Emotional Intelligence | Cara's Main Page

Letter to Cara from Rob in the UK

Well, when I first started reading about it, it was some of the best stuff Ive ever read. It really opened my eyes, and taught me a lot about how much emotions matter and made me realise how many people are so out of touch with their emotions and how many people have unmet emotional needs. I also read stuff on the site like 'feelings aren't debatable' and invalidation, and things like labelling people only makes them feel less understood.

Steve hein understands why so many teenagers and younger people are depressed because of the way they are invalidated and treated, and he knows how damaging invalidation can be, and Ive realised if someone is scared or upset, telling them not to be is just the stupidest thing a person can do. and i realised things like managing emotions in people, and it completely changed me because ususally in my house, my parents would shout at me from the otherside of the house to ask me a question, and then i realised that to respond, I will need to shout back at them, and i hate shouting, if you want to ask someone a question, ask them calmly and nicely, If you show respect you will get it. i think steve calls this managing emotions in other people and thinking about what emotions you will create by saying something or how you say it.

ive personally changed because im not as materialistic as i used to be, I spend less on clothes, and try and spend more time around people, and I feel better for it. I try and live simply, instead of buying things to make up for my unmet emotional needs.

Ive also recognised why I might be so depressed, and identified each emotion and it has really helped. And using something like a 1-10 scale is really useful yet so simple.

ive also learnt the importance of listening, simply listening to someone can make such a difference, and I really feel a change in myself and I literally feel better when Im helping people more, and when I see drug addicts and other people in a bad situation, we shouldnt always judge them and make presumptions, because they have probably been abused by their parents and never respected by them .

I kept a list of links from some of the best pages and quotes from eqi, and this is one I picked out from the list


...if your a dumbass and you dont like teens and you look down on
people who are depressed and you expect everyone to be super happy,
dont get into a fucking field where you deal with depressed anxious
crazy people.

And personally what I hate most is when psychologists analyse and dehumanise everything teenagers do as they express their emotions, for example, on the radio on some discussion about teenage drunks etc the expert said ''more and more teenagers are hugging each other these days as a way to feel better, and we find that teenagers will often put themselves into an identity like they did in tribal days,'' and what I hate was that the way they have to turn peoples emotions into some form of logic, just let emotions be there, dont analyse them obsessively. And it depends on why the person is saying it. Ive read on Steves site about hugs and how they can release chemicals in the brain to make us feel better, and he was saying it to say why we like to hug. A psychologist says it because she like to dehumanise teenagers and think that out emotions dont matter and she can just dismiss out emotions, and lots of people feel strongly about being part of a crowd or having an identity or belonging to a group as teenager, and if someone comes along and labels it, analyses it and doesnt understand it, it only makes the people more angry because it completey dismisses their emotions, I hope this makes sense.lol. We should accept them and let them grow naturally, instead of controlling them. let them experience life freely without logic getting in the way. the main problem is many adults dont understand teenagers, what they do and the way they dress, so when a psychologist tries to help it only makes things worse most of the time. some adults do understand, like Steve, and Ive read his site for a year now and it keeps getting better.

Ive also read on steves site about the dark side of emotional intelligence, where abused people have learnt to manipulate people because they never had their meotional needs met by simply asking their parents for them, and this was one of the things I found really interesting aswell. And steve talks about making presumptions about people and presuming someone did something when they didnt, and this has happened to me and its so annoying, and its just nother example of how adults dont understand that when you make presumptions about a person taking something or doing something, it makes them feel annoyed,judged, labelled, misunderstood, and ultimately depressed, for example accusing someone of taking money from a wallet when they didnt. Except some people get this sort of scenario everyday of their life.

If you want the list of links, , just ask me.