Active EQ: Create Stronger Connections

In audio taped meetings with patients, researchers identified 384 "empathic opportunities," but found that the physicians responded empathically to only 39 of them. Each encounter elicited an average of less than two empathic responses from the doctor.

Empathy - Psychology Wiki - a Wikia wiki

Wikia's entry on empathy. Good resource.

An article from my alma mater's quarterly magazine entitled: The Hardest Thing You'll Ever Do: A philosopher tackles the ethical conundrum of forgiveness. It starts:

During the period of apartheid in South Africa, Eugene de Kock, the head of a notorious death squad, earned the nickname "Prime Evil." But de Kock, now serving a life sentence, decided to tell the truth about the atrocities he had committed and to ask for forgiveness from women he had widowed.

Incredibly, the women chose to forgive him.

Click for more. Bostonia - Winter 2007-2008

BU Alumni Web - Bostonia - Winter 2007-2008

My alma mater's take on why the Muslim world is in the eye of virtually every storm. It strikes me that it is emotionally based. The article starts:

"Husain Haqqani recalls a Newsweek cover from October 2001: a Pakistani child brandishing a gun and the headline "Why They Hate Us." The photo is emblematic of a question that has haunted Haqqani, director of BU's Center for International Relations and a College of Arts and Sciences associate professor of international relations. "I have always wondered why the Muslim world is in the eye of virtually every storm, in my lifetime at least," he says. "The Middle East is a cauldron. The India-Pakistan conflict has a Muslim dimension. In Russia, there's Chechnya, another Muslim dimension." Why is the Muslim world plagued by instability, undemocratic governments, and sectarian violence?

Haqqani has set out to find answers."

Do them now.

37 Stress Management Tips: More Tips for Easing Stress | Health | Reader's Digest

Welcome folks.

Thanks for the invite to present at your monthly meeting, and thanks for the hospitality and participation.

As promised, here is my entire presentation, with over two dozen links that will aid you in further study.

If you have any questions or comments, please be sure to post them (click on "Leave a comment" below). Looking forward to hearing from you.

Slides Only:
- Part One
- PartTwo
- Part Three

"All learning has an emotional base."
-Plato

How's that for a title?

But I didn't write it -- it's the title of a true story, written in sonnet(ish) form, by someone close to me who suffered a doomed relationship with a brother.

I assert that this is emotionally intelligent expressing at its truest form.

ALL CATS MUST DIE

I saw my brother take a cat and shoot it with a gun.
I saw my brother take a cat and slice it with a knife.
I saw my brother take a cat and stomp it with his shoe.
I saw my brother take a cat and strike it with a car.
I saw my brother sic his dog and gobble up a cat.

"All cats must die," he said out loud.
I don't see my brother any more.

"Everything becomes a little different as soon as it is spoken out loud."
–
Hermann Hesse

(or written out loud)

Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (Revised, Adult)

Identifying emotions is a critical skill in EQ. In this test, created by EQ expert Simon Baron-Cohen, you read 36 faces and identify emotions.

I scored 30 out of 36. My husband 29 out of 36.

What's your score?

Are you in the middle of conflict? In CCL's (Center for Creative Leadership) July newsletter, you will find a quick yet comprehensive article on calming conflict.

What I took out of it was their suggestion on the positions/destructive responses to avoid, which I will translate as questions to ask yourself (for self-awareness, emotional management and relationship building). You could also ask this of another in case they are in the middle of conflict. Those questions are:

* Am I/Are you taking the position to win at all costs?
* Am I/Are you displaying anger?
* Am I/Are you demeaning others?
* Am I/Are you retaliating?
* Am I/Are avoiding?
* Am I/Are you yielding?
* Am I/Are you hiding emotions?
* Am I/Are you self criticizing?

Be sure to click on "return to issue" for even more articles on conflict management.

"You think you can, or you think you can't - either way, you're right."

Henry Ford

Thanks for signing up for my Emotional Intelligence course. And thanks mostly for your great questions and intelligent participation.

For the next couple of weeks, I have opened up this blog for comments. (Which simply means you don't have to sign in to leave a comment -- something I do to prevent spam comments.)

To get in touch with me, please leave a comment by clicking on "leave a comment" below and fililng in the fields that displays. (I will never publish your email on this blog; you enter it so I can email you back.) You can also decipher my email (not difficult) which is explained when you click on "email me" in the above menu bar.

Thanks again and hope to connect soon.

Martha

My husband and I are dealing with a local business owner who has been intimidating and bullying us by questioning and legally threatening the validity of a contract over 16 years old. This business owner uses his clout to lie to the local police department claiming we are trespassing on his property and sends us scores of letters by mail bullying us and making life horrible.

We refer to him as a "psychopath" or "sociopath" (synonyms, in fact).

And we may be very correct in our assessment. Turns out one percent (thank heaven it's not more) of the population are "subclinical psycopaths". (The scary question is "how many "clinical" psychopaths?!")

"They're your neighbor, your boss, and your blind date. Because they have no conscience, they're natural predators."

The scariest part of all is that there is no "cure", no functioning treatment program for psychopathy.

Tragically, my and husband and I have unintentionally made it worse because we would not let ourselves be threatened, so we engaged. We sent letters back and, boy, did we make him livid. A livid sociopath is not a pretty sight and can be extremely frightening, in fact. We were not prepared.

I wish we had known that psychopaths have three motivations: thrill-seeking, the pathological desire to win, and the inclination to hurt people. "They'll jump on any opportunity that allows them to do those things," he says. "If something better comes along, they'll drop you and move on."

He's got upwards of 11 litigations and a $65,000 contempt of court against him. He does not rest. Even when the courts call him on it, he breaks all the rules. He knows no boundaries.

Scary, scary stuff. A business owner, a father, a husband, and a psychopath. Just our luck that one out of 3,000 psycopaths in the population, he'd be in our community.

Click to read more about psychopaths and the test used to "diagnose" called the Hare Psychopathy Checklist.

Daniel Goleman makes a presentation at the TED Conference on emotional intelligence. The TEDBlog recaps it by saying:

"Daniel Goleman made a wonderful connection between emotional intelligence and the empathy which will be required -- by all of us -- to make more informed, broader-scope consumption and action decisions in the future. "

Your best read is Ethan Zuckerman's synopsis of Goleman's presentation.

Bruno's review is a little more lean. Read it here (then control f for Daniel Goleman).

Direct from the TED Conference, blogger Bruno Giussanitells us about Jonathan Harris, a 28 year-old Internet artist and designer who has created software that tries to capture "emotional footprints" happening as we speak.

What you see is the ultimate feeling words list that is happening now.

I know I'm failing miserably attempting to describe what that actually means, so go take a peek here right now (then click on Open We Feel Fine)

And that's nothing compared to his other site, Lovelines. This one displays feelings of love (or hate) as they happen now. Wow.

Click here to read Ethan Zuckerman's post on Harris' presentation. He doesn't fail miserably.

From the Ted Conference:

John Maeda is a graphic designer and visual artist, and computer scientist at MIT's MediaLab, and author of the book "The Laws of Simplicity". Maeda says "Simplicity is about living a life with more enjoyment and less pain". Here are the ten laws of simplicity:

1. Reduce: The simplest way to achieve simplicity is through thoughtful reduction
2. Organize: Organization makes a system of many appear fewer
3. Time: Savings in time feel like simplicity
4. Learn: Knowledge makes everything simpler
5. Differences: Simplicity and complexity need each other
6. Context: What lies in the periphery of simplicity is definitely not peripheral
7. Emotions: More emotions are better than less.
8. Trust: In simplicity we trust
9. Failure: Some things can never be made simple.
10. The one: simplicity is about subtracting the obvious, and adding the meaningful

Click here for Maeda's blog and then click on Laws for his own words on each one.

Psychology Today: Swallow Your Fear

"Experts have found that taking physical risks is good for you: successfully navigating risky situations teaches you about yourself, increases your self-confidence, and helps you better manage life's inevitable uncertainties."

Couldn't agree more. If I use myself as a case study, consider: learning to sail, learning to scuba, climbing Machu Picchu, riding horseback through the Sacred Valley to 14,000 feet.

Hardwired for Happiness

Of all the emotions, happiness is the one scientists least understand.

In this article, find out the recent developments in the neuroscience of happiness. What stood out for me was:

"Research in psychology has shown repeatedly that the ability to regulate one’s emotions is essential for a happy life. While we may strive to be rational and in control, emotions are an indissoluble and essential part of our psyche. The great personal search, then, is how to defeat our inner enemies, to achieve control over our negative emotions. Although many psychologists and neuroscientists decry as unsupported sensationalism what has been known as the “power of positive thinking,” in fact several serious studies, using functional brain imaging techniques to observe the brain during sadness and happiness, have shown that distinct parts of the prefrontal cortex are involved in the volitional suppression of negative feelings."

So: CHOOSE HAPPINESS, MISERY IS OPTIONAL.

Here are more compelling excerpts:

A new study by Leadership IQ shows that poor interpersonal skills -- which are often overlooked during the interview process -- will cause new hires to fail.

The study found that 26% of new hires fail because they can’t accept feedback, 23% because they’re unable to understand and manage emotions, 17% because they lack the necessary motivation to excel, 15% because they have the wrong temperament for the job, and only 11% because they lack the necessary technical skills.

Read the press release of the study here.

