One of less mentioned benefits of developing your emotional intelligence is that eventually you can modulate your emotions. They don’t “come in” as strongly. You don’t experience them as strongly. Therefore they’re easier to manage, like cub scouts no longer agitated by my loud tones who were therefore better behaved.

You can also benefit by learning to turn down, your negative self-talk. These are things you’re always telling yourself in your head that you may or may not be aware of, which actually make things worse. These are things that pop out of your mouth when you miss an appointment, for instance, like, “Why am I so stupid?” or “Can’t I ever get it right?” Pay attention to how you talk to yourself. Make it positive and self-soothing. The other doesn’t work. Get off your back and on your side!

Slow it all down. When you immediately react to what someone says is when you are most likely to say something that will either agitate situation, harm you or other, or that you’ll regret having said later.

This is when we speak like knee jerk reaction when doctor taps our knee with that rubber thing – as if it were automatic, and we had no control over words that come out of our mouths, or gestures and expressions we use, which can be equally damaging. If someone has rolled their eyes at you in disgust when you’ve made a suggestion or asked a pertinent question, you know what I mean.

This is when we get that flash anger and say, “That’s it. I quit,” or “Pack your bags and get out.” The take-home point is to ‘get’ that you’ve been insulted or what not, but not to take it so “hard” that you can’t deal with it in a way that’s constructive and that won’t sabotage you.

Work with an emotional intelligence coach and learn how to slow down your reactions to things. It will give you time to think them through and this will almost always bring better results.

And try thing about whispering next time you’re with a young child. It works beautifully. In fact they’re kind of fascinated by whole thing. Which is to say, as we say in coaching, “try one thing different.”

3. Reward success. The most fundamental law in all of psychology is “law of effect.” It simply states that actions followed by rewards are strengthened and likely to recur. Unfortunately, studies show that people rarely use this technique when trying to change personal habits. Dieters, for example, routinely overlook weeks of exercise and restrained eating, only to let a single lapse “snowball” into a total relapse and complete collapse.

Setting up formal or informal rewards for success greatly increases your chances of transforming bad habits into good ones, and is far more effective than punishing yourself for bad habits or setbacks.

4. Schedule your bad habits. If you are really struggling to kick a bad habit, try limiting habit to a specific time and place. If you are struggling to quit cigarettes, allow yourself to smoke from 9-9:30pm, and only in an uncomfortable “smoking stool.” When urge to smoke strikes, tell yourself that you’ll have plenty of time to smoke during your pre-scheduled smoking period. Research and case studies confirm that this rather unconventional approach can be a useful first step in changing bad habits.

Copyright © 2004 Stephen Kraus, Ph.D.

REFERENCES

The findings and recommendations in this article are based on scientific research published in peer-reviewed journals. For complete references, see Psychological Foundations of Success: A Harvard-Trained Scientist Separates Science of Success from Self-Help Snake Oil by Stephen Kraus, Ph.D.