Personal Empowerment – Series 2 – Episode 2

I greet you with the greetings of peace. I'm your host Padma Ali. In the first series brother Idris camisa. Angela Khan dealt with moving from where you are to where you want to be. Due to the tremendous popularity of that first series and the overwhelming requests for a series on human relations. We offer you this inspiring presentation on the path to positive relationships with yourself and with others. In this series, our presenters Idris camisa, Asadullah Khan will be focusing on the path to positive relationships. The topics to be discussed are one, getting in touch with a real you to emotional wisdom, three, improving human relations for the friends you choose.

Idris camisa is an international consultant in Education and Human Development. He began his career as a teacher of English. His passion and expertise for the subject culminated in his nomination as the chairman of the English Society of South Africa. He embraced the Muslim school movement in 1987, and since then, has been a head teacher of three schools. He has conducted numerous workshops in Australia, United States, Canada, England, Middle East, Nigeria, Lusaka and throughout South Africa. He was one of the founding members of EME South Africa. He is an advisory member of ibor International Board of educational research and resources. He is the co author of the ibor manual

for Muslim schools. His expertise is installed development and curriculum design. His creativity made him a dynamic lecturer in didactics, and methodology at epsa International Peace University of South Africa. He also conducts in service training for business corporations. As a parenting expert as a marriage counselor. he conducts workshops on these topics. Youth Leadership is another area of his focus. He is a regular guest on National and Community Radio stations. She has studied Lacan has studied law in South Africa, journalism through Britain and religious studies in Egypt. He co presented a weekly wise living television program in the USA, from the streets of LA to the hearts

of the world. He has presented papers at numerous international conferences in Malaysia, Belgium, Nigeria, Egypt, USA, Iran, Botswana, Canada, Sierra Leone, Sri Lanka, Kuwait, Mexico and Turkey. He is the author of dimensions of the Quran, and co translator of classical text, a pistol for the seekers of guidance. saddler Khan has served as lecturer for the Academy of Judeo Christian and Islamic Studies at UCLA. Currently, he serves as director of empower development international as a motivational speaker, addressing issues of personal empowerment, youth development, leadership training, art of communication, and fostering interfaith interfaith understanding and cooperation.

We greet you with a greetings of peace. I'm your host Fatima Ali. And in this series, our presenters Idris camisa, Angela can focus on the path to positive relationships. The theme to be discussed in this session is emotional wisdom shudder Why is the topic of emotion so important to our lives? Please be unto you is indeed a fundamental question. Referring to fundamental issue because we are human beings, and human beings are emotive beings, we are constantly in some emotional state. We are never out of an emotional state, whether we are awake or even asleep. So we are emotive beings by nature. So every single one of us are constantly experiencing some form of mental state, which

inevitably influences the way we live, and the way we work and engage the world.

And these mental states, which we refer to as emotions are part of the consciousness that involves feeling and feelings directly affect our moods, and our moods affect our attitudes. And of course, our reactions. These mental states or emotions are something that all human beings share all the time. So indeed, we're talking about emotions. We're talking about something fundamental to human beings and emotional wisdom would be the wisdom of how to deal or the intelligence of how to deal with those emotions. For the entities. Why has there been an

keast focus on emotions in recent years. In fact, I'm very glad that in recent years, they are focusing on emotions. If you even if you look at school life, there's so much of emphasis on the cognitive the mind. And many people have argued that modern day schooling doesn't prepare people for the real world. Because one of the most important things in life is how you manage relationships, and relationships are underpinned by emotions, as saddler rightly indicated, in his preamble of the different kinds of emotions. Often you find even in marital relationships. And men might tell you, I have no idea what my wife feels she doesn't express herself. She seems so placid. Sometimes she's so

clinical. She's more a housekeeper than a homemaker. Now, these are very important things. A very critical aspect is this. As human beings, we are made up of different emotions, things that irritate us if we are going to sublimate it and suppress us. We'll go through all kinds of problems internally is important how we express it, but more importantly, how we manage those emotions is very critical. And therefore, I am very, very glad that today they speak about the EQ, the emotional quotient, the IQ is now relegated to the background is not as important as EQ. And throughout history. And even today, modern day writers, psychologists, people involve business corporations,

they say a successful person, a manager is a person who could manage people. In that way we'll be able to manage people you can unleash the potential. When you're able to manage your own emotions, you're able to unleash your own potential, and that is fundamental to our lives. But an important thing in life is this. Of course, we need to have a balance. We need sometimes to respond to your gut your intuition. Other times you need to be far more circumspect. But also, as in Hamlet, when he was asked the question, he says, it is curses spite, that I was born to set it right. And his thoughts dissipated into inaction. Too much of thinking too much of analysis gives you paralysis. So

