5 Understanding Emotions and Motivations in Yourself and Others

Understanding Emotions and Motivations in Yourself and Others.Enhance your emotional intelligence by learning how to understand the feelings and drives of both yourself and those around you.

In social life, we must have heard the word moral as a basis for distinguishing between good and bad. In the moral method, there is also empathy which is one of the learning elements. Empathy is something that is very important to be honed in a person to face various situations in life. Basically, empathy is a behavior for us to be able to understand the feelings, desires and thoughts of others which are then reflected into ourselves. 

Empathy itself is closely related to emotional intelligence or what is often called emotional intelligence (EI). Emotional intelligence is needed which involves our ability to understand emotions in ourselves and in others to analyze shared judgments and decisions. If we want to hone our emotional intelligence, we will understand how to recognize our own emotions as well as those of others, which is beneficial for self-control, self-motivation, and building relationships with others. 

Understanding Emotions and Motivations in Yourself and Others.

After knowing the components of emotional intelligence, the next step is to understand the characteristics of people who have emotional intelligence. There are several characteristics of people who have emotional intelligence, namely:

  1. Able to recognize one’s own feelings;
  2. Able to read other people’s feelings;
  3. Know your own strengths and weaknesses;
  4. Not easily offended (read: offended);
  5. Tends to be a good listener;
  6. Open-minded and able to accept other people’s opinions;
  7. Don’t be ashamed to apologize first.

The level of emotional intelligence itself can also influence a person’s learning independence, so that the person’s achievements tend to increase or even be high, as discussed in the book Tips for Success Through Emotional Intelligence and Learning Independence.

After understanding about emotional intelligence makes us understand what is meant by that intelligence. Next we will understand the components in the formation of emotional intelligence.

1. Have Self-Awareness

The first component is self-awareness. According to KBBI, self-awareness is defined as the awareness that someone understands about their own condition. In this case, it means that this awareness is the awareness in which you are able to understand the emotions that are inside you.

This is the most important aspect of emotional intelligence. The more you understand the emotional conditions within yourself and how to control them, the better the emotional intelligence that is formed.

In fact, apart from understanding the emotions within oneself, a person must also be aware of the impact of actions, moods and emotions when interacting with other people.

Individuals must have control over the emotions that exist within themselves, to form self-awareness, in addition to having access to control over their own emotions, they must also understand the reactions to different emotions, and be able to understand what emotions are emerging.

It would be good, to form emotional intelligence, a person must understand and know the relationship between what they feel and how they should behave. In addition, they must be able to recognize what their own strengths and weaknesses are.

Researchers reveal that basically people have self-awareness, have characteristics, namely having a good sense of humor, having high self-confidence and believing in their own abilities, and being aware of how people view them.

2. Forming Self-Regulation

In accordance with the first component, the second component is to form self-regulation. Regulation has the meaning of regulation. In this case, it means that individuals must have good emotional regulation.

After being able to realize that there are emotions within oneself, it will have an impact on other people, so in its performance, emotional intelligence must be able to manage emotions and regulate them.

It doesn’t mean that you have to hide your true feelings and lock the door tightly, so that your emotions don’t come out. No, that’s a big mistake . If you are like that, you will only wait for the right time and circumstances for you to express your true feelings. Expressing emotions appropriately both in choosing the right time and circumstances is called self-regulation.

The impact of those of you who are able to do self-regulation is that they tend to be able to adapt well to changes and are flexible. In addition, they are also smart in calming tense situations and smart in managing conflicts so that they can produce solutions.

Research shows that someone who has good self-management skills and good self-awareness will have an impact on how they are responsible and have the ability to influence others around them.

3. Have Social Skills

An important aspect of emotional intelligence is the ability to interact socially well. In fact, emotional understanding does not only involve understanding one’s own emotions, but also understanding the emotions of others. The more often you interact and apply understanding of your own and other people’s emotions, this will help in forming higher emotional intelligence.

4. Have Empathy

Having empathy is one component of emotional intelligence. Empathy is defined as the ability to better understand the feelings of others, and this is very important for the development of emotional intelligence. Empathy forms an understanding of the emotions being felt by the person we are talking to, or the people around us.

5. Have Self-Motivation

The key role in shaping emotional intelligence is held by self-motivation. Emotionally intelligent people tend to be motivated beyond external motivations such as gaining fame, praise, money and recognition.

They tend to have motivation to fulfill their own needs and inner needs. Someone who has self-motivation tends to be competent and tends to be oriented towards control actions. So if you look at people who have emotional intelligence, they are able to commit and are very smart in taking initiatives.

The emotional intelligence that a person has is sometimes reflected in real life, where in general they become individuals who stand out and have warm close relationships and become stars at work and this is discussed in the book Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman.

There are several studies that state that people who are successful in society are not just cognitively intelligent people. Except people who have interpersonal relationships between people. And of course, to be able to have interpersonal skills requires high emotional intelligence. If we are only intelligent but do not have a sense of empathy, we will not know what the benefit of that intelligence is for other people.

The bad thing is, we can use that intelligence for things that (not impossible) actually destroy humans. So having intellectual or cognitive intelligence is not enough. We must have a balance between intellectual and emotional intelligence so that we are not only smart in thinking but also have morals that help us distinguish between good and bad behavior.