"The companies that are going to prevail realize it's the quality of the emotional experience that sets them apart."
Danny Meyer

In an interview with Fast Company magazine, mega-restaurateur Danny Meyer, who has 4 of the top 20 restaurants in Zagat's New York, shares how he hires people in the hospitality business.

FC: Given the reps of Union Square Cafe and Gramercy Tavern, you must get resumes from every great chef and waiter in the city. How do you tell the fois gras from the chopped liver?
Meyer: The most important thing we do is teach our managers how to hire for a certain emotional skill set that yields what we call a hospitalitarian. We want people who have the technical skills we need -- how to clear a table beautifully, how to distinguish between wines, how to chop a perfect brunoise. That's 49% of the equation. The other 51% is emotional skills. You can't teach those skills, but you can teach how to spot them.

FC: What emotional qualities are you looking for?

In his book, Goleman explains social intelligence means being smart in relationships by being empathetic, or being able to sense what others are feeling and their intentions.

Read an exceprt here.

Emotional intelligence and leadership are intertwined. The disconnect is that so many people don't think they are leaders. Most people in business would define a leader as the CEO, or manager with budget and staff authority.

The truth is each and every one of us is a leader -- of ourselves and of the interactions we contribute to.

This article talks about how leaders must manage their ego and emotions if they want to be effective.

Excerpt:

"We influence others all the time emotionally. A leader who knows that can be tremendously effective in fixing a bad situation or reinvigorating members of his organization, captivating people, or calming them down. People resonate to people who connect to them emotionally. It is a learned ability."

"Business leaders who don't know themselves as well as they should and who cannot get a grip on their ego and emotions...fail."

Leading from Within Means Learning to Manage Your Ego and Emotions

CEO Hatim Tyabji is pointing to a poster on his office wall. The poster consists of twelve blocks, each with a photo of an Irish setter. The first 11 blocks show the dog standing, thoroughly oblivious to a command to "sit." Finally, in block twelve, the Irish setter sits. "Good dog," reads the poster.

"To me, that is the essence of leadership," Tyabji declares. "Human beings are worse than the Irish setter. Leadership is an ongoing, nonstop, continuous process. I can't get disillusioned when I say 'sit' and nobody sits. So I just keep repeating the message."

This book review came to me via email (gotta love it when the internet comes to you), and it looks like a good read.

The author of the book observes that there are plenty of management books out there but none tell you how to go about dealing with the emotional minefield work can be.

The author says "it's appropriate to go to the boss with questions regarding accounts receivable or sales firgures.....but when you feel nauseous after a staff meeting or a certain account gives you a migraine, where do you turn?"

Sovereign Bancorp's CEO, Jay S. Sidhu, gives commencement address and urges students to develop their emotional intelligence skills each day:

Today I came across a new word -- a Chinese word at that -- twice within a couple of hours. What serendipity!

When the universe talks to me in this way, I listen. (Could it be I have guanxi with the universe?)

Translated literally, guanxi (pronounced gwan-she) means "relationship building"; in practice, it means carefully cultivated clout, a culturally calibrated measure of respect, influence, and honor. It is a personal as well as political form of capital.

Hmmm. Isn't that EQ?

This makes me wonder how EQ fits into global business, specifically with China. China is the next big market -- China has more teenangers than America has adults!

So, what can we learn about guanxi and how can that help us understand how to do business nationally and internationally?

In his book, Genius at Work, author Dick Richard's premise is that we all have genius, no matter how much we might fight the notion, no matter how much we don't recognize our own genius. (What is genius?)

Recognizing -- that is identifying and putting a name on -- our unique genius is a difficult task, he asserts.

"Empathy requires the ability to understand how others perceive situations. This perception includes knowing how others feel about a particular set of events or circumstances. Empathy requires knowing the perspective of others and being very able to see things from the value and belief system of the other person. It is the ability to fully immerse oneself in another's viewpoint, yet be able to remain wholly apart. The understanding associated with empathy is both cognitive and emotional. It takes into consideration the reasons and logic behind another's feelings or point of view, while also alowing the empathic party to feel the spirit of a person or thing."

Adele B. Lynn

I like this definition because it talks about how others perceive situations. Perception is reality. So by trying to see how another perceives a situation, you enter their reality. It doesn't mean you have to agree with it. It doesn't even mean you have to feel it or even understand it.

Being empathic allows you to gather the data that supports their reality. The more you know, the better able you are to align and influence.

Take a suicide bomber's perspective.

The short of it is this:

We spend our working days (we used to call them "careers") uninspired and unproductive because of unsupportive micro-managers, demanding clients, unreasonable delays and impossible requests.

Or as Richard Boyatzis says in his book Resonant Leadership:

....who's the fairest of them all?

Could it be that real beauty lies in the most empathic and compassionate ones?

So says Matthieu Ricard, former genetic researcher, now Buddhist monk and author of Happiness: A Guide to Developing Life's Most Important Skill.

"You see it on someone's face when she feels in harmony with our deepest nature as human beings, which is basicall peaceful and loving."

Something radiates from within. What is it?

"You're responding to empathy, compassion, an openness to others."

But how does that harmony manifest itself physically? Through subtle expressions, sas Ricard, which we pick up both consciously and unconsciously. Hundreds of almost impreceptible muscular movements constantly communicate our feelings. Think of how a classically beautiful face changes when it's transformed by contempt; less beautiful, right? Maybe even ugly?

Unconditional love transforms a face, too, says Ricard. We identify with that look. It brings up in us a yearning to be loved and to be loving.

Author, columnist for O Magazine and coach Martha Beck hits the nail right on the head in this article about how to cultivate empathy.

She walks us through an empathy workthat that consists of:

Apparently it can. In fact, a diet rich in omega-3's.

Read about a study that showed a diet of salmon and spinach fed to prisoners led to a decrease in violence. (From the NYT Magazine, April 16th issue.)

I rush to imagine a future where a judge, fed up with a repeat offender, imposes anger management courses and a diet rich in omega-3's.

In April's issue of O, Dr. Phil shares a four-step program for teaching your child empathy as he answers a reader's question:

Q: I have a 10-year-old daughter who steals things from friends. My husband and I just caught her for the fourth time in two years. She makes up ridiculous stories about how the toys got into her hands. How do we deal with this?

I realize I haven't written about technology for quite some time, so here's a great review of blogs and websites that are the best. These SEOmoz's Web 2.0 Awards were handed out March 28, 2006, so it's real current.

It's a fun read....you'll discover websites you never knew existed. Like, did you know there is free websites out there that will let you create maps of your choice? Did you know there was free web-based word processing programs that allow you to file documents onto your desktop?

If I had known that I would not have forked over copious amounts of money for Microsoft Word. Doesn't Bill Gates have enought money?!

But, boy do I love technology. That's the emotional part of it.....when designed correctly, blogs and websites can create an entirely new and useful experience that expands the mind.

I just discovered a newspaper column that covers The Apprentice weekly as a "leadership" course.

I just love that! Why didn't I think of that!?

Here are the installments which appear in a Seattle newspaper called Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Note: You may have to register as a free user to get full access to articles.

Episode #1

Episode #2

Episode #3

Episode #4

Episode #5

Episode #6

Episode #7

Episode #8

Episode #9

Episode #10

Episode #11

Episode #12

Episode #13

Finale

...that helps us navigate our social surroundings. More than just caring, empathy is a complex neurological mechanism that holds society together.

So says the Infinite Mind as they discuss empathy, it's history, it's place in science, how it works in the brain and more. You'll learn about what goes on in our brains when we tune into each other’s emotions, and what it means if we can’t.

Listen to this fantastic hour-long show to understand more about empathy. Originally aired November 2003, but re-aired recently on March 8, 2006.

Heck, just the show's abstract is an interesting read and gives a great "who's who" and "what's what" in the world of empathy.

Find out here.

From Carl Rogers' book "A Way of Being"

"An empathic way of being with another person has several facets. It means entering the private perceptual world of the other and becoming thoroughly at home in it. It involves being sensitive, moment to moment, to the changing felt meanings which flow in this other person, to the fear or rage or tenderness or confusion or whatever he or she is experiencing. It means temporarily living in the other's life, moving about in it delicately without making judgments; it means sensing meanings of which he or she is scarcely aware, but not trying to uncover totally unconscious feelings, since this would be too threatening. It includes communicating your sensings of the persons world as you look with fresh and unfrightened eyes at elements of which he or she is fearful. It means frequently checking with the person as to the accuracy of your sensings, and being guided by the responses you receive. You are a confident companion to the person in his or her inner world. By pointing to the possible meanings in the flow of another person's experiencing, you help the other to focus on this useful type of referent, to experience the meanings more fully, and to move forward in the experiencing."

To be with another in this way means that for the time being, you lay aside your own views and values in order to enter another's world without prejudice. in some sens it means that you lay aside your self; this can only be done by persons who are secure enough in themselves that they know they will not get lost in what may turn out to be the strange or bizarre world of the other, and that they can comfortably return to their own world when they wish."

Here are some free online EQ tests. C'mon, self assessment can be fun!

Psychology Today

Blogthings

Queendom

Leadership

Tim Sanders' Likeability Factor

OK, this one's a little extreme, but, hey, you never know.

