Day 49 - Coping with Emotions

 

Picture credit - SCMP

Day 49 - Coping with emotions

28 May 2020

─

Prabodh Sirur

sirurp@gmail.com

My learning for the day

Today I want to summarise two books on the topic of coping with emotions. Thanks Marcel Schwantes for 12 Must-Read Books That Will Raise Your Emotional Intelligence 

Book 1 - The Book of Human Emotions

Author - Tiffany Watt Smith

Summary - Review by Lisa Feldman Barrett

Do you have the heebie-jeebies? Are you antsy with iktsuarpok? Are you filled with nakhes? Is cheerfulness and gezelligheid the same? How do you present yourself to a new group when you are Nginyiwarrarringu? 

The author takes us through an amazing journey of ‘emotions’ covering 156 emotions (some examples of unique emotions - Toska - a longing with nothing to long for, basorexia - sudden urge to kiss someone, iktsuarpok - a feeling of anticipation while waiting for someone to arrive, often leading to intermittently going outside to check for them, Torschlusspanik - gate closing panic, awumbuk - A feeling you get when you say goodbye to the last guest, close the door and survey your empty home, schadenfreude - enjoying someone’s misfortune) 

Some of these emotions exist in modern Western culture today, but don’t mean the same thing as they did in the past. 

Some of the emotions are not translatable into English with a single word, so it requires conceptual combination.

The Scottish Gaelic dictionary describes 49 shades of ‘sadness’. The Pintupi tribe of Australia have words for 15 kinds of fear. 

The more emotions you have in your vocabulary, the more emotionally intelligent you’ll be.

Book 2 - Emotional Intelligence 2.0

Author - Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves

Summary - Review by Kim Tasso

EQ (Emotional Quotient) is so critical to success that it accounts for 58% of performance in all types of jobs.

‘Emotional Intelligence 2.0’ delivers a step-by-step program for increasing your EQ via four, core EQ skills that enable you to achieve your fullest potential - Self-Awareness, Self-Management, Social Awareness, Relationship Management

It explains how to deal with emotions creatively and employ our intelligence in a beneficial way.

One of the advantages of this book is that it comes with an authorization code to undertake an on-line assessment of your emotional intelligence. This helps you to develop your EQ action plan. 

The other advantage of the book is that it focuses on providing 66 simple, practical exercises to help you develop your chosen area (self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship management).

Some useful stats from the book 

- Only 35% of people tested are able to accurately identify their emotions as they happen

- 90% of the high performers are also high in EQ

- Middle managers have the highest EQ scores in the workforce, with CEOs with the lowest

- American executives averaged 15 points lower than Chinese executives in self-management and relationship management

- The authors observed an increase in EQ across the US population (from 13.7% with high EQ skills in 2003 to 18.3% in 2007), it declined in 2008 – the start of the recession

What is Coping with emotions?

Emotions are biological states brought on by thoughts, feelings, behavioural responses, and a degree of pleasure or displeasure. 

The basic emotions are 

1. joy/ sadness, 

2. acceptance/ disgust, 

3. fear/ anger, 

4. surprise/ anticipation. 

The word "emotion" dates back to 1579, when it was adapted from the French word émouvoir, which means "to stir up". Emotions create responses in the brain called feelings. 

Coping with emotions is - 

a. understanding the patterns of emotions, 

b. understanding our responses to emotions and 

c. taking corrective and preventive actions

My learning so far on this topic

Day 9 post -  Plutchik wheel of emotions and ways to cope with emotions

Day 19 post - Association of emotions with endocrine system, the Chakras and the Yoga postures

Day 29 post - Learning from an RJ (Radio Jockey)

Day 39 post - Two TED talks - The gift and power of emotional courage & Why we all need to practice emotional first aid

How to improve this skill?

Set a goal to become a go-to person by mastering the art and science of coping with emotions. 

Follow the LAST model to build your personal brand as a Guru of coping with emotions. 

Learn - Invest time in learning different frameworks/ models/ techniques of coping with emotions 

Apply - 

Identify a model suitable to you

Create a template to document the flow of the process

Find opportunities to use the selected method/ template

Maintain record/ process flow of every important activities you did with respect to coping with emotions

Maintain notes of your thoughts/ insights/ failures/ challenges…. to be used for sharing/ training others

Share - Share the insights captured in step 2 above in a planned manner (social media posts, blogs, videos, study notes…)

Train - Generate opportunities to train your peers and team members so that, over time, your organization benefits from your efforts

Purpose of this document

I took a 66 day challenge to study Life Skills last year (10 April 2019). To my astonishment, I succeeded in studying for 66 days one skill a day. 