emotions must become an integral part of our life. Our children must see us cry, they must see us laugh, they must see us responding to a situation of pity in the appropriate way. In that way, they say it's okay to cry, it's okay to respond in that particular fashion. I, I like to believe it's my opinion, I'm sure many people who subscribe to it, if more of us showed emotions, the world would be a far happier place. No one would be sitting back and speculating what is going on in his heart, because your emotions as subtler or dimension must result in some kind of action, some kind of response to a particular situation. Brother Idris has alluded to IQ and EQ. She has said, there are

so many emotions, how does one grapple with this complex phenomena of human emotions fathima emotions are basically survival instincts. If we do not have these feelings, we will not know how to respond

or how to react. So emotions motivate our behavior, and a powerful indicators of our Indonesia,

though you have mentioned the variety of emotions, and it's a very complex matter, but nonetheless, there are four or maybe five basic emotions, all other emotions are categorized under those four or five emotions. I will use the American style of what they say you feel sad, you feel mad, you feel glad you feel scared, or you feel bad. So these five so basically these sad mean grief, which are unpleasant. Feelings of sorrow, and happiness, depression of gloom, mad meaning angry, of course, unpleasant feeling of annoyance of indignation, or at times rage. And don't forget some time we'll do a series on on anger management and so on. Don't forget sometimes, what may seem as a negative

emotion may have a positive dimension, for example, rage is never a good thing. It's extremely anger over reacting to something specific. Something small happens somebody loses a piece of paper or you can't find the the remote control for the television you become crazy. That is rage. But sometimes anger is important, though it may seem as negative in general, for example, indignation. Were you upset when someone is ill treated or pressed? There's no indignation. There'll be no movement for justice. So there must be a degree of anger at witnessing injustice.

So, to understand that So, you either sad which means grief, a feeling of sorrow or unhappiness depression or gloom, depending on the circumstance to be sorrowful is okay. But to be depressed is not necessarily a good thing.

Mad to be angry feeling of annoyance of indignation which can be okay but raid which is not very good, glad this joy is a pleasant instinctive feeling of contentment, of well being,

then you get scared. This is fear, unpleasant feeling of anxiety, of apprehension of dread, depending on the circumstance or situation, we feel, and it's very important, is not good to be scared. But it helps you be scared that you know how to react. When a dog barks at you or someone Jesus you or you're in a situation, you react scared, it's fear, and then bad, which means giving you feel bad about something. And guilt is a negative emotional state, in which in which one experiences regret in having done something. One Believes One should not have done a sense of remorse while thought it can also be positive. Because if you did something which is bad, you're

supposed to feel bad about it.

So do understand that this idea of guilt, it can be a positive one, though, it seems a negative emotion is a positive. So if we're looking at the whole arena of of emotions, there are five basic ones said which is grief, mad, which is anger gladd, which is joy, scared, which is fear, and bad, which is guilt and remorse in understanding emotional wisdom, brother eds. One does that always relate emotions with building positive relationships? Is that accurate Association for people to make? I think it's an incorrect association to make I think this is a generalization. I found in my counseling of people trying to heal people. I found when emotions I express the seen the evidence

that people can deal with it, because your emotions are authentic and genuine response to every situation. It's about how you manage relationships. If I know for example, that something upsets my wife, no matter how trivial it might be to me, but to her, it's an important issue, then I'll be far more circumspect how I deal with it, how I broach a particular topic. And emotions are very critical for not only survival, but to ensure a consolidation of relationships. It brings about togetherness, for example, in ever you look at your wife, and you look at her with love, and sometimes a tear flows.

A person might say, son, a manly thing, but the joy it will bring to her that feeling, nothing has been expressed. But what you express there was true love, affection, I'm fond of you, I'm concerned about you. I'm concerned, what's going to happen to you when I die. These are very important things. You see, words can be used to manipulate, words can heal, or they can harm. silences can also be harsh, or they can be appropriate. But emotions

is about passion. It's about externalizing your inner feelings. In that way. This brings about a positive relationship. Many people say, you know, what?

Does he love me?

