Emotional Intelligence Using the EQ‐I: An Overview This content is excerpted from OKA’s forthcoming EQ‐i Workbook, by Hile Rutledge. It is intended for educational purposes and may not be reproduced without permission from the author. This excerpt focuses on one of the 15 EQ‐i scales, and is designed to give you a sense of both the content and application of EQ‐I that will be covered in the full product and workshop. Emotional Self‐Awareness • Emotional Self‐Awareness relates to the degree to which you are in touch with your feelings and emotions and are able and willing to be open—vocal and transparent—with them. • Emotional Self‐Awareness is reflected in your knowing what emotion you are feeling—
being able to distinguish one emotion from another—and understanding why that emotion has resulted. At one end of the continuum (where Emotional Self‐Awareness is lacking) are ignorance, misleading and missed emotional cues and denial while at the other end (where Emotional Self‐
Awareness is active) are healthy awareness and expression. This end of the continuum can also reflect an extreme of Emotional Self‐Awareness that can look and sound like self‐indulgence and an incorrect assumption that your emotional state is wanted or relevant. With too little Emotional Self‐Awareness, you have an inability or unwillingness to differentiate between your feelings and their logical sources. A deficit of Emotional Self‐Awareness also may reflect a tendency not to express feelings and emotional states. Too little Emotional Self‐
Awareness may well yield feedback that you are: • Emotionally unaware or immature • Ignorant of your emotional needs and motivations • Surprised by others’ reactions and emotional states • Often misunderstood and misunderstanding others • In denial of your own feelings Low scores on Emotional Self‐Awareness can indicate an incomplete emotional vocabulary, a lack of emotional awareness and/or a lack of appreciation for self‐awareness or emotional expression in general. A score below 90 reflects answers that were in approximately the bottom quarter of the norm group, and are objectively low scores. © 2009 – OKA (Otto Kroeger Associates) Page 1 Active Emotional Self‐Awareness may reflect an awareness of your emotions, their origins and an openness to their expression. Too much Emotional Self‐Awareness, however, can work against you and lead to feedback that you are: • Injecting yourself or your emotional state into issues non‐related to you • Emotionally transparent • Emotionally hijacking‐‐making objective issues and events reasons to share personal data • Self‐centered • Self‐indulgent High scores on Emotional Self‐Awareness can indicate that you know what you are feeling and why you are feeling it, but high scores can also point to an overactive skill set in this area or an inability not to emote and inject your own emotional state and reaction into the world around you. A score above 110 reflects answers that were in approximately the top quarter of the norm group, and are objectively high scores. An average score on this subscale could mean either moderate or sporadic attention given to your own emotional state and its expression, but mid‐range scores could also indicate a tendency toward sharp focus on your emotional state with a tendency not to reveal or vice versa—a tendency to readily share without a firm idea of what is being made public. The average score is 100, but statistically, any score that falls between 90 and 110 is regarded within the average range. Average scores do not necessarily reflect trouble spots or problem behavior, but certainly do indicate an area that could be worked on and improved. In interpreting and giving context to your EQ‐i report, remember that your Emotional Self‐
Awareness scores come from your response (from Very Seldom/Not True of Me to Very Often/True of Me) to questions that probe a number of facets of your self‐opinion—questions like: • It is easy for me to express my feelings •
It is hard to understand my personal feelings • I am aware of my feelings • It is easy for me to describe my feelings •
Even when distressed, I’m aware of my feelings © 2009 – OKA (Otto Kroeger Associates) Page 2 Use the box below to sum up your EQ results on Emotional Self‐Awareness Note your Emotional Self‐
