From the course: Developing Your Emotional Intelligence

Dealing with stressful situations

From the course: Developing Your Emotional Intelligence

Dealing with stressful situations

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- Acting on emotional impulse means that you're being led by your emotions, which may or may not be useful. It depends on the situation. Of course, being passionate and excited will encourage others to be interested in what you're saying, and you might find it easier to engage with those that you're speaking with. In this scenario, you're being led by positive emotions, but the outcome won't always be so positive if you are being directed by fear or anger. The time between experiencing a thought, then a feeling, and responding to that feeling can be so quick, it can be almost hard to imagine how you can break the chain, but this is possible with practice. The trick is to choose how to react. And to do that, you need to slow down your reaction time. Step one is to identify when you're reacting emotionally and you feel that you could be more objective. Step two, when you start to feel your emotions, such as anger or fear, try to take a step back and give yourself some breathing space. Unless it's imperative that you react immediately, which it might be if you're in a circumstance that's urgent or you're in a crisis, take a few minutes to remove yourself from the situation and take deep, long breaths to regulate your breathing. This can be a hard habit to adopt, particularly if you feel passionately about the situation and you want to react. But taking deep, slow breaths can lower your heart rate if that has crept up, and it can regulate other physiological symptoms, such as sweating or blushing. Step three is to give yourself time to recover. You should have had some space, even if it's just for a few minutes. Now, let your body recover. And if you can manage it in the situation, don't make any decisions until you feel that your emotions have settled. Finally, choose how you will respond. You may still decide to take the exact same action that you were considering when you were in a heightened emotional state, or you may decide to take an alternative approach. The key here is you've given yourself time to consider your response so you're more likely to achieve the best outcome for you. Breaking the link between feeling and responding takes some work and may be hard if you're feeling stressed or tired. When you start to feel the physiological effects in your body of emotions rising, if you can get some space and time to slowly choose how to interpret the information and then choose how to react, you're much more likely to achieve a positive outcome for you and for others.

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