He's not expressive at all. He doesn't show his emotions. We look at his situation that evokes a picture of pity, a tragic situation, a catastrophe. But he looks at it. Like as if you look at a piece of art, very clinical, nothing is cathartic, nothing purges and cleanses you. So I would recommend people to find out what is it that is holding you back? What is it that is preventing you from expressing from sharing your emotions, and it is those emotions can really bring about intimacy, closeness, and propinquity. In relationships. Sometimes you may have only one experience one individual, it might be through a traumatic thing. When you see the father jumping into the

ocean, trying to save his child, and it comes out in your house, my son, oh god, my son is gone, my son is gone. That one experience will be enough to understand the person, his pain and his anguish, as opposed to another person who seems to be very, very apparently come because it is inappropriate to behave in a particular fashion. So it's very important. Very, very critical. And I'm urging you the listener,

fee, express in that way. It will bring about closeness

homeless, you find it nice, but it is mentioned. They're emotionally non expressive. And it seemed as inappropriate to hug the child or kiss the child. And sometimes we display negative rather than positive emotions. For example, a child as well is not commended for that. And he does not do so well in exam that's remembered, they are shouted the insulted, humiliated. So I do good. There's no joy expressed, I do not so good is anger expressed. So you are more seen as one expressive of anger.

The anger may be due, but you're not expressing joy when joy is due. And that is an emotional imbalance that people are non expressive with emotions. So all you see is, for example, a wife or a husband, whoever makes them food in the house, makes the toast of the breakfast, and one morning the burn the toast, that stands out for the whole year, 384 days, the toast was not burn, it was never mentioned. Only those who can express appreciation, they have the right to criticize. So the point I'm making is sometimes we display emotions, but only one dimension of the negative dimension. For Non performance we showed the child and for performance, no comment. What would you add Shaq you

know, I cannot help but reflect on my father and my mother. Both of them are late. And may God Almighty forgive them. May they attain the highest status in heaven for all parents anyway. And I recall vividly that if I were to tell my mother a story of a total stranger, a friend of mine, who might have gone through some tragic experience, immediate reaction is tears. immediate reaction is tears. She would go to a wedding. To see the girl's mother crying, she would cry. She turns her head slightly. She sees a boy's mother smiling, she would smile. And my father,

I often hug him. And when I hug him,

tears flew from his eyes. I don't have to tell him anything. He knows I love him. And he knows that I'll be there for him. And I know that he loves me.

When you ask people, when you leave home? How many of you hug your family? How many of you express your love for your child? They think there is another way of doing it the fact that I'm working hard. I'm feeding them clothing them housing them? Yes, it's a noble responsibility. But you need to go far beyond that. It reminds me of a child whose father asked him, my darling son, does daddy love You see, yes, my daddy, my daddy loves me. Then he asked the question, why do you think Daddy loves you? Is it because your daddy loved you, the child could see that. So we need to be far more expressive our homes become like museums of us institutions that become like that very clinical

places, we are system people, we have forgotten the humanity, we have forgotten the fact that we are human beings. The physical contact, as brother Idris has alluded to is very important within our families. And now the social networking that is happening, people are either SMS thing, or you're sending emails, or they're on other social networks. And that close bond is not there anymore. And can one say that many people think irrationally. And this gives rise to debilitating emotions, where people feel as if they are victims, isn't this kind of fallacious thinking damaging, it is very, very damaging. And I want to create the indulgence of the listeners. And I'll go through some of

those fallacies. And before I do that, I sort of take your point that you referred on social social networking, it is our view that many people who are obsessed with it, that they are able to be a different persona, they can hide their identity, they can appear to be resilient and courageous and romantic. And I say that people meet on Facebook. But when they get married, they cannot face each other. The ability to have a conversation, a direct conversation, the ability to look at a person in the eye and tell him exactly what you feel is about being your authentic self. So there must be a balance. I'm not saying social networking is deleterious or pernicious, it can have an effect on

society. Let us look at the fallacies the fallacy of perfection. The whole idea is this.

People feel that I can only be accepted if I'm perfect. All human beings are fallible human beings. We all make mistakes, and we'll learn more for mistakes than our successes. No one is perfect in this world. The profit scheme is perfect example.

To us, but we're not profits, we are human beings. We'll make mistakes. And these are important in the next one, the fallacy of approval. Many people go at great lengths to seek approval to appease other people. When they go to a function, they want to spruce themselves up. In the look at themselves. It's almost like there'd be some kind of cosmetic surgery there where the recent fashion, and they go there and no one seems to acknowledge it. I've often asked my wife, I said, you went to the function. Did anyone tell you, you're looking elegant today? And she tells me, will fellow women do that? So they say generosity of spirit. So in other words, it's about each of the

fallacies by being true to yourself. The other one, the fallacy of shoulds. You know, for example, you say, you know what, they I don't know why it should be raining this weekend. I don't know why this I don't know why that, in fact, is also based on my lack of self esteem. Because when you got high self esteem, you're able to decide on a journey, a route, but it is an obstruction. You say there's an obstruction, so I take another route, or do something else, then you become malleable, you're able to adapt to every situation, adapt the sales and save as the wind blows in a particular direction. The sailboat will go in the direction. And if the wind doesn't go into direction, you

readjust your sails and go in the direction that you want to go. Very, very good point. Right. The other one the fallacy of overgeneralization like saying, you know, I am so stupid, you know,

