EMOTIONS@WORK

Emotional intelligence is more than learning a theory. Emotions live in our bodies, and that’s where we can start connecting with them.

Understanding what an emotion is goes beyond our cognitive understanding or discussion of a model or theory. When we talk about embodied emotions, we talk also of the body changes that occur related to an emotion, no matter if we’re aware of them or not. Some are changes we have all felt at some point, like feeling butterflies in our stomach or a lump in the throat, or that can be seen from the outside, like blushing. Many changes operate in a more subtle way, and we may not even realise them.

Improving our early perception of these changes allows us to be aware of emotions before they take over our behaviour, to understand where our triggers are, and, in many cases, to make a choice about what happens next. It also allows us to perceive these changes in others.

Does your “professional side” have emotions?

When in our workplace, we often have the perception that some emotions don’t have space to exist. Our “professional sides” are meant to be emotionless productive machines. Unfortunately, dissociating from our emotions also means that we dissociate from compassion, flexibility and creativity.