"What you do speaks so loud I can't hear what you're saying."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Emotional Intelligence is still quite a new science and therefore has many different definitions. So, here you will find various definitions that I have come across. Also, why improve your EQ? So you can:

• promote optimism
• build loyalty
• celebrate success
• resolve conflicts
• plan well but recognize, analyze and deal with failures
• “reach out" to everyone around you
• assess and respond to other people's signals
• elicit fresh ideas from employees
• effectively help employees transform negative feelings into opportunities for improvement
• push yourself to higher levels of excellence
• build rapport and relationships (be likeable!)
• Be able to build effective teams
• Lead people through change
• Read social signs
• Influence individuals and groups in the required direction

List of Definitions

"Quite simply, emotional intelligence is the intelligent use of emotions!" -- Hendrie Weisinger

According to the authors of the MSCEIT (Mayer Salovey Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test):

- EI begins with the idea that we want to identify the existing emotions in the relevant people or person, including self and others, as appropriate.

- The next step is we want to match emotion with task and this is the use of emotion.

- The third step is to understand the causes of existing emotions and what it may take to change, if necessary, or to keep the existing emotions if that is what we choose to do.

- And finally to manage emotions by following through with what we have learned by attending to the first three steps.

"Emotional intelligence is about mastering ourselves so our thinking brain can stay in charge when stress overwhelms us." Brenda Smith

A website called Edge asked its community, made up of the most interesting minds in the world, the following question:

What is your dangerous idea?

An idea you think about (not necessarily one you originated) that is dangerous not because it is assumed to be false, but because it might be true?

One contributor sites Emotional Intelligence.

Read about his dangerous idea here (scroll down to, or control f for, John Gottman). Other contributors include phsychologists Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi and Howard Gardner, neuroscientist V.S. Ramachandran, mathematician Keith Devlin, and many others.

Very provocative stuff...you are bound to get lost in this intellectual sandbox for a delicious chunk of time.

Notice Edge's credo:

To arrive at the Edge of the world's knowledge, seek out the most complex and sophisticated minds, put them in a room together and have them ask each other the questions they are asking themselves.

Sioux saying,

"If you listen for the whispers you won't have to hear the screams."

...that will make the biggest difference.

Then conduct the following exercise, as described by Marshall Goldsmith in the October 2005 issue of "Workforce Performance Solutions."

"Without understanding, no knowledge; without knowledge, no understanding."

(I think I detect a virtuous cycle.)

Kay Redfield Jamison, a Johns Hopkins professor of psychiatry, is a manic depressive with first-hand experience on the highs and lows.

In this interview with Elle Magazine she talks about the positive mental qualities of exuberance, happiness and joy and her book, An Unquiet Mind.

Back in June I started a collaborative relationship with a women who runs her own sales training firm. I was hoping to create a partnership wherein she would help me market and sell my emotional intelligence course and I would add value to her firm by adding to her current course offerings. I was hopeful and enthused.

The relationship ended recently, and not on the best terms.

What derailed us was that I gave her some feedback on her tone which I perceived to be as abrasive and demanding; bossy, rather than collaborative.

Now, of course I could say that what derailed us was that she didn't accept/receive feedback well, but I will take responsibility for what and how I communicated.

"My great religion is a belief in the blood, the flesh, as being wiser than the intellect.
We can go wrong using our minds. But what our blood feels and believes and says is always true."
- D H Lawrence

Here's a 33-page ebook called "Understanding the Power of Feelings." You get your own copy for free when you register on their site as a user (registration is free, and they don't sell your email).

I love the way they tell you a story about how the brain works and how the heart gets involved too. It's got some great visuals, "fun facts" and even exercises if you are so inclined.

IHM is mostly dedicated to schools, educators and kids K-12. But there's still a lot of applicable stuff for addults. I especially like their blog.

EQ has hit the mainstream as far as I'm concerned when I see the following magazine that launched in the UK this month. It's called Psychologies and here's their "About Us" blurb:

Welcome to Psychologies, the first women´s magazine that is about what we are really like, not just what we look like. If you are interested in the ways we think, behave, communicate and connect, then this is for you. Whether you want to develop your own potential, or become a better parent, partner or friend, we will bring you the ideas, insights and inspiration to help you do it. We all have more choices and more demands on our time than ever before. In a fast-changing world, the greatest skill we can have is to understand ourselves, and the people around us. With support from experts, who are leaders in the fields of behaviour, personality, emotions and relationships, we will present practical strategies and mind shifting insights to help you develop that understanding, and to live a richer life. I hope that you will find Psychologies.co.uk relevant to your life, thought-provoking and above all, useful.

Oprah, move over. Explore the magazine at their website.

And, also in the UK, there's a magazine called Easy Living that has -- in addition to the standard Fashion, Beauty, and Health sections -- a column on Emotional Intelligence.

It reads like an etiquette column, but with a focus on relationships, tough decisions, and communicating issues.

(Note to self: Explore the connection here to this and to my Miss Conduct/Missy Q opportunity. Hmmmm.)

It can be said that EQ is about becoming more emotion-sensitive.

Well, here's a firm that is ahead of the game and has brought emotional intelligence into artificial intelligence. NICE Systems of Isreal and NJ sells systems for call monitoring.

They're on to something. Their software tracks anger cues (like tone, pitch and number of interruptions) from incoming callers and receiving agents alike. Calls that match the algorithm are brought to a manager's attention, rather than fall through the cracks.

Next? Just imagine:

Emotion-sensitive software may be just a first step to broader monitoring. NICE's Veinstein says the same algorithms can be used to detect fraud. "You're calling your insurance company about a claim—say, that your car's been stolen, but it really hasn't been," he says. "A software agent could identify, in real time, an emotion that correlates with fraud."

Yikes. And after that? I can just imagine a future where individuals carry their own emotion sensitive monitoring devices. Just like disk drive space went from refrigerator-size units to thumb drives, perhaps emotion detection devices will ultimately be carried -- or implanted -- by you and me.

So, when you ask your kids where they've been, your husband why the business meeting lasted so long, or an applicant his education background, you'll be in the know.

Before you know it there'll be courses and chemicals that you can take that will inhibit emotions, so that we all will become a species superior at hiding emotions, fooling and yet confusing everyone. We'll all be like zombies or actors in a freak show.

Sounds like a bad science fiction plot; forgive my digression. Although I may not be far off: Fortune reports that NICE is used by the LAPD.

Read more about NICE systems.

Self-awareness is a major component of emotional intelligence.

Rather than poo-poo the concept, it's time for more to believe that there's something valid about being "in tune" with your own emotions.

In the article below, Lauren Slater (author of Openning Skinner's Box) tell us why it's OK to think self-help is helpful.

Also, looking for some good self-help? I couldn't find Koocher's list of top self-help books that the article referred to, but I did find the folowing:

About.com's list of the top self-help classics of all time.

Uniersity of Wisconsin's recommendation list.

To me this is both visually beautiful and cognitivly intriguing.

I heart the brain.

Goldsmith writes:

"...listening requires the discipline to concentrate. So I've developed a simple exercise to test my clients' listening skills. Close your eyes. Count slowly to 50 with one simple goal: You can't let another thought intrude into your mind. You must concentrate on maintaining the count.

Sounds simple, but incredibly, more than half of my clients can't do it. Somewhere around 20 or 30, nagging thoughts invade their brain. They think about a problem at work, or their kids, or how much they ate for dinner the night before. This may sound like a concentration test, but it's really a listening exercise. After all, if you can't listen to yourself (someone you presumably like) as you count to 50, how will you ever be able to listen to another person?"

Read more here.

Nova had an excellent piece on how neuroscientists have located empathy in the brain and what that means to us as humans and how we relate to one another. I've included the transcript from that show in this post.

It's about a 15-minute read, but if you are looking for the science behind empathy, or just want to understand empathy, this is the read.

If you'd rather watch the segment (I highly recommend it since some examples are purely visual), click here.

Met a lovely woman who reminded me of me.

She was professional, smart, elegant, articulate, motivated, full of great ideas, eloquent, fasionable, shall I go on?

But the me I recognized in her was the part that can be forceful, confident bordering on cockiness, in-your-face, demanding, and has high expectations of others. She was an open, vulnerable, take-control kind-of-gal, and I knew exactly what she meant when she said she was truly puzzled on why she turns people off.

I couldn't help see me! So I asked her, "Are you a Scorpio?"

You know what she said?

National Geographic's March 2005 issue has a full feature on the brain called "Beyond the Brain."

In it they talk about:
- brain surgery while patient remains awake
- how different regions of the brain control different functions (front left, language; back of brain, vision, etc.)
- brain development starting from inside the womb (did you know that at the moment of our birth we possess more brain cells than we ever will again?)
- how the brain, at birth, is able to hear every sound of every langauge on Earth, but only the syllables of our native language fill our ears, then our brain becomes more sensitive to just those sounds, while losing their responsiveness to other langauges
- In the old days, people said the brain is like a computer, but it's very distributed, closer to the Internet. (Most activity occurs in both hemisphere's of the brain.)

While National Geographic doesn't offer the entire article on-line (even for subscribers; what gives!?), they do include some other fun and useful links.

My favorite is Paul Eckman's survey that is asking for volunteers to take an online test to see how good you are at identifying emotions. It takes about 10 minutes.

Using the link above, click on "Do Your Part for Science" over there on the right hand side of the page. Have fun! (You have until the end of 2005 to participate.)

Last weekend my husband played in another two-day golf tournament.

That meant I was a golf widow for the weekend again -- not my favorite thing to do. I'd much rather spend the weekend playing tennis and going to the beach.

If the golf industry only knew they could make golf widows feel better, would they?

What I mean is, rather than give each player a new golf bag or pro shop dollars as the door prize for attending the event, how about giving something that would please the golf widow more than the player?