I can never remember anything. What a friend, am I, you know, I forgot the birthday. Everyone hates me, everyone hates me, they don't they despise me. Now, in that way, what happens? is almost, you know, a self effacing it's about really running yourself down. And when you do that, what it also does when any person acknowledges you, you begin to be suspicious. Why? Why is he saying this wonderful thing? The other one is the fallacy of helplessness. Right? You know, when you say or I'm a woman, we can never get go ahead and society, we've got a very critical society, they are very patriarchal, and they are so demeaning. You look at the adverts in that way, what you are really

doing, you are blaming everyone else, and you tell yourself, I'm helpless, and look back at your life. And you say, Listen, I could not do anything. In fact, you are true to yourself. You could have done many, many things. You could have gone on a crusade, you could have gone and fought for the rights of women, even the fact that you could have done anything in the past doesn't prevent you from doing something from now onwards. You know the ideas, even if you in the past, you have a negative mentality. There's nothing that prevents you from lifting yourself up and motivating as well inspiring yourself to do what is best right now, in fact, subtler I want to add, it's about

really being assertive in a sense about placing your life and giving it a priority, then you speak about the fallacy of causation, right? For example, you keeping quiet when another person's behavior is bothering you, or you pretending to be attentive when you arrive late for an appointment, or you become very, very overly cautious when you're communicating with other people. And in that way, what is really based on an irrational belief that emotions are caused by others, rather than by one's own self talk, because people's negative talk leads to what I call a negative self talk. And the last point is a fallacy of catastrophic expectations.

For example, if something bad can possibly happen, it will, if I invite them to this birthday party, they probably will not come. If I want to organize this weekend, I'm sure it's going to rain. If I apply for the job, I probably will not get hired. And these are statements people make it becomes really a self fulfilling prophecy. Because this fallacies and it's quite clear it the fallacies is not based on reality. The reality is this, that you are not a victim. You only make yourself a victim. The reality is you need to do things differently. The reality is Believe in yourself. The reality is once you have a high self esteem, you become an owner of your life. You become decisive.

You do not become a pessimistic, you not become a warrior. And in that way, you're able to really go on with your life. Rather than adopting a victim mentality. It must be me. I'm all bad luck. This kind of talk sadly, is so pervasive in our community and try as you will, such individuals can only change it they decide. My thinking is fallacious negative thinking whether these thoughts are energy or flows of energy within ourselves, and is what they call the law of attraction. What do you think negatively you attract yourself?

You keep thinking a particular way. That's the result you'll always get. So negative thinking is emotion that affects your emotion. And thinking itself also emotional impulses, thoughts or emotions are impulses within ourselves and emotions that affect those thoughts. And also it permeates beyond yourself. So it radiates. So negative thoughts lead to negative emotions. And that negativity radiates around you. Under add another point, when people look at others, they look at others and they say, what do they say, Oh, he can do it because he's got all the resources. But people forget. Many people have done well they've gone through adversity. For example, you look at a trapeze

artists, you see him there on stage the same day, and you admire him, but you forget the hard work, the dedication, that diligence, the focus he had. These are very important issues. So people, if you have to move from where you are to where you want to be, please my brothers and my sisters,

we have only one life,

what legacy you want to leave behind. There are certain people that make things look so easy from the outside like brother Ed said, a trapeze artists, he makes things look so easy, yet, so much effort and time has gone into that. She said, what purpose do emotions serve in our personal and also in our social lives? A very pertinent questions at the Fatima, we need to know that each emotion serves a very important function. And each emotion may have more than one dimension. And each emotion offers us some dimension of the essential truth and insight in what it means to be a human being.

For example, I'll give some of the emotions that are common emotions that we have love.

Love, offers connection, and a sense of compassion.

The more love there is, the less of everything else there would be.

So love offers connection, a sense of compassion, sometimes even a sense of connection, and of belonging.

Fear.

Fear makes us evaluate our strengths and our weaknesses. Specifically in the face of challenges,

grief or sadness. It reminds us of how fragile Our lives are. Nothing is permanent.

Nothing is permanent.

Anger.

It can be constructive disagreement, such as I mentioned early on indignation aroused by witnessing or experiencing injustice, or wrongfulness, or impropriety. But anger can also be destructive. For example, when it occurs when a person is more intense in his reaction or her reaction than the situation requires. Sometimes there are people who are

overly emotional. And sometimes the emotion is one dimensional. They're angry all the time.

