Emotional Intelligence Is Limited by Reactivity

One of the biggest blocks to emotional intelligence and effective communication is emotional reactivity. You know how it is, you have all the best of intentions to have a productive communication with somebody and they say the “wrong thing” – the thing that pushes your “hot button”. Often it can be a criticism, or a negative reaction to your “great idea”. In any event, defensiveness arises and communication becomes regrettable. This shuts down any creativity or collaboration that could be possible in this situation.

When this happens, it is because our survival instincts triggered our emotional brain which overrides the more rational part of our brain, causing a “fight or flight” stress response. Reactivity causes us to respond in a more rigid, automatic fashion. We fight for our position or passively retreat from it, often losing sight of our primary goals of creativity and collaboration.

While the negative emotions such as anger and fear reduce the number of behavioral options available, Dr. Barbara Fredrickson, Principal Investigator of the Positive Emotions and Psychophysiology Lab at the University of North Carolina, finds that positive emotions expand our cognitive and behavioral responses, allowing for a broader view and expanded opportunities.

An emotionally intelligent leader will be aware of these emotional pitfalls and have some strategies to switch into a more positive emotional state quickly. Some ways of doing this are:

• Developing self-awareness of problematic emotional patterns. Looking back on your life, what situations cause anger, fear or judgment to arise?
• Noticing automatic self-talk and feelings that these situations engender, such as “I’m a failure”, or “this person’s out to get me”.
• Finding a more realistic and functional way to reframe it.
• Practice breathing and relaxation exercises (examples – link) to give yourself a moment to move out of the reactive emotional brain into the a wiser part of the brain.
• Engender a sense of curiosity about where the other person may be coming from and what a more creative way of looking at the situation might be.

Copyright © 2010, by William R. Murray, President of Eagle Alliance Executive Coaching, LLC. Reprint rights granted to all venues so long as this article and by-line are printed intact with all links made live.