We’ve all heard of emotional intelligence. Now what about emotional competency? Doug Noll is here breaking it down exactly what Emotional Competency is and how we can develop this skill.
Listen in to the entire episode here –
He tells us emotional competency is –
We talk about regulating emotions and how well you can regulate when you are faced with conflict.
Learning emotional competency is a powerful skill to learn.
We can each use the ability to be a little more emotionally competent whether it’s during conflict or just showing up for a loved one in need.
The competency we have of our own emotions and another is a powerful tool to have at our disposal to hep resolve tension and conflict at any given moment.
The 3 Aspects To Emotional Competency
And we also talk about empathy that consists of cognitive and affective empathy. Emotional intelligence is made up of these three components; emotional self regulation, and cognitive and affective empathy.
He says these three components are required and with these three you can score high on an emotional competency test.
To watch my entire exchange with Doug on Emotional Competency and Emotional Intelligence – watch it here –
Listen in to a previous conversation I had with Doug on Emotional Intelligence.
To learn more about Doug and his incredible organization – Prison Of Peace check him out here.
And read this post here to learn about emotional resiliency
My 3 Takeaways From Doug On Being Emotionally Competent
One of the most powerful takeaways from this second conversation with Doug was that emotional intelligence cannot be learned, but developed through learning emotional competency.
Here’s his response to my question – Is there a very simple way to become emotionally competent.
“Yes. Very simple. Effortless. And that is to start learning cognitive empathy through a skill known as affect labeling. That’s what I teach. I teach people how to listen to emotion. Affect labeling is simply a fancy word for listening to and reflect back the emotions of another person. As you develop your skills in affect labeling you automatically develop your own skills in emotional awareness and emotional self regulation.”
The beauty and power of what Doug teaches and raves about is the simplicity with which any one of us can learn this and the profundity that comes along with learning this powerful skill.
Doug says, “All you have to do is listen to and reflect the emotions of another person over a period of months and your emotional intelligence will go through the roof.”
And this is here is my favorite takeaway. Doug offers this guidance for calming down if we are about to get reactive, “If somebody is yelling and screaming at you and you are about to get reactive what you are going to do is engage in self affect labeling and what you are going to do is say, ‘I’m really pissed off, I feel really frustrated, I feel completely ignored and disrespected. I’m not being heard and not supported. I feel deeply hurt and insulted. I’m a little anxious and worried and concerned. And I’m a little embarrassed this is happening to me. I’m sad. I want connection and I’m not getting connection and I’m distressed. And in this moment I feel completely abandoned and betrayed. If you say that to yourself when somebody is yelling at you you will go immediately to your center.”
This is what emotionally competency entails.