So you see them the display anger or their fault finders. So what they do is, they tend to have this notion of reacting more intensely to anything when the situation requires. So we'd have love we have fear, we have grief, we have anger, which can be constructive,

like indignation, or it can be destructive, where there is a like rage, where the reaction is more than the situation that it's it's another one called hate

is often the most destructive, with the least pleasant consequences. Unlike love, which is the most positive or the most pleasant consequences. Hate is often the most destructive, and the least pleasant consequence, gratitude, very important one appreciation of our blessings that we have. Sometimes we focus so much on what we don't have, that we forget to be thankful and grateful for what we do have. And when we do lose that we have, what we had, then we realize the value of it.

Joy, like knowledge by the way, which is shared becomes multiplied, not depleted, unlike money. So joy is celebration of the positive aspect of life. Jealousy, which is a negative emotion.

It can evolve into ugly, unreasonable selfishness. And if you view things through an envious eye, as we mentioned early on, everything appeared, appears yellow to the jaundiced eye. And sometimes people are given example one day, I was at the airport.

And there are a couple of people waiting for the person to pick them up or waiting for someone to pick me up and there was some other lady standing there and another young lady standing there as well. So we watched and you waited for a while and then the young lady was sitting in front, a beautiful Mercedes Benz convertible ladies model for the SL

Something stopped and the lady jumped into the car and took off. The two ladies next to me then passed a remark. Did you see her shoes is so outdated. Now it's nothing to do with the shoes as you got into an ordinary old car, no comment. So you mask your criticism of the shoe. Because actually rejection jealousy is the merch that made you jealous, or maybe the cute person beat up or whatever it may be. So you fool yourself and you have a discussion. Oh my God, who has those kind of shoes, and you feel so good about it, not realizing how stupid it seems and how stupid it is. But actually, you're masking your true emotion, you are not critical of a shoe. But actually You are jealous. And

a shakedown to just interject I think it's a very important point, something worth elaborating. In life, for example, in the workplace, or anywhere else, if I have some antipathy towards you, not based on any reason, purely out of jealousy, so I whisper those negativities to others, and others being susceptible to rap says negative peer pressure, begin to auto subscribe to my point of view. And this creates all kinds of problems. I find it shocking, really, I find it shocking that adults can behave in this way. Then we ask ourselves what examples I mean, who would emulate that example, life is far more pleasant. If we have a generosity of spirit, and feel good for other people, wish

them well. wish them well in the successes and also feel the pain participate vicariously in the life and feel the pain when they go through some kind of trauma. The other feeling besides jealousy is guilt, which can be healthy as a reminder of an obligation that is due, or a task that was supposed to be fulfilled, but you didn't do. So guilt can be a positive one. It can be unhealthy when becomes a pile of resentments that constantly burden our conscience. You feel guilty about everything, some something happens. Some people do this. They are religious people at times, and they have an accident in the home. I wonder why God is punishing me it's an accident happen, a

reckless driver, but almost this notion. So guilt can be a healthy reminder what we supposed to do or what we haven't done, but also the same time or having done something wrong, but an unhealthy way is a pile of resentment that constantly burdens the conscience unnecessarily. And then of course, the other one is excitement, it provides motivation, it is energy to do things. So these are the basic emotions love, fear, grief or sadness, anger can be positive or negative hatred is negative gratitude, which is positive joy, which is positive jealousy, which is negative guilt, which can be healthy or unhealthy, and of course, excitement, which is a motivational force. But of course, it

should be excitement for something good, not excitement for something bad. Human beings are social creatures and our body language accounts for so much. Not necessarily verbal, it is our nonverbal communication that is also very, very important. Now, the law of physics says that everything has a cause and effect. And so too with emotions. For the Idris, what is the impact of emotions on our lives. emotions have a very profound impact on our lives. It's about how we relate to our emotions, how we deal with them, and how we utilize them have a tremendous impact on a few things. And these few things are very substantive. The one is our character and personality. The other is our

attitudes towards the world. The other one is relationships we have with others and others have with us. But let's look at the first one, our character and personality, you find that some people have what you call endearing personalities. Some of them are very likable people. Some of them are just obnoxious, and you look at them, you put off from the attitudes, the way they speak, there's a kind of rudeness kind of vulgarity. Now, we It's natural for us to respond. As DS Lawrence said, the ebb and flow of sympathy. When person flows towards you be flow towards them. If they move away from you, you also move away from them. I'm not saying it's the right thing to do. I don't subscribe to

