Emotional intelligence and Cognitive Dissonance

By Heidi Kaye 

For most people in the conference room, the relevance of emotional intelligence manifests in two major areas. 

Firstly, at work: To operate more efficiently in onescurrent workplace, expanding influence in team or networking environments and moving toward organizational excellence to generate greater revenue for the company. 

Secondly, at home: to find peace in the family home. 

For a millennial on the brink of a career,with an unprecedented potential to impact the world, emotional intelligence is the space that exists before the parachute opens and after leaping out of a moving plane. It’s a scary, painful and real sensitivity to ones surroundings. It’s an intense feeling of self-awareness. A dangerous realization of ones impact. In my definition, if true emotional intelligence was an extreme sport, most people in the room would perish.

Are the collaborations occurring between large corporations and the government, causing destruction of the planet and people, a result of emotionally intelligent leaders? 

On behalf of a desperate generation facing the impact of climate change, coal mines and a growing refugee crisis (to say the least), the meaning of emotional intelligence has leveled up and is now of utmost importance or we face impending doom. 

Empathizing with others, expressing emotions, feeling positive, confident and proud of ones achievements, having good relationships, being resilient, positive and a good judge of character is recognized as baseline self enquiry.

These revelations belong in a postcolonial paradigm when we learnt to treat humans with basic sense of humanity. 

I believe true emotional intelligence is one step further. 

It has become synonymous with critical thinking, authenticity, integrity and ethically inspiredaction. 

Emotionally intelligent behavior results in the benefit of the collective. It is interesting that the basic act of ‘listening’ is considered an emotionally intelligent act. 

Making a killing is no longer of intelligent motivation or value for those who believe they deserve of a stable climate, clean, safe jobs and a future to look forward to.

These are some of the hyper emotional thoughts that color the mind of a different generation in a corporate mastermind lunch.  

Despite everything that you have just read, she sports the following unethically produced clothing as values instilled by a capitalist society promote cognitive dissonance. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Posted on July 28, 2017