Awareness score in the space below OR circle whether the score is Low, Moderate or High _____ Low Moderate High Note whether Emotional Self‐Awareness is a positive, negative or neutral force in your life. + ‐ = Note how important or relatively unimportant Emotional Self‐Awareness is to you in the context of this assessment. Important Unimportant If you decide that increasing your Emotional Self‐Awareness would benefit you (if it is rated above as negative (‐) or neutral (=) and Important) consider the following actions or experiments (down the left‐hand side of this table) with deliberateness and repetition to develop muscle memory on this element of EQ. Place a check beside those actions you would consider doing. Note along the right hand side that taking these actions—even though focused on Emotional Self‐Awareness—may benefit or impact another element of EQ. Some of these connections and EQ scale relationships are detailed below. Potential Activities to boost Taking these actions to bolster Emotional Self‐
Emotional Self‐Awareness Awareness would also have an impact on other EQ elements as well. Among these are: Become curious about your mood and Self‐Regard—becoming curious about and feelings. Check‐in with yourself at attentive to yourself and journaling about regular intervals (put it on your your emotions and behaviors activates and calendar to do so periodically reinforces a positive Self‐Regard throughout a meeting or the day) to Self‐Actualization—acting to improve your objectively survey your emotional Emotional Self‐Awareness—or anything—is state. You are less likely to ignore movement toward greater Self‐Actualization what you task yourself to pay attention Flexibility—making any change or adjustment to. to behavior means activating or harnessing your Flexibility If writing appeals to you, keep a Optimism—engagement in goals and journal or log of quick entries that note development activities carries with it the your emotional states—with the goal hope—if not the assumption—of success and of seeing how one segues into another, follow‐through, which exercises your forming natural emotional chords or Optimism □
© 2009 – OKA (Otto Kroeger Associates) Page 3 strings. You can then tie or attribute these chords to specific events and interactions. □ Explore your personality and personal style with a neutral to positive personal style assessment like the Myers‐Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), Strength Deployment Inventory (SDI), or Pearson Marr Archetype Indicator (PMAI). Knowing your cognitive preferences, attitudes and behavioral tendencies is a great and needed step toward Emotional Self‐Awareness. Self‐Regard—becoming curious about and attentive to yourself activates and reinforces a positive Self‐Regard Self‐Actualization—acting to improve your Emotional Self‐Awareness—or anything—is movement toward greater Self‐Actualization □ Find a trusted friend or family member Self‐Actualization—acting to improve your and share your feelings about a given Emotional Self‐Awareness—or anything—is issue with him/her—then branch out movement toward greater Self‐Actualization and do this with one other person, Assertiveness—initiating such a conversation taking the skills you have exercised activates your Assertiveness within a trusted relationship and Interpersonal Relationship—tapping an applying them to someone else, with existing friendship and working to develop a whom you can then start to build a new one is also activating the Interpersonal more trusting relationship. Relationship EQ skill set. Flexibility—making any change or adjustment to behavior means activating or harnessing your Flexibility Self‐Regard‐‐becoming curious about and To get practice, talk about people you attentive to yourself activates and reinforces a know and characters you come across positive Self‐Regard in books, movies and on TV—and what Self‐Actualization—acting to improve your you believe they are feeling at given Emotional Self‐Awareness—or anything—is times. Think about what you would be movement toward greater Self‐Actualization feeling if you were in the same Empathy—starting to consider the emotional situation. states and feelings of other people exercises your Empathy also Verbalize your feelings in Self‐Actualization—acting to improve your conversation— Emotional Self‐Awareness—or anything—is • “I’m excited about this project.” movement toward greater Self‐Actualization □
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© 2009 – OKA (Otto Kroeger Associates) Page 4 • “I’m afraid this course of action is not going to work.” • “I enjoy working with you.” • “I’m irritated that I have to do this.” Even when these statements are not asked for. They are true and playing a part in your behavior, so admit it overtly. Interpersonal Relationship—the openness and honesty of this action has a tangential benefit of activating the Interpersonal Relationship skill set and focus The goal with the above suggestions is not for you to do them all, but for you to find at least one that you will engage with right away to have some positive impact on your Emotional Self‐Awareness. © 2009 – OKA (Otto Kroeger Associates) Page 5