Elements of Self Awareness-Management

Self Awareness

In continuation of our discussion on how to develop Personal Competence (self-awareness and self-management) aspect of Emotional Intelligence, we will discuss the Basics of Self Awareness today.

To develop the Self Awareness skill:

  • you must recognize your emotions, how they affect you and others, and who & what push your buttons
  • recognize and understand your strengths and weaknesses
  • be aware of your capabilities
  • seek feedback from others who will give you genuine information about what they’ve seen

&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

If you’re not aware of those emotions/feelings that make you unproductive at work, inefficient spouse or parent, you will not be able to manage them.

To conclude our topic on Personal Competence, we will discuss how to manage the behaviours and tendencies we have recognized

Self-Management:  is your ability to keep a pulse on your emotions so that you can stay flexible and positively choose how you react to different situations and different people – TalentSmart

Our ability to resist the urge to act or react to issues that may make things worse is very important if we are to grow this skill.  Our feelings affect what we say and what we do (actions).  

To grow this competence:

  • practice self-control  – count to ten or devise a method of controlling the out burst
  • You may share your frustrations with someone else to calm your nerves
  • Develop the ability to remain flexible to handle multiple demands and priorities
  • Be open to the others’ perspectives
  • Avoid negatives – “I cannot pass the exam”, “I’m not competent to do the job”, “my mother died of cancer, I will also die of….”, “I’m not a good wife, I cannot satisfy my husband” rather think positive

Tunde and Joy have a three months old baby they adore so much.  The baby cries throughout the night even after feeding and ensuring she’s not wet. With so much compassion for the baby and anger that they’ll be awake throughout the night, they put her to sleep and after 5-10mins she starts crying again.  This they do till day break.  They decided to manage the situation and not allow the baby push their buttons.  They agreed that they will feed the baby every 2 hours and at the first cry, they’ll checked her pampers. 10mins after they laid the baby down, she started crying again but they didn’t pick up the baby, but after a while, Joy couldn’t hold back again.  As she got up to carry the baby, Tunde held her back.  The baby cried continuously for another one hour and slept off.  They did this for 3 days and they succeeded. It was not easy to practice self-control, but they supported each other to help them and the baby sleep well at night.

“No one knows what he can do till he tries” – Publilius Syrus

Ciao!!     In the next segment, we will talk about the second dimension – Social Competence which focuses on your interaction with others