that philosophy. But this is something that people respond to on a day to day basis. Number one, the other important thing is your attitude towards the world. Now you find someone said this, and it's so true. The only thing in life we have complete control of is our attitude. Of course, our attitude is based on life experiences, but you can decide on what attitude you want to embrace. Now your attitude towards the world is a result of all of these emotions. And as a result of it, for example, you could say the world is a wonderful place to live in. And I need to contribute to this world. Or you might say this world is pathetic. People are selfish people in the organization I worked is more

about people who they egos, about the personalities. It's more about them having an agenda, a and those result what happens. You have that attitude, then you'll find that you'll become

yourself and slowly and slowly is so being an integral part of your society, you'll become a loner, perhaps dying in solitary confinement somewhere like a recluse. The other one is relationships. Now, relationships is something you know, the prophets have said this and that, as a human being, there is no good in a human being, who neither be friends or is befriended. That means as a human being, we are social beings, we are gregarious beings, we have to interact with other people, because he's part of the society to be part of a bigger humanity. And in that way, when we are part of it, we want to contribute when you're part of it, you're acutely aware of the pain, the sorrow and you are

there to alleviate, to help to support to commiserate. Now, the other important aspect is what the relationship others have with us. Now, that's also a very critical aspect, you find the all kinds of people, I mean, you do not expect everyone to love you and express that love for you. They are those perhaps because of their own insecurities may not want to interact with you, there are many who want to interact with you. So what is important that you have a few friends and many acquaintances? So in the reality is this whilst you want to initiate friendship to allow other people to relate to this also, and this is what the impact of emotions have an either strengthening the bond on the other

extreme, creating a wedge, creating a hiatus between two individuals to deal effectively with our emotions will require emotional intelligence or emotional wisdom. Chefs Angela, could you kindly elaborate on emotional intelligence and emotional wisdom, as well as how we appropriately exercise our emotions? I think emotional intelligence and emotional wisdom is fundamental require emotional intelligence for emotional wisdom. Emotional intelligence, basically, is our ability to recognize our emotions, like I mentioned about the lady early on the two ladies early on, they themselves did not recognize that the emotion was one of envy, not fake criticism, which is a just thing to do.

It's a nice thing to do. You see. So for example, sometimes you find some people commenting, and I mentioned this, like, I like your shirt, but I hate your shoe. And you ask the person, why did you say that? to not just be honest, to be honest, you'd be obnoxious, because nobody asked you to comment on the shoe. And maybe you said my shed was nice in order to get my shoe. So my point I'm making is, we need to be able to recognize our emotions, when you are jealous, even let's say to the people recognize that you are jealous, when you are concerned, recognize that you are concerned. So emotional intelligence is the ability to recognize emotions, your own emotions, as well as the

emotions of other people. For example, someone offers you criticism, a regular criticism, I get people say you speak too fast, I can get angry and say they tend to condemn a lecture. I know I speak but fast at times. So my question very often, at least from my point I'm making is the actual read another emotion that they are jealous, or the undermining me? All right. And even if they may be my point is, is the point valid? So I react to that information. It was appropriate emotion. So the ability to recognize emotions, whether it be your own, or that of other people, and the way you deal with emotions, emotional intelligence deals with both of these recognizing emotions, you also

others, as well as dealing with emotions, your own emotions, and how you react to the emotions of other people. Someone may behave inappropriately. How do you respond? You take the phone, someone swears at you, Do you swear back? Or do you put the phone down? So emotion, intelligence, therefore, he's not just playing forward, there are some social skills that are required for emotional intelligence to take place. One is self awareness, to one social skill, very important for emotional intelligence. Self Awareness is our ability to recognize feelings, and its consequences.

From hateful, there's a consequence to it, if I'm envious, if I'm angry, and explicit is the consequence to that sometimes I can be brave and insult someone, the consequences of that. So the self awareness in relation to emotional intelligence is ability to recognize our feelings and the consequences of those feelings. And it is very important for what we call emotional literacy to be able to read emotions. Can I read your emotion, emotional literacy? It is, you know, maybe comment on Yes, I think the two points that you raised about self awareness.