How about a laptop bag especially for the wife? This one's cool. Or portable speakers? A must-have ipod accessory. Or, the ever useful Amazon gift certificate?

But then again, maybe the golf industry is actually being empathic. After all, with gifts like these, we'd probably end up fighting over who keeps them!

What do you think, is linking golf and EQ a stretch?

I don't think so.

Although am I the only one thinking this new EQ program might be taking it a little too far?

In an interview with Reed Hastings, co-founder of Netflix, he mentions how he connected some dots that really paid off: a mega-deal with Wal-Mart wherein Wal-Mart handed over their online dvd business to Netflix.

First dot: Hastings observes that Wal-Mart enters the online dvd market with modest promotional efforts.

Second dot: Hastings is impressed with Wal-Mart's dvd prices during a Christmas shopping visit.

Third dot: He called the CEO (of Walmart.com) and asked if he could have dinner.

I always thought empathy was a cognitive function, a thought-ful/mind-ful cortical exertion that focused on processing emotional data from the primitive brain.

Research using MRI scanners monitored volunteers while their legs were touched and while they watched videos of other people being touched and of objects colliding.

Turns out, a sensory area of the brain called the secondary somatosensory cortex, thought only to respond to physical touch, was strongly activated by the sight of others being touched.

This suggests that empathy requires no specialised brain area. The brain simply transforms what we see into what we would have felt in the same situation.

"This means we can feel empathy without building up complex theories about what others feel". The researcher says.

This is good to know since I've always thought that empathy has something to do with a set of intuitive emotional knowledge we all have.

I decided to see how collaborative encyclopedias like Wikipedia and Everything2 define empathy.

Real interesting search. In it, I found out that the drug ecstasy (MDMA) is classified as an "empathogen" which is the name applied to some members of the phenethylamine family of psychoactive molecules.

It is in the realm of consciousness - the psyche, the mind, and the soul - where the results so far seen from MDMA make it one of the most fascinating, mysterious molecules discovered during this century. Its actions are little understood as yet. But it is clear that is has an extraordinary and unprecedented heart-opening or empathy-generating effect...

See Everything2 finds on empathy
See Wikipedia finds on empathy

Are women better at empathy than men?

I get this question a lot when I train empathy skills. I used to say that there's no difference. Oops, I might be wrong.

It turns out that while there are no major differences in total emotional intelligence scores, women and men do differ in certain abilities (according to a study that used Reuven Bar-On's EQ Inventory.)

Again, men and women are equal when it comes to total EQ, but when it comes to empathy, interpersonal relationship and social responsibility, women score higher.

When it comes to assertiveness, stress tolerance and impulse control, men score higher.

But wait.....

I am part of a brilliant trend and I feel happy.

Says BusinessWeek, in this article entitled "The Power of Us," I'm part of a....

...big, hairy, monstrous organism, that is. The nearly 1 billion people online worldwide -- along with their shared knowledge, social contacts, online reputations, computing power, and more -- are rapidly becoming a collective force of unprecedented power. For the first time in human history, mass cooperation across time and space is suddenly economical. "There's a fundamental shift in power happening," says Pierre M. Omidyar, founder and chairman of the online marketplace eBay Inc. (EBAY ) "Everywhere, people are getting together and, using the Internet, disrupting whatever activities they're involved in."

Mass cooperation across time and space? It touches me profoundly that I'm part of that. You see, Bloggers reveal their knowledge -- themselves -- all the time and it doesn't get more cooperative than that. I end up wanting to know more about what these people know about. I get hooked, and so do roughy 10 million other people.

And online reputation? I can tell you I feel bad when I act unbecoming to online customer service. (Maybe I don't sense cooperation?) But I feel good when I use paypal on Ebay and click on "donate" on Mozilla, for example. (Maybe I feel I'm giving, not paying?)

In any event, give people information and access to other people, and just step back and see what they do with it. We feel a network of brains synthesize information into knowledge, collaboration, experience and wisdom. We feel evolution happening. An evolution that depends on others.

Do you feel the Power of Us? I know I do. Bloggers provide me with a sort of continuous learning opportunity. They plug me in to what's going on, and that requires others. I depend on others in a profound way.

This isn't touchy-feely stuff. It transforms the economy.

How can a tiny European upstart like Skype Technologies S.A. do a number on a trillion-dollar industry? By dialing up a vast, hidden resource: its own users. Skype, the newest creation from the same folks whose popular file-sharing software Kazaa freaked out record execs, also lets people share their resources -- legally. When users fire up Skype, they automatically allow their spare computing power and Net connections to be borrowed by the Skype network, which uses that collective resource to route others' calls. The result: a self-sustaining phone system that requires no central capital investment -- just the willingness of its users to share. Says Skype CEO Niklas Zennström: "It's almost like an organism."

To be sure, there's still a lot of junk to wade through. Search engine have solved one giant problem (to locate the kowledge), but given us another giant problem (knowledge overload). What you need is more eyeballs. That comes from other people. In fact, this BusinessWeek link was provided by my personal knowledge consultant and collaborator. (Yes, they exist.)

How do you tap into the Power of Us? Organize your knowledge and stay connected, that's how. Everyone knows that knowledge is power, but Kpedia says: Organized Knowledge is Rocket Power.

Read what else Businessweek has to say about the Power of Us.

I went to the “How To Think Like Leonardo� workshop, led by author Michael Gelb, at the Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, NY this past weekend. I signed up for the course because of an interview I read with the author.

So, how’d it go? Here are my thoughts.

There's an interesting magazine out of Australia called "Knowledge of Reality Magazine." It costs to subscribe, but in the spirit of sharing, they have some of their articles available online for free.

I found one on EI and Yoga:

"It has been argued that Goleman’s definition [of EI] is confusing because he has included variables which might be better called ‘personality traits’ than components of EI, and that the included areas reflect his personal biases and interests which include meditation and Eastern philosophy. Goleman’s book, however, contains very little reference to these areas and, considering the failure of western science to grasp the workings of the psyche, it might be worthwhile looking at EI from the perspective of Yoga."

A few students from my last EQ class gave me these wonderful rocks as gifts. Thanks Alicia, Connie, Ron, Jenn and Kevin!

Why rocks?

I have been addicted to Survivor since the first season, and can confess that Survivor turned me on to other reality TV shows. From Dr. Phil, to The Bachelor, to Star Search, to The Apprentice, I am no longer embarrassed to say I LOVE these shows.

Are you with me?

Why can we hold our heads high?

This article talks the importance of management style in political appointees:

"... the White House vetting process for political appointees may well now expand to also cover a candidate's management style. Just as potential high-level federal appointees have been forced to consider whether their nannies are in the country legally since the nominations of Zoe Baird and Kimba Wood were derailed during the 1990s, future nominees may have to ask themselves how they have treated subordinates..."

Finally, a real consequence to bullying to get your way!

You see, high EQ is about relating well with others. And at all levels of management, job function, intelligence, and motivation. The article points out that:

"Deborah Seltzer, a senior vice president in the Atlanta office of Boyden Global Executive Search based in New York, said more than half of her corporate clients now routinely check with administrative staff on how prospective senior executives treated them while making travel arrangements for job interviews. Some companies even ask the limousine drivers who pick up job candidates at the airport to report back on how they were treated."

High EQ sounds so complex sometimes, but after all, it's just treating others with a certain amount of social etiquette. But I guess it's hard when we've been socialized to brown-nose up and peck down.

This interview with Michael Gelb, author of "How to Think Like Leonardo Da Vinci" is an uncanny review/synopsis of all the ideas I like to keep in front of me: health, brain, evolution, mind mapping, questioning, and the like.

I liked it so much I signed up for one of his workshops being held in June. Stay tuned for a review.

I absolutely LOVE "The Apprentice," and hope you saw last night's show.

In it, Tana had a brainstorm on how to charge more for the t-shirts they had to sell without putting in too much effort: glue snazzy rhinestones on to them. Reason? She had done the same thing earlier in her career and made thousands of dollars.

However, Tana got SO turned on to her happiness from a past success -- rather than focus on the present situation -- that she wasted too much time and effort to locate just the right rhinestones and just the right gizmo to help glue them on. In doing so, she failed to focus on the remaining details of the project, such as marketing. In the end, they had a great product, but no excited buyers.

This is a good example of when a serious/somber mood helps us focus on detail, while a happy mood helps us see outside the box by being better brainstormers and innovators. You see, happy helped Tana brainstorm, but serious would have helped her focus on the details. Tana should have managed her way in and out of both.

Poor Tana, high on happy, couldn't see the trees in the forest.

I call this a classic case of "Nose to the Rhinestone."

I believe consciousness is simply what it feels like to have a neocortex.

Jeff Hawkins, author, On Intelligence

One of the most provocative definitions of consciousness I have come across.

This quick read scares me.

And while we are at it, here are Dr. Phil's strategies for managing anger and frustration he calls Anger Manageemt 101 from his October 2004 magazine "The Next Level." The mag is free; sign up on Drphil.com.

The reason I haven't been writing for the last two months is because I've been on a sailing sabbatical through the Bahamas.

Yes, it was a awesome as it sounds.

Take a look. Wouldn't you agree?

Paul Graham, computer science genius who created Yahoo! Store (the first web-based application), writes in his book "Hackers and Painters" (where hackers means awesome computer programmers who've contributed to technology for the sheer joy of it, just like painters have done with art):

Here

Just before my ski trip to Utah last month, I got the following email:

Dear Martha Mendoza,

If you're interested and you'd like to hear more, please call me�

"Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever."

