Yesterday’s post looked at the first component of Emotional Intelligence; Self-Awareness. Today’s post looks at Self-Regulation.
When we begin to have a greater understanding of our own emotions, we can begin to manage our emotions more efficiently, which leads to feeling capable and self-confident when it comes to controlling our emotional response. Some ways that we can build emotional self-regulation skills include:
- Taking a pause. When emotions begin to feel out of control, take a pause – by way of a deep breath, by actively slowing down – we give ourselves time to allow our rational brain to weigh in on how our emotional brain is reacting. This gives us a more informed decision as to how we want to move forward by way of action.
- Being accountable. When we make a mistake, we need to own it. If we said something we regretted, lost our temper, did something we wish we could take back – it becomes important to acknowledge not only to ourselves but to those we affected that we messed up. Doing so tends to build our self-regulation skills as it reinforces what we don’t want to do.
- Manage stress. Living in chronic stress tends to wreak havoc with our ability to regulate our emotions. By managing stress (self-care is a good place to start), we create a better foundation for emotional self-regulation.
Emotional self-regulation promotes feeling efficient; we begin to feel emotionally stronger when we can see the results of having controlled an emotion that we may have struggled with in the past. Tomorrow’s post will explore the third component of EI – Motivation.
Photo credit: https://unsplash.com/@brett_jordan