My objectives of learning these skills were - To strengthen my mind to face life’s challenges with ease, To use these skills in my worklife for a better performance, To use these skills in my personal life for enriching my relationships, To open new possibilities to surprise myself. 

This is my next 66 day challenge (from 10 April 2020) - To share my Life Skills learning with my social media friends. 

I pray that my toil helps you in your success journey.

What are Life Skills?

UNICEF defines Life skills as - psychosocial abilities for adaptive and positive behaviour that enable individuals to deal effectively with the demands and challenges of everyday life. They are loosely grouped into three  broad categories of skills

- cognitive skills for analyzing and using information, 

- personal skills for developing personal agency and managing oneself, 

- inter-personal skills for communicating and interacting effectively with others.

Which LifeSkills are covered?

The World Health Organisation identified these basic areas of life skills that are relevant across cultures: 

1.  Decision-making

2.  Problem-solving

3.  Creative thinking

4.  Critical thinking

5.  Communication

6.  Interpersonal skills

7.  Self-awareness

8.  Empathy

9.  Coping with emotions

10. Coping with stress.

Some trivia

‘Life skills’ was never part of the school curriculum. WHO/ UNESCO mandated academia to teach these skills in all schools across the globe in 1993.

Different countries educate their children in these skills with different objectives

- Zimbabwe and Thailand - prevention of HIV/AIDS

- Mexico - prevention of adolescent pregnancy

- United Kingdom - child abuse prevention

- USA - prevention of substance abuse and violence

- South Africa and Colombia - positive socialization of children.

Day 48 - Empathy

 

Picture credit - Claire Cain Miller - New York Times

Day 48 - Empathy

27 May 2020

─

Prabodh Sirur

sirurp@gmail.com

My learning for the day

Today I want to summarise two books on interpersonal skills. Thanks Clifford Chi for your recommendation 

Book 1 - Well-Designed: How to Use How to Use Empathy to Create Products People Love

Author -  Jon Kolko 

Source - Summary by Brand-Genetics and The Drum by Matt Boffey

Summary - 

Feeling and experiencing the emotional world (aka Empathy) of the person you are designing for is the key to successful design.

The author champions this view - Designing is about designing for feelings, not features - giving your product a personality and soul that connects with users rather than introducing just another layer of functionality into their lives.

This means understanding the following three things before designing the product or service - 

People’s goals (we are emotionally invested in our goals)

People’s expectations (expectations determine our emotional responses)

People’s emotional response to how something ‘feels’ when it is used.

Emotional Value Proposition

Most brands have a value proposition (a promise to produce value for a customer). The author advocates companies to work on emotional value proposition too (look at emotional outcomes – how people feel as opposed to what they do when building the proposition).

Kolko recommends this format of an empathy value proposition - 

After using [product] people will feel* more [positive emotion] (and/or will feel less [negative emotion]).

*The 10 feelings psychologists use to measure happiness  internationally are -  the frequency you feel these five positive feelings – active, determined, attentive, inspired, alert vs. the frequency you feel these negative feelings – afraid, nervous, upset, hostile, ashamed

Here are the four key steps: (1) Determine a product-market fit by seeking signals from communities of users, (2) Identify behavioral insights by conducting ethnographic research, (3) Sketch a product strategy by synthesizing complex research data into simple insights, and (4) Polish the product details using visual representations to simplify complex ideas.

Whatever you’re designing, give your product a personality. Kolko argues that audiences are essentially in dialogue with the products they use.

Book 2 - Wired to Care: How Companies Prosper When They Create Widespread Empathy

Author - Dev Patnaik

Source - Summary by the author in Informit 

Summary - 

The essence of the book is - the problem with business today isn’t a lack of innovation; it’s a lack of empathy

The Pattie story

Early one morning in 1979, Pattie Moore, a young designer living in New York, transformed herself into an old woman three times her age (strapped herself into a body brace that made her shoulders hunch forward,  wore a white wig, plugged up her ears so she couldn’t hear, put on glasses that blurred her vision….). 