-- Mahatma Gandhi

Musician John Mayer (cool kid, great music, even writes hip music reviews for Esquire Magazine) has a new song out called "Daughters."

I hereby officially nominate him for most empathic lyrics in a song. (Surpassing "Superman" by Five for Fighting which I wrote about some time ago).

John writes,

"Fathers be good to your daughters
Daughters will love like you do
Girls become lovers who turn into mothers
So mothers be good to your daughters too....

On behalf of every man
Looking out for every girl
You are the god and the weight of her world"

Wow wee. That's a message that should have started ages ago! My question: why couldn't Frank Sinatra, Elvis or some other ancient singer have sung this? Were they asleep at the microphone?!

Helen Fisher, Ph.D., is one of this country's most prominent anthropologists. She has conducted extensive research on the evolution, expression, and chemistry of love. Her two most recent books, The First Sex and Anatomy of Love, were New York Times Notable Books. Here, in an interview from Elle Magazine, she explains what goes on in the brain when you are in love, and the differences between men and women.

And while she's measuring love in the brain, Fast Company writes how marketers have figured out a way to measure how consumers really feel about brands. And they note that rsearch suggests that brands that engage people emotinoally (as in "To Google is to love") can command prices as much as 20% to 200% higher than competitors', and sell in far higher volumes.

Dopamine frenzy.

Early in December I took an hour to attend a webinar given by Crucial Conversations. Good little webinar (actually tele-seminar). They are repeating it on January 6. 2005. They have a pretty good e-zine too. Sign up for it on their home page.

Here are some of my own notes from the tele-seminar:

In a recent interview with Oprah, Barack Obama says:

"I often say we've got a budget deficit that's important, we've got a trade deficit that's critical, but what I worry about most is our empathy deficit."

Oprah asks, "how do you actually get people to be more empathetic?"

Barack answers, "Images, actions, and stories always speak the loudest...to move people, you have to tell stories."

Once upon a time.........

Did you know that MIT offers a whole bunch of their courses online? What a tremendous resource!

After some researching, I found a "Power and Negotiation" course, from Sloan's School of Management (given in 2002) where Emotional Intelligence is an integral portion for understanding how to negotiate more powerfully.

For the exact slide show on EI click here.

Click here or the course description on "Power and Negotiation."

And for all course information click here.

What other courses turn you on?

According to the Center for Creative Leadership, "the most common reason for career derailment is an inability to relate to people in meaningful ways. Executives who are unable to establish strong interpersonal relationships are described by their bosses, peers, and direct reports as:

� Insensitive.
� Competitive with others.
� Self-isolating.
� Dictatorial.
� Overly critical.
� Overdemanding.
� Easily angered.
� Arrogant.
� Emotionally explosive.
� Manipulative.
� Aloof.

And executives who are perceived as adept at building and managing effective interpersonal relationships are described by their bosses, peers, and direct reports as:

Harvard Business Review once wrote in their 2003 issue on "Breakthrough Ideas for Tomorrow's Business Agenda":

"Emotional intelligence can be used not just to produce harmony...but also to outwit your enemies by giving you the tools to understand and anticipate them." (emphasis mine)

This is brilliant, but a difficult concept to understand, let alone apply. Enter the Yale Harvard rivalry for a terrific example.

The story goes like this: a group of Yale students disguised themselves as the Harvard Pep Club at the 2004 Yale Harvard game and played a phenomenally hilarious practical joke. The Yale students went over to the Harvard side and passed out 1,800 sheets of red and white construction paper. The fans (all Harvard alumni) were told that when Harvard scored, they were to hold up the paper which would read "Go Harvard."

Instead, what did it say? "We Suck."

This is EQ in action, believe it or not! The Yale students capitalized on the Harvard fans' emotions. It was really the only data they needed to play this awesome practical joke. The Yale students used the emotions that were present on the Harvard side to pull off the prank. Emotions such as: trust, rivalry, competition, comradery, teamwork.

To see more about this funny hoax, click here.

And what do you think? How can you study others' emotions to understand them more. For instance, I can't help but think that the next time we get an Osama tape, the translator should tell the world that Osama is saying "I pick my nose and then eat it." Hee hee!

Recently I saw a Frontline episode on PBS called "The Persuaders," a fascinating look at how emotions solve buying and selling problems. Emotions have long been used in marketing and advertising, but our expert use of emotions has moved it to a new level.

For example, for years the political issue of "estate taxes" was emotionally uncharged even ignored until a political consultant changed the words from "estate" to "death." Before the change in words, the masses thought that estate taxes didn't refer to them -- only to the wealthy, so, why would they be interested in eliminating it? The truth is that you are taxed at death no matter how big or small your estate is. Once the masses understood that -- and created a new emotion towards "death taxes" rather than "estate taxes"-- did the masses become interested in eliminating "death taxes."

This is remarkable. This is being emotionally intelligent.

I had a very provocative conversation with one of the instructors who certified me in the MSCEIT (Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test).

He says he's got trouble with Cooper's ideas about EQ. Precisely, he wondered why Cooper labels qualities such as honesty, courage and creativity as EQ qualities.

Once, several years ago, a grad school buddy shared her daytimer with me and one of the things that stood out for me was that in the back she had these tabbed sections organized by topics such as expenses, coupons, and books to read. Books to read! What a great idea; I had never considered organizing that specific knowledge in its own special place -- I relied on trying to remember them. Since then, I adopted the practice, religiously jotting down book titles as people recommended them or as I came across a review.

But that's so 20th century.

Now, I've moved that practice to Amazon's Wish list -- a wild ride in organizing knowledge and at the same time, Amazon "deeply supports" you as they recommend uncannily targetted books. It's like talking to a friend.

In true knowledge management form, Amazon allows you to share your wish list with others (or you can search for someone else's wish list). This helps with Christmas shopping, but the real fun is that it provides a view of inside someone's head! (If you don't want to look inside someone's head, you can look inside a book. Use this Amazon feature to read the first few pages of a book.)

So, if you'd like a fun and enjoyable knowledge management activity why not create an Amazon Wish List now? As I like to say "knowledge is power, but organized knowledge is rocket power."

By the way, here's mine. What do I reveal about myself in the book choices?

Had a meeting on the 4th wherein Jean Marie shared with us that she likes to write and made the keen observation that there's a certain amount of intimacy in writing in blogs.

Right on! And, I'll add that that is probably also true when we write newsletters or even e-mails.

You see, I believe that when you share knowledge -- what's inside your head -- that's intimacy. But not any-old-knowledge. The best knowledge to share is the kind you are passionate for. The kind of knowledge you like to play with inside your "intellectual sandbox." Where you have fun and lose track of time. I believe organizing any knowledge creates a sandbox of sorts.

So Jean Marie raised an intriguing question: What are the reasons for writing and using blogs, and what are the responsibilities?

There's a conference dedicated to blogging called BloggerCon, and this year they are holding a session on the "emotional life of blogs."

This 2-minute read gives an overview of the workshop and asks some dialog-provoking questions. How I would love to attend so I can join in on that conversation!

Why don't we hold one of our own?

Tim Sanders, the chief solutions officer of US internet giant Yahoo spoke at the Yorkshire International Business Convention early in 2004. He urged Yorkshire's business chiefs to become "knowledge-sharing leaders."

"Through faith, employers create a virtuous circle. There's nothing more destructive than the vicious cycle of not trusting employees. The vicious cycle can destroy your business," said Mr Sanders, who went on to give a string of real-life examples of how some of the biggest and best corporate executives used a management system based on "compassion, network and knowledge."

"Empathy is one of the greatest management skills you can build. If you lived your life right then later you can look back on it and enjoy it a second time."

Here for more.

In an article I read recently about Kabbalah, it mentioned that the study and practice of reading faces is a part of this ancient religion. What a fascinating fact. What made it more fascinating to me was that I had just recently posted an entry on this blog entitled Reading Faces. (I sense the beginning of a triangulation here.)

I had to find out more. My internet research discovered that the science of reading faces is called physiognomy, and that it's actually a psuedo-science because of some dangerous premises.

I wonder if Ekman would call himself a physiognomist? Here's someone who does call herself one, and she's read the faces of both the incumbent and candidate first ladies and gives her interpretation. Fun read!

What do you think? Psuedo-science? An EQ skill? (Accurately identifying an emotion in others is often a visual clue.)

By the way, do you see an old woman or a young woman in the picture above? Or something else?

Recently I've had Jeff Hawkins on the brain. That's because I've been thinking about this article from Fortune on Jeff Hawkins called "How Do You Think the Brain Works?" It has excited me at so many levels and I'd love to talk to you about it. (If you aren't a Fortune subscriber, email me and I'll let you borrow my login.)

First, it's got to do with the latest theory on one of my favorite subjects, the brain, and second, it talks about how the brain works, specifically, its intelligence. (He's written a book called "On Intelligence". Here's a free excerpt from the book's website.)

Third, the theory is a scientific theory gaining respect from top nueroscientists, even though Hawkins is a Silicon Valley millionaire legend in the technology market. He pursued this interest while he ran Palm (is in the Palm Pilot handheld) and later, Handspring.

Fourth, it weaves in theories of language and creativity and artificial intelligence and how business should get started on developing "intelligent systems" now.

Oh my, I could go on and on. Why don't you read it yourself (about a 10-minute read) and let me know what you think about it. What stood out for you?

