Sweet Emotion

I first heard about Emotional Intelligence from a woman I shared studio space with at Mudflat. Reme  was a kindergarten teacher by day, thrower and painter of porcelain by night. A wonderful, beautiful studio-mate.

What is emotional intelligence?
From Help Guide.org:

Emotional intelligence (EQ) is the ability to identify, use, understand, and manage emotions in positive ways to relieve stress, communicate effectively, empathize with others, overcome challenges, and defuse conflict.

• Self-awareness – You recognize your own emotions and how they affect your thoughts and behavior, know your strengths and weaknesses, and have self-confidence.
• Self-management – You’re able to control impulsive feelings and behaviors, manage your emotions in healthy ways, take initiative, follow through on commitments, and adapt to changing circumstances.
• Social awareness – You can understand the emotions, needs, and concerns of other people, pick up on emotional cues, feel comfortable socially, and recognize the power dynamics in a group or organization.
• Relationship management – You know how to develop and maintain good relationships, communicate clearly, inspire and influence others, work well in a team, and manage conflict.

This Emotional Intelligence shit seems like a smart thing to have. You know, getting through la vida loca takes a shit-ton more than just being able to calculate a 20% tip in your head, solving for Pi, knowing all the laws and regs of the land or being able to craft a winningly fab Queen’s Park Swizzle.

For starters there’s the Herculean task of getting along well with folks who, if they weren’t co-workers, family or fellow earthlings, I couldn’t be bothered to spit on if they were aflame. (Yez, I’m a bright sparkly People Person with stone misanthropian tendencies)

There’s so much more to why increasing EQ is so damned mega important. Royale Scuderi's column at Life Hack says it all. 

Go read, I'll wait right here.

Back? Nice to see you again!

Now, I know that I’ve got a few functioning brain cells but do I have any emotional intelligence to speak of? Naturally, I looked around on line for some super duper quiz that’d quantify the deepest spectral quantum of my being.

 I can easily find out What City I Should Live In? (Los Angeles...‘the hell?!), Which Muppet am I? (Mahna Mahna of course), Which Classic Female Author am I? (Joyce Carol Oates. C’mon, I’m not even a fan!) and Which Buffy Character I Should Totes Hook Up With? (Spike, YES!) — surely there’d be a test to help me out.

And there is and it’s even kinda, sorta, semi respectable. Instead of the Buzzfeed (christ, I’m a sucker for those ‘quizzes’) five or ten questions asked to elicit the nature of my very soul, the meat of who I am, Queendom’s exam required me to respond to a whopping 146 questions and scenarios.

How’d I do? I’m a solid C student. OK, could be worse and I am a work in progress. Certainly I’m more empathetic and self aware than I was even five years ago. I credit Lily, Dave and Janice with educating me up out of my Tasmanian Devil natural self.

Hell’s, I’m deep —shit takes time!

Aerosmith — Sweet Emotion