We are so quick to pass judgment on others, but we're not quick enough to look at ourselves and measure our words. Has I remember someone saying this? He says words

That are softer than silk can make a heart harder than rock softer than silk. words that are harsh can make a heart softer than silk harder than rock. Words can be purring, or snarling. You have no control what others feel and say about you, but you have complete control how you respond, being constantly aware, say to yourself, I'm angry now. So I must be guarded, I must guard what I say and how I say self awareness is a very important thing. self knowledge is so critical. If we can learn about ourselves, what we do and how it makes a big difference. The other thing that

is also needs to be mentioned, it's when you understand who you are, then you are able to regulate yourself also. That's why the first in the series was about getting to know the real you. Second point about second social skill for emotional intelligence is self regulation, the ability to manage your emotions, of course, you get angry, you can't deny your emotions. We are human beings. Remember, we are emotive beings, we do get angry, we do feel joy, we may get envious. How do we regulate those emotions? How do we manage those strengths? So self regulation is very fundamental. And it's part of of a noble character is like, you find that when you ask someone, why did you do

this? So I was very angry, he upset me. And the thing is, okay, he made me angry, he must not do this to me. But the point is this. He did something to you, by you responding, what have you done, you compound the situation, sometimes through anger, it could be a fatal blow through anger, you create embarrassment for yourself and the whole family. So one has to be very, very circumspect. Now, we're not saying for example, that when you have a one to one chat with everyone, now, and you're going to be so conscious and overly cautious not to be not saying that, but we could be very, very guarded, we'd not allow our emotions take control, especially the negative emotion because you

can do irretrievable damage. The third point is a third social skill required for emotional intelligence is self motivation, or self confidence, rather than trusting one's ability to do what needs to be done. Do you trust yourself to do with your emotion in any particular situation? What needs to be done even in anger is but it is so beautifully mentioned. You're angry, you're angry with an uncle, for example, at a wedding? How do you respond? So you angry, acknowledge that emotion, no one said, you shouldn't be angry, maybe angered you? What do you say how you say it, where you say it will will have a tremendous impact on what how people perceive you, and what they

think of yourself, and what you might even think of yourself afterwards. So this notion of self confidence, and I put with it also self motivation, together with that, the ability to actively pursue with personal passion, what needs to be done other words, if something is not right, something is not appropriate. You want to set it right. But your emotion should come in your way to cloud, your judgment about how to do it. So I would say self confidence, and self motivation are very fundamental for emotional intelligence, because you don't have that the way you think would be crooked. Yes, indeed, we find that people look at others to inspire them. But we look at ourselves,

we have tremendous capacities to do many, many things. And self confidence is a very important thing. Once you have the self confidence, then you do things with conviction. And the other important thing is about self motivation. Now, it's about things to drive you to do something, you can't sit back and say find this, it be like a passive consumer, you got to be an active agent, an agent of change. So that is what really drives and motivates you. Then the last one is self esteem, which is linked to the previous to the value you attach to yourself, based on your perception of yourself, and see how you view yourself. And that self esteem is important. If you have principles,

those principles or values, if you live by those principles, your values are high, you have high self esteem, I think it's important point in life, what we must remember that nobody can diminish you without your permission. It's far more important is about how you see yourself than being worried unduly about how others see you. I'm not saying it's unimportant, but they can't there needs to be a kind of transaction, to look at yourself and say to what extent and measure what people see you because they criticism of you can also help you to grow. So self esteem is important. The last one is empathy, right? It's about understanding other people. And once you understand other people,

then you would be more guarded, perhaps in terms of how you respond to them, what you do and how you go about doing things. So we say emotional intelligence is important for emotional wisdom. So emotional intelligence, self awareness, self regulation, self control, self confidence, self motivation, self esteem, and abilities mentioned empathy ability.

appreciate how others feel, and to convey that understanding, I know what you feel, understand what you feel, I know why you are saying what you are saying, I may disagree with you. But I know this very often is probably religious conflicts, people, they have two differing views. But you need to understand why they say what they are saying, you may differ with them. And to realize that the issue is separate from the person, I may differ with you on the issue. It doesn't mean I can't be your friend. Emotional wisdom requires emotional understanding, or emotional intelligence, which means understanding our emotions and dealing with them effectively. That's what emotional

intelligence is. and emotional wisdom also require what you call equanimity. In other words, this is the difficult part. This requires tremendous amount of resolve and character, the ability to experience the inescapable ups and downs of the rollercoaster of life without losing control of our emotional state. You can cry, you can celebrate, but not losing control of yourself that balance that something's happened. But how do I react to it? I'm angry, how angry do I get? For example, if if a child does something to you, you can react freely and say what you want. Let the judge do that to you and see how you react. That means you can control your emotion, let your fellow classmate

hurt you and see how you react and what language you use. And let the principal do that to you and see how you react. So be very cautious. Last point you mentioned about exercising our emotions. There are three basic ways we could exercise our emotions, one is expressing our emotions, the other one is acting on our emotions. And the third one is acting out our emotions. The first one, expressing our emotions, we use words that indicate our feelings, like but it is early on, people really express themselves. I feel hurt, I feel angered by this. I love this. I prefer this. I like this use words expressing indicating your feeling, say what it is then acting on emotions, which can