Great book Emotions Revealed, by Paul Ekman, (download the preface for free at this link) explains there are seven core emotions and that a face has 43 muscles that can make more than 10,000 expressions.

Most expressions last about two seconds; some as short as a half second, but rarely are they shorter or longer. The core emotions are:

- sadness
- anger (most dangerous of all emotions because of its' potential for violence)
- happiness
- fear
- disgust
- contempt
- surprise (because surprise is so short-lived, doesn't linger, is often identified as fear by others, Ekman wonders if surprise isn't really fear, but he includes it in his list anyway)

You might ask why love or hate aren't on the list?

Jack Welch, former CEO of GE, quoted in the Wall Street Journal, January 23, 2004 said:

“…a leader's intelligence has to have a strong emotional component. He has to have high levels of self-awareness, maturity and self-control. She must be able to withstand the heat, handle setbacks and, when those lucky moments arise, enjoy success with equal parts of joy and humility. No doubt emotional intelligence is more rare than book smarts, but my experience says it is actually more important in the making of a leader.”

In my last EQ class I had a rich example of using the an emotionally intelligent method for resolving conflict.

The class participant was a musician and she was having a problem with another member of the orchestra who would move around in his seat while he was playing his intrument to the point of distraction. It annoyed her to no end. She just wanted to tell him "stop it!" But just telling him to "stop it!" isn't the most emotionally intelligent way to communicate something, now is it?

Instead, we talked about how her feelings of annoyance began to interfere with her own playing. I call this performing an "emotional autopsy" on the situation. Why was this annoying to her? Was it just her, or were others feeling it too? Was it a situation that had reached a point where they simply had to talk about it to resolve it? Had she already tried mental or even physical methods to avoid distraction?

In analyzing it, she discovered she just had to say something.

So we worked out a speaking model to bring up the issue with the colleague:

1. Fact: Hey, Chuck (all names are made up), you may not know it, but when we were in rehearsal today and yesterday as well, you got really into it and began moving around in your seat, rocking back and forth and even lifting off your seat once or twice.
Remember to state facts that are observable and recent. Don't say "you always move around", and watch emotional words like "you always move around so violently."

2. Feeling: When that happens, I feel distracted.
State your feelings in a way that you own them. This takes some thinking time on your part to really identify what it is you are feeling and what feeling word would best reach the person you are talking to. For example, it wouldnt be helpful to say "you annoy me."

3. Positive Hope: I was hoping that I could concentrate on playing my best...
When stating your positive hope, notice that it's something you own. For example, don't say, "I was hoping you could stop it." This isn't a hope and save the request for the next step.

4. Request: ...so, would it be OK if I could tap you on the shoulder the next time this happens so that we can all concentrate on playing?
Remember to make a request that is do-able on the part of the listener. It wouldn't be realisitic to say to your friend, "could you just stop doing that?" beause your friend might not even be aware of what he's doing it!

It sat well with the participant, but, sadly, I don't know if she tried it out and if she did, what the result was. (If you are out there A, please leave me a comment to let me know how it went!)

What do you think?

Early in my career, I never gave body language much credibility. Arms crossed doesn't mean someone's evasive. It could mean that they're cold, or are hiding warts on their hands.

But while researching emotional intelligence I've become a convert. After all, what are emotions but body language?

Here's a good article about what psychologists and anthropologists are saying about body language. I've also included links to the books and sites referred to in the article.

If you like this article and want to read more, take a look at Malcolm Gladwell's (author of The Tipping Point) article on body langauge that appeared in The New Yorker.

If there's ever a business case for empathy, it's innovations like Apple's mouse. Read this Fast Company article to get what I'm talking about.

BA: should we order a pack and see what it does to our Kpod and Pedia design? Check this out for a sample of the cards. Here's a recent conversation about their value and a suggested alternative. I just think we need something to shake our design up.

David Caruso led the MSCEIT certification seminar I went to. This is an interview on his new book, The Emotionally Intelligent Manager.

Review to follow.

Hi gang! Thanks so much for your participation and thoughtful questions tonight. I had a great time, and hope you did too.

If you want to continue talking about EQ or have any thoughts or questions you'd like to share, please click on "Comments" right below this post. In the spaces that pop up, enter your name, your email address (you will never get spam from me!), leave the url field blank, type in your comment and when you are done, click post. I'll receive your message and will respond within a day, so come back and check to see if there are more comments from me or anyone else.

If you don't want to leave a comment, no worries. Hope you enjoy surfing my blog! See you next Wednesday.

I know, I know: its "to whom can I give comfort today"? But, you know what I mean. As Roosevelt once said: "that is editing upon which I will not put!"

Anyway, here's a great quote from this LHJ article. "Giving comfort amounts to acknowledgement and empathy. It doesn't require eloquence." What do you think?

What I'd like to learn next: how to give comfort when you feel defensive. Or, how to ask for comfort. Help!

As I sit here on my deck with my wireless laptop, I dream of a wireless planet. Imagine, wireless sailing! How far is heaven? Could it be as far as San Diego?

I've been using Mozilla for at least a year now and will tell anyone who will listen (and anyone who surfs the internet for more than an hour a day), that it's the browser of choice. Why? Among just some great features: no pop-ups, it remembers username and passwords for any site you tell it to (no more forgetting obscure site logins), and awesome bookmark features, just to name a few.

Another reason: "security experts are recommending people ditch Microsoft's Internet Explorer and seek an alternate browser." See article for full details about browser alternatives.

Enjoy this good article that quickly describes Stanford Business School's most popular class called "Interpersonal Dynamics", but affectionately referred to as "Touchy-Feely." Stanford believes that getting along with others is a key leadership skill.

Sounds alot like an EQ class to me! Interested in an EQ class? My EQ class is being held at the Boston Center for Adult Education on August 4th and 11th, 2004, 5:30 - 7:30 p.m. at 5 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, MA. Another session being held at the same location and time on December 1 and 8th.

Now click to read the article.

I'm surprised how often I find articles in Ladies Home Journal that are quite meaningful. Here are the 7 secrets:

1. Do something genuinely new. (What I call "Be a Life-long Learner.")
2. Reclaim life's meaning.
3. Put yourself in the fun zone. (What I call "Have Fun! Check.")
4. Bid farewell to guilt and regret. (What I call "Misery is Optional.")
5. Keep your flywheel spinning.
6. Make up your mind.
7. Give to get. (What I call "Giver's Gain.")

Read more.

I plan to live to 100. And I want my brain to live that long too! Don't you?Here are some tips.

Sorry to bore you, but this is medical information I want to keep in my periphery. Better yet, I'm keeping them in my blog. That way I can search for them; relying on technology as a memory support system. I feel better already.

Info on:
- stress tests
- EBCT heart scan
- c-reactive protein blood test (CRP)
- benchmark cholesterol numbers

Actual article.

For quite some time I've been meaning to capture the thought that sailing has been for me a valuable teacher of life. It's hard to articulate all the ways that sailing has taught me about how to best "sail through life."

One small example is how listening to certain sounds on the boat warn you of trouble -- and if you aren't listening, you could miss a huge message. Isn't that a lot like life?

Here's a great article that begins to tell my story about how sailing skills can be applied to life skills.

I'd love to continue this conversation. Do you see the parallels?

Here's a recent lesson I learned on choosing the right words and a lesson on the importance of taking new perspectives.

You might think that people with an active social life actually get more colds than their less sociable counterparts, because sociable ones tend to expose themselves to more people. But the opposite is true. This study showed that when injected with a cold virus, unhappy people are three times as likely to get a cold as unhappy people. The gene or genes that govern sociability "may contribute to biological processes that play a role in the body's ability to fight off infection."

I've mentioned Marshall Rosenberg before. He's the founder of the Center for Non Violent Communications. He's got a terrific model for listening and speaking. One that I've used with great results. Here's a profound and recent interview with him called "Communicating from Compassion" (you may need to scroll down to find it, even though the introduction "Beyond Violence" is a good read too).

After reading this article I had many thoughts about how I listen, communicate and let judgments create a powerful (or destructive) springboard for communications.

What are your thoughts?

Author, Margaret J. Wheatley, give us her experiences with good listening in this article from one of my all-time favorite publications, The Institute of Noetic Science's' Shift Magazine (formerly called IONS).

When I experience good listening, I literally feel tingling in my body. A lot like the tingling I get when I eat a decadent chocolate eclair or great sushi. It's a phyiscal pleasure without the calories!

What have you experienced from good listening?

There are ways to give your brain a workout and keep it fit. And a fit and healthy brain means a longer life. David Snowdon, PhD, author of Aging with Grace notes that those who age best share optimism, gratitude and engagement in a variety of new intellectual pursuits.

So live longer, exercise your brain! Learn, explore, share, discover, create, innovate, play!

And get physical: Outside Magazine has an article that gives you some tips on the physical and mental brain workout you can focus on for a healthy brain.

In this article, my hero, Dr. Phil, writes his views on talking and listening. Plain and simple, but effective.

What rules are you breaking? What rules will you implement tomorrow?

I have a great friend with whom I went to high school and he and his wife adopted a precious little girl, Rosalind, two years ago. She's growing and becoming a person right before their very eyes. What joy! Someone to love forever. I am so happy for them I could cry.

So here's a poem dedicated to Rozzy, or more precisely, to the woman out of whose womb came Rozzy.

