mostly be better because of the
small but conscious effort they vested in the morning.
Starting the morning with gratitude is another placebo famously used. When one counts the
blessings they have in their life, their brain thinks they are supposed to be happy because of the
blessings they have and therefore releases hormones leading to happiness and excitement
throughout the day.
The breathing patterns and using placebos becomes a habit after a while and is done without
conscious efforts by the brain. The brain adapts to 4-4 breathing pattern in a daily basis making
the overall average mood better of a person compared to the short and rapid breathing we are
used to. Placebos on the other hand can be created in whatever situations we may see fit and used
in whatever circumstances without any restrictions. Once these two are integrated into one’s life,
their emotional intelligence rises higher than a normal person. And with proper understanding
and managing of one’s emotions while not neglecting other’s emotions, the EQ of a person can
rise significantly, guaranteeing a prosperous and happy life in the future.