be positive as well. It's neutral, we respond to our feelings by either crying or talking with someone about it. In other words, it creates a response within us, which is maybe more emotive in the sense not necessarily verbal, it could be verbal, and then acting out our emotions. Now this is where if you don't have self regulation, you can go crazy. acting out emotions, we give physical vent to our feeling. You can't scream at someone or hit someone. So it can be negative, you can just go kill someone because you like them. Or you can eat someone just because you hate them. So the point I'm making is you can express your emotions and use appropriate words. You can act on your

emotions, by crying, and so on which may be appropriate and acting out emotions, which depends on how much self regulation you have. So emotional intelligence, understanding our emotion, and equanimity, the ability to go through the ups and downs of our roller coaster of life without losing control of our emotions. If you have those two things, then you have what we call emotional wisdom. There are so many interpersonal conflicts these days, many if not most of them stem from emotional crises. But the idea is how could we use our emotional intelligence and our emotional wisdom to respond to life's challenges. The emotionally intelligent person learns from each emotion. He learns

to control his or her emotions, and in essence controls himself or herself.

When we are smart, we get all we get from our emotions, many things. The old stands for acknowledging them, you got to acknowledge those emotions.

Listen, listening to them, you got to listen to emotions, and more importantly, learning from them. The other important aspect is validation.

To validate someone's feelings, is first to accept someone's feelings, to understand them, and to contextualize them. If someone tells you, I feel this way about you. Don't get agitated, don't get upset, try to find out why he feels the way he feels or she feels the relationship would be better. Because with more validations you're going to have less debating, of course less conflicts and less disagreement. So it is important for us to understand our emotions, understand how we need to manage them, and more importantly, how we articulate them. Also, part of relationship building is to understand the other and therefore Sadler spoke at great length about empathy, which is so critical

in any relationship. If empathy can become an integral part of our relationships, I think there'd be a far better understanding far more compassion and caring. Rather than sitting in judgment of the understanding emotional wisdom and also implementing emotional wisdom we have to start with ourselves. She has said that if we are emotionally aware or more conscious of our emotions,

Could that contribute to our happiness?

Indeed, emotional awareness can lead to happiness. I believe emotional awareness is a key, leading to a happier and a more fulfilling life. Getting to know the self,

acquiring knowledge of the self, how we operate, and how we feel, how we act and how we react, and why we react the way we react. All this to as many situations determines who we are. When we know how we feel, we know what we enjoy doing,

and who we enjoy doing it with. We know we feel safe with who we feel accepted by who we feel understood by. This is very important, and how we engage those people.

In the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, it is said and I quote, no aspect of our mental life is more important to the quality and meaning of our existence than emotions. They are what makes life worth living, or sometimes with nd

emotions, somewhat

instrumental in defining ourselves to ourselves

as a good measure, for us to be able to analyze ourselves and see how we respond to the realities of life. The more balanced our emotion, the more control we have aware of our emotions. The more we imbibe positive emotions, the more we can be a positive contributor to society and to the world at large. By the 80s, your parting thoughts, I think if you were to reflect on what has been said, I think we cannot diminish emotions in our life. I think we need to relook at it. We need to be far more expressive of it, and more importantly, take charge of our emotions. Yes, there are certain situations arousing us different emotions, sometimes extreme anger, sometimes of euphoria, but we

need to understand the appropriate see of how to express it in any given company. What may be beautiful to a person may not be beautiful to the other. It's about understanding the others, and also tend to look at yourself, being self aware. Once you become acutely self aware about who you are, the image people have of you. I'm not saying you're going to bow down to that image, long as you are authentic and genuine. Without being extreme. Any kind of extreme emotions is something that is not very, very healthy, it can be debilitating and disempowering. And to those who are not expressive at all, there is a great deal of concern. Learn to express your feelings. In that way you

bring about intimacy with people you need to be intimate with, with friends who may not understand you will become closer to you and to others who are only expressive emotions who do not, for example, become circumspect when you express it. While the extreme joy will bring joy to others. Your extreme hurt could also hurt others. It's about in the end, saying, I am here. I need to be part of this larger society. I need to integrate with the society. I can only integrate the society when I'm able to express my emotions with emotional wisdom and emotional intelligence. We thank brother Idris camisa answer de Lacan for an informative and motivating presentation on emotional

wisdom. Having explained what emotions are, why they are so important, the need to understand our emotions, the challenges they pose and how to acknowledge those challenges. How to utilize our emotional intelligence to respond to the daily realities of life, and how our emotions relate to our general well being. Thank you, and peace be unto you