Hail Mother
Full of grace,
We wish peace is with thee.
Blessed art thou amongst women
And blessed is the fruit of thy choice, baby
Holy Stranger
Mother of Rozzy
Pray for us parents
Now and at the hour of our death

The Chinese character for "listening attentively" consists of five characters:
- the character for ear
- for standing still
- for ten
- for eye, and
- for heart and mind.

Chinese characters are really picturegrams: they are pictures that have evolved to describe a certain situation. Therefore, listening attentively means:

"When in stillness, one listens with the heart. The ear is worth ten eyes."

-- Zen Master Dae Gak, "The Practice of Listening"

I like the character and concept so much, I had it drawn by a Chinese calligrapher -- on the streets of New York City -- and had it framed. It hangs on the wall of my bedroom.

"What we are today comes from thoughts of yesterday,
and our present thoughts build our life of tomorrow:
our life is the creation of our mind."

- Buddha

They say you only use 10% of your brain and that if you used 100% you could fly. I often think what the results would be if we used, say, only 12, or even 11 percent. How much would it take to reach world peace? How much would it take to simply get along better with those around you, including yourself? I'm not greedy, let's just all agree to use 11% and see what happens.

By the way, here's an interesting read (albeit a little dry -- the juicier read is at the bottom "Is Your Brain Really Necessary?"). The article talks about the proof that exists that reveals that we only use 10% of our brain. It also gives some good brain facts.

Are you ready to feed your brain?

The Senses Boiled Down to One:

Seeing is really just the eyes listening
Smelling is really just the nose listening
Tasting is really just the tongue listening
Touching is really just the hands listening
That means all this listening provides input for the soul

When you listen, you pick up data from all over your environment. This data is a wealth of information for making decisions, learning, changing and more. Listen! If you believe in listening as much as I do, or at least want reminders of listening delivered to your email, I suggest subscribing to the following email newsletters. Listening resources:
1. ILA - International Listening Association. Click on "Qoutations about Listening" and then subscribe to their newsletter.
2. This guy is prolific.. Click on "E-mail News" from the left-hand side menu. He should be blogging.
3. This one's sporadic -- it's published only four times a year -- but can give some good tips and techniques. It's called Highgain.
4. Listening Leaders also has an ezine.

Please let me know if you enjoy them.

EQ is more than reading or managing emotions. It's about being aware of your environment. That's why I often think I'd like to change the name of what is referred to as "emotional intelligence." Some have offered "emotional literacy", but I don�t think that covers it either.

I'm leaning toward something like "being aware, or hyper-aware, of your environment." It doesn't sound very glamorous but what I mean is that so many people go around the world not being aware of what's around them! Maybe you've seen these people. Up here in the northeast, they're the drivers who drive after a snow storm with only their front windshield brushed off. Every other part of their car is still piled with snow, but they get on the highway with only the ability to see in front of them. And if they aren't aware of their immediate physical surroundings I wonder how much they pay attention to what's inside their heads, inside the head of others, how they might be perceived, how they are acting.

I mentioned this to a friend who told me a story I call Upside Down Trees. There's a museum in Western Mass that hung a whole bunch of large! potted maple trees upside-down. These are exhibited right at the front door of the museum. Well, one day, my friend is at the front door of the museum paying his way in, when a man and his family walk up to the desk and ask "So, where are the upside down trees?" He had walked all the way from the parking lot to the museum's front entrance right past the upside down trees, and never even noticed them! (Really, you can't miss them; cut and paste this link into your address bar to see a photo of what I'm talking about: http://www.berkshires.org/story.php?f_id=9

Now I don't know for sure if this man could be called emotionally intelligent or not, but I do believe there must be a correlation between being aware of upside down trees and the ability to manage and use emotions in yourself and others as a source of energy, influence, growth and inspiration.

What are you not paying attention to in your immediate environment? Is it time to clean up clutter, paint a room, or clean up your checkbook? What are YOUR upside down trees?

When you open a pdf file, click on "select text" option on the pdf tool bar and now you can use your cursor to click and highlight the text you want to copy. I always thought you couldn't cut and paste from a pdf document....that they were only pictures. But, this little trick saves me time!

In my training and coaching, when I talk about how feelings are a choice -- about how no one makes you feeling a certain way (only you make you feel a certain way) -- I usually get someone who bites: "I don't buy it. There are simply times when someone does something and it ends up making me feel a certain way." Yes, it's true, I concede. Someone holds a gun to you and you get scared.

RSS FUN!

Don't know what an RSS or an RSS Reader is? Continue reading. If you know what I'm talking about, click here for a tuturial on how to install an RSS Aggregator (specifically, SharpReader) to your computer.

Thanks, Jennifer, for a great Top 10 About Collaboration.

Collaboration has been on my mind a lot too. In fact, I just finished watching a fascinating special on TV about Mileva Maric, first wife of Albert Einstein.

I learned that Albert Einstein and Mileva produced a schizophrenic son who was eventually responsible for Mileva's nervous breakdown, subsequent multiple strokes and death. And worse, Albert was a cheating bastard who gave his nobel peace prize money to Mileva in return for a divorce and left Mileva to care for their sick son for years by herself.

What captured my attention just as much was the apparent controversy over whether Einstein's paper on the theory of relativity was actually written -- and the idea collaborated on -- with Mileva. A scholar claims that an original Russian manuscript references the paper's authors as "Einstein-Maric," but some scholars vehemently argue against that notion. What's the controversy; what's so hard to comprehend? Collaboration happens.

It's not hard to imagine considering Maric was a physicist herself, and was partnered intimately and professionally (they wrote about five papers together) with arguably the greatest mind of the millennium...what a platform! Collaboration happens!

Later in the episode, a historian explains that there is a German saying that describes Mileva as an oyster and Einstein the pearl--the grain of sand needs the oyster to become a pearl, but then after it's a pearl, it doesn't need the oyster anymore.

But I think that it's not Einstein that's the pearl, but instead the theory of relativity itself. All three needed each other.

So, I see a metaphor: pearls as a symbol of collaboration. Out of two entities emerges a rare jewel, hard to describe, scientifically proven, cultured even. Luminescent, coveted, harvested. Worn, tested, meaningful. Connected.

We all know words are powerful. But did you know there's a non-profit organization trying to spread the message that words can heal? They are called Wordscanheal.org, and I've added a link to them in my blogroll (over there, bottom right).

It's worth a perusal. I especially like their communications pledge, and their newsletters (which you can subscribe to for free) are often good. One of their best isn't listed on the archive list yet, but I got it as an email attachment (no url). So, I'm going to figure out how to put an email attachment into a post, so you can read it. In the meantime, check it out.

Here's one of my favorite articles on the importance of emotional intelligence written by Peter Senge, author of The Fifth Discipline.

Just like Senge, I have found asking for help difficult. But I do remember once, when I was extremely distressed, it was my only option. And it produced the results I needed. I suppose you could say I was a frog in boiling water? (Bert's blog has a very funny post on frogs in boiling water.)

I was horseback riding on a ranch in Wyoming and about six of us went out to bring back a few horses that had wandered off. We had been in back country like no other for three days already. And now we had an important task to attend to. Horses like to run in packs, so when we reached the errant horses, the ones we were riding on instinctively wanted to join the others. We were warned of that beforehand and I felt comfortable with it. But, in a split second I felt my horse take control of the situation, beyond a point I could recover. Without even thinking of any other option, I calmly raised my voice and said firmly, "I need help." Of course, visually they could see I was in need of assistance; instinctively I knew that my screaming would have been redundant. Most efficiently, I got the help I needed -- the guide told me how to regain control and coached me until I was back in control.

I distinctly remember sensing how odd it was to have felt complete helplessness and a complete sense of control all within a span of about 45 seconds. I knew then that those 45 seconds would have been wildly different had I not asked for help. In any event, I sure do hope that means that asking for help is getting easier to do. I believe it has.

When you create a new blog, it looks a little boring. Adding color and design to it makes it more appealing. This is often called "skinning" your blog. Here are the steps to skin your blog.

Another topic my business partner (BA) and I (MM) agreed to blog about -- so we can better understand it -- is our collaborative process and how well it works. We are well on our way towards accomplishing what we set out to do (develop and implement a business plan) and have done it with intelligence, humor, playfulness, focus, creativity, discipline and with vision. How the hell did that happen!?

If you are interested in starting a blog -- and especially if you don't consider yourself a writer -- you will find that your first post (and even several more after that) are very difficult to write. You fret. What to say? How to say it? Is it important? What if it sounds stupid? What if I don't like what I write after I post it? (The last one is easy to answer: delete it. Most blogging software allows you to delete a post, and it certainly allows you to edit as often as you want.) As for the other questions, well, those are harder to answer.

Recently, my business partner and I agreed to blog on the topic of execution in business. That's because we are trying to solve the problem of execution in business. We believe it's the biggest unaddressed problem in business today. Execution (that is to say, getting things done) is a leader's most important job, and, in fact, why executives are called executives in the first place! When executives successfully execute goals, it results in profits, growth, innovation, and yes, even winning!

So, what about execution? It's elusive. Very elusive, yet it's so simple. It's simplicity is its curse. Because, executing isn't just executing. It's executing with perseverance, with an eye to the future, without fear, with knowledge, with discipline, with a generous attitude, with an awareness of your environment, and especially with support from others. It true: you can't do it alone and executing alone won't do it.

I suppose that's what Nike meant by "Just Do It." Or what AA means when they say "One Day at a Time." It sounds so simple, but it's about doing getting things done every day.

I got this great RSS Resource from elearnspace blog.