And then stepped out to feel the world as an old lady. What she realised was the world was not designed for senior citizens (Pill bottles demanded too much dexterity. Telephones were too hard to dial. Climbing the steps onto a city bus was a dangerous ordeal). She continued this experiment for over three years. Pattie’s experience opened up a new generation of ‘Empathetic designers’. 

This story (and many more such stories) of how companies prosper when they reach out and connect with other people forms the basis of this book.

When people in an organization develop an intuitive vibe for what’s going on in the world, they’re able to see new opportunities. A widespread sense of empathy starts to influence the culture of a place, giving it a sense of clarity and mission.

Though a business book, it seeks to answer questions that are relevant to all - businesspeople, educators, designers, marketers, athletes, policymakers….

This is how the book is organised - 

The miopia - how organizations lose sight of the real world and how they might regain that connection

The empathy culture - how we can create a widespread sense of empathy across a large group of people

The pay off - how the widespread empathy can help companies to see opportunities faster, prosper for longer, ensure ethical conduct, and instill a personal sense of meaning in each employee

Hope this helps you do a deep dive to draw out your empathy and make your organisation prosper, emotionally and financially. 

What is Empathy?

Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another.

This is a nice quote that explains the difference between Empathy and Sympathy - 

“Empathy is walking a mile in somebody else's moccasins. Sympathy is being sorry their feet hurt.” ― Rebecca O'Donnell

This is what Webster Dictionary says -

Sympathy - an affinity, association, or relationship between persons or things wherein whatever affects one similarly affects the other

Empathy - the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner

Compassion - sympathetic consciousness of others' distress together with a desire to alleviate it

My learning so far on this topic

Day 8 post -  5 People Who Changed the World By Taking Compassion to the Extreme

Day 18 post - How brands are using empathy to enhance marketing

Day 28 post - Types of unempathetic people

Day 38 - Two TED talks - Trash cart Superheroes & Compassion and the true meaning of empathy

How to improve this skill?

Set a goal to become a go-to person by mastering the art and science of Empathy. 

Follow the LAST model to build your personal brand as a Guru of Empathy. 

Learn - Invest time in learning different frameworks/ models/ techniques of Empathy 

Apply - 

Identify a model suitable to you

Create a template to document the flow of the process

Find opportunities to use the selected method/ template

Maintain record/ process flow of every important activities you did with respect to Empathy

Maintain notes of your thoughts/ insights/ failures/ challenges…. to be used for sharing/ training others

Share - Share the insights captured in step 2 above in a planned manner (social media posts, blogs, videos, study notes…)

Train - Generate opportunities to train your peers and team members so that, over time, your organization benefits from your efforts

Purpose of this document

I took a 66 day challenge to study Life Skills last year (10 April 2019). To my astonishment, I succeeded in studying for 66 days one skill a day. 

My objectives of learning these skills were - To strengthen my mind to face life’s challenges with ease, To use these skills in my worklife for a better performance, To use these skills in my personal life for enriching my relationships, To open new possibilities to surprise myself. 

This is my next 66 day challenge (from 10 April 2020) - To share my Life Skills learning with my social media friends. 

I pray that my toil helps you in your success journey.

What are Life Skills?

UNICEF defines Life skills as - psychosocial abilities for adaptive and positive behaviour that enable individuals to deal effectively with the demands and challenges of everyday life. They are loosely grouped into three  broad categories of skills

- cognitive skills for analyzing and using information, 

- personal skills for developing personal agency and managing oneself, 

- inter-personal skills for communicating and interacting effectively with others.

Which LifeSkills are covered?

The World Health Organisation identified these basic areas of life skills that are relevant across cultures: 

1.  Decision-making

2.  Problem-solving

3.  Creative thinking

4.  Critical thinking

5.  Communication

6.  Interpersonal skills

7.  Self-awareness

8.  Empathy

9.  Coping with emotions

10. Coping with stress.

Some trivia

‘Life skills’ was never part of the school curriculum. WHO/ UNESCO mandated academia to teach these skills in all schools across the globe in 1993.

Different countries educate their children in these skills with different objectives

- Zimbabwe and Thailand - prevention of HIV/AIDS

- Mexico - prevention of adolescent pregnancy

- United Kingdom - child abuse prevention

- USA - prevention of substance abuse and violence

- South Africa and Colombia - positive socialization of children.