Or more precisely, what are blogs becoming now and what will they become next?

Jay Cross, in his webinar on Interwise, told of a study that tested which group would have higher test scores: the ones who received an essay and the instructions "Read this. You will be tested." Or, the ones that received the instructions "Read this. It may or may not be true. You will be tested."

Click here to see a quick and easy tutorial on how to create links and put them on your blog's main page. Remember, linking is good....google likes linking, and so do social networks. Not to mention it's another type of collaborative (and ontological) skill that's necessary for great connections.

An interesting thing has occurred. The words �purple loosestrife� have been permanently attached to the visual image of the flower, so that every time I see it, I think �purple loosestrife.� I used to think �what is that flower?�. But after blogging about it, learning stuck.

This is also called linking. Linking is highly recommended.

Lately I've been about how much music both brings out and contains emotion. Empathy in music? I can�t help it: I tend to see empathy, the lack of empathy or opportunities for empathy everywhere I look.

Every summer these purple flowers bloom. And, try as I might, every summer I forget their names. That won't happen again because I will post their name here in my blog. Gee, blogging as a memory tool. Cool.

Communicating effectively during difficult moments takes practice, coaching and skill. But communicating effectively during �no-brainer� moments, should be, well, a no-brainer! What I�m getting at is that I have a pet peeve about how poorly people say hello when making a telephone call. And it�s such a no-brainer moment! (I won�t just complain; I�ll also provide a suggestion for an effective hello.)

In these blogs I will talk a lot about empathy. What it is. How to use it. When to use it. Etc. In this particular blog, I�ll talk about how I got interested in empathy in the first place.

Communicating with emotional intelligence takes practice and discussion. In this blog, I hope to do just that: I�ll present an interaction between two people and invite you to practice along with me (because I�m always learning too). What would be the emotionally intelligent thing to say/do?

If you’d like to get into blogging (you will not regret it), then the only real good way is to commit a little time to understanding what blogs are, and then visit other people's blogs. As I've been doing for days...upon days....upon days....

Finally, after a several-hour binge, I came to, blurry-eyed and thirsty, and it occurred to me that rather than feel like an unproductive lump of voyeuristic nothingness, I could make great use of that time spent (which I'll never be able to replace) as a way of helping others understand blogging more.

In all seriousness, it’s worth the time to do some research on blogging so, you too, can join the blogosphere with comfort and pride. (I was serious about the several hour binge, however.)

1. Begin with intro stuff like: What are weblogs? and What is a web log. Look at Fast Company’s article for a good overview, too. Also, elearn has a very good overview.

2. If you are really understanding this stuff, try this more advanced read, but only if terms like RSS and XML mean something to you. If they do, this is a great run down of the more “advanced” concepts.

3. Now that you understand conceptually what a blog is, open wide the doors to the blogosphere by finding a blog that interests you. This is an important step; don’t skip it. It’s also the fun part! (Believe me, you will get lost in completely irrelevant, but largely interesting, blogs of every size, type and color – and this can eat up serious chunks of your time, but can be a “flow” experience, if you know what I mean. Great book, by the way, Flow.) To do a research on a blog that interests you, go to google and in the search field, type

blog (insert topic you are interested in), click on search
(example: blog emotional intelligence)

Magically, google will display some very accurate -- and plenty of not-so-accurate (but that's part of the fun) -- bloggers you can read and enjoy. This is where you’ll get your ideas about what you want to blog about, what voice you want to take, what topics are being discussed that interest you, even what formats and colors you like, etc.

For example, I’m interested in emotional intelligence and adult learning and found these sites:
elearningspace
internettime

I also did a blog search for sailing in the Caribbean (since me and my honey are planning to do just that next year…..now that’s a great blog idea: chronicling our trip via a blog!). And found a lot of advertisements disguised as blogs and this, which has absolutely nothing to do with sailing, but the writer’s quirky style was a hook for me. Most interesting is her "about", and I like her design, too.

4. OK. Now that you are surfing blogs, don’t just read…..interact! There are many ways you can interact with blogs. First, as you find weblogs you like, add them to your RSS Reader. If you don’t have one, put them on your favorites as a way of keeping track of them…..and don’t forget to visit them often. (RSS Readers will be discussed at a later time.)

Next, read the comments. They give you a look at the true reason blogs exist: to create a dialog of like-minded people who have something to say!

Don’t be afraid to leave a comment. All you do to comment, is click on the word “comment” (which is usually highlighted….and if there’s no comment field, click on the time or date posted which will take you to the comment section). There, fill in the three or four fields asked of you. Click on post and your comment is now part of that post. (Trackbacks will be discussed at a future time.)

Finally, read the site’s links…..good bloggers will always have a slew of other bloggers they like to read (this list is often called a blogroll) and websites they find interesting.

5. Now, go back to your blog and blog. (Don’t forget to have fun!)

Please leave me a comment if this little study guide helped!

See also:
1. What is a Blog? Part I
2. What is a Blog? Part II

I just came back from seeing Terminator 3. (Thumbs up, by the way, but then again, I am a Terminator groupie.) In any case, there's a scene in the movie where (of course) the Terminator and John Connor (the human he's programmed to protect) are in a pickle. John Connor's destiny -- we know as die-hard devotees -- is to be the leader of a human resistance group that saves the human race from machines after an apocolypse kills 3 billion people (hooray, John!). Except at this tense moment he doubts that he can fulfill this fate, doubts he even has leadership abilities and that he's always felt overwhelmed, and afraid, and blah, blah, blah (would you like some cheese with that whine, Johnny?).

The terminator comes up to him and picks him up by the neck with his strong hands, and as John hovers over the terminator, he wells up in anger (and confusion too, but the poor acting makes us see mostly anger). He spits out something like: "fuck you, you asshole."

The terminator let's go. "Thaaht's more like eet" he says. "You mean you were messing with me?" John asks. "Anger is more productive than dispair. Basic psychology is in my subroutines."

Classic.

And he couldn't be more right. Emotional intelligence (EQ) is managing others emotions, and this is difficult. Now try managing emotions in a highly stressful situation. And even though the terminator is on a life or death mission, he stops to manage emotions, because it's the smart thing to do.

It's a learnable skill, managing yours and others emotions. It's so important it helps you survive in this dog-eat-dog world. Have you ever tried to manage your own emotions? These are a couple of things I've tried and the research urges you do. You might try tuning into your body -- do you feel heat, prickly feeling, hair stand on end, something in your gut? You might try asking your self some questions, after taking one or more deep breaths: What's going on here? Where am I feeling this in my body? What body signals am I seeing in the other? What can I predict will happen if we continue on this emotional path?

Emotions are signals, and in the terminator's case, so were John's words and demeanor. We can predict the result of an emotion. Despair leads to something......what? Giving up, wild and unpredictable behavior? Yes, quite possibly. What if that would not be conducive to the situation...be it saving the world, or just getting through a negotiation with a client, co-worker, boss, spouse or child.

Learning and discovery are emotion-based. The terminator knew this. He's programmed. How do we get programmed so that our response isn't to tell the other "shut up, and get a grip", or choose to leave the room, or throw our hands up in the air and saying you don't have a clue what fear is, look at what happened to me, I don't want ot hear your griping.

Emotional intelligence is a choice. Just becoming aware of that concept has helped me a great deal. What do you think?

I'm excited that blogging has the potential to open up a whole new learning universe. And because we are learning creatures, this should resonate and spread rapidly. Research has shown that learning that really sticks is social, emotional, experiential, individual, fun, just to name a few. The blogosphere can accommodate these learning criteria. However, I begin to blog with apprehension....where to begin!? Sometimes when I'm stuck trying to articulate something, I try a haiku. Well, not a traditional one, but it's a great exercise to see if I can whittle down to a fundamental thought. Here goes:
To blog or not to blog?
That's the answer. You see,
we learn together.
P.S. I'm not the only one having fun with haikus....check out this movie review site where all reviews are in haikus (fun!).

Here's my haiku regarding communication:

That's How Magical One Conversation Can Be
How magical can
one conversation be? Talk.
Listen. Learn. Repeat.

I�m running late for work because I forgot to put the garbage cans away from yesterday�s garbage pickup. I notice I�m not the only one, though. My neighbor is doing the same; she smiles a commiserating smile and I nod back. Need coffee, so I stop for my fave, and the line at the coffee shop is long. I get impatient, but understand it�s fully my fault (how evolved, I think, taking ownership for my own actions � a wrinkle in my brain). I accidentally give the counter clerk the wrong change and she yells after me as I�m running out the door. I don�t have the correct change and end up having to break a $20 bill for a cup of coffee. I make it to work about 10 minutes late (not bad, considering), I come into work and walk by the receptionist into my work area. I see my manager is in her office and hope she won�t get on my case for being 10 minutes tardy. The phone rings.

I�m only 30 minutes into my work day and I�ve already interacted with half a dozen people (the last one's on hold). Or, more precisely, should I say non-interacted.

You see, non-interacting means I hardly nodded at my neighbor while we worked on an identical task, and didn�t say a word to the person behind or ahead of me waiting in line for coffee. Not to mention that I don�t know the name of the counter girl who�s been pouring my coffee for the last three months and did I even see a receptionist at the receptionist area? And avoiding my manager is a classic case of non-interacting.

Tomorrow I promise I'll avoid the non-interacting mindset.....what perspective will help me do that? What stops me from giving it my focus?

A 21st century perspective: interaction starts at the next opportunity. If not then, when?