Have You Ever Had to Apologize for Controlling Your Emotions? – Maximizing Emotional Intelligence to Lead Through Tense Situations

I am sorry for my actions, I let my emotions get the best of me. Have you ever had to say this to anyone? Emotions can run high and emotions can drive you to do things that you normally do not do. In the current climate too, many people are reacting to situations based on pure emotion and not always allowing information to come to light or clarity to be provided to a situation. I have often debated with myself if emotions are a weakness. Nobody has ever had to apologize for their actions because the remained too calm, cool and collected in a situation. This is something that can be easy in principle but harder to implement in practice.

This inner battle on whether emotion is a weakness weighs heavily on me as a person. I am a passionate person and I am driven by emotion. I have also had times in my professional and personal life where I have allowed my emotions to get the best of me, and this reaction put me in a less than ideal position. I have worked with people that are also passionate but could be all over the radar emotionally on a daily basis and that contributed to a challenging work environment. As a parent I have been exposed to a whole new meaning of emotion. The feelings that my son elicits from me are on a whole new level. So how do I acknowledge the strength that comes from being an emotional being and balance that with the risk that too much emotion can bring?

There are two areas to focus on when leading through an emotional situation. The first piece is external presence while dealing with emotion. As a leader everyone is watching you all the time. Understanding how your emotions manifest in externally is the first step in controlling your emotion. There are obvious reactions that are easy to control like not yelling or throwing your hands in the air, but there are many external reactions that can be harder to control like your face turning red. As a leader you must always be conscientious of what your body language is telling your team. Body language does not talk it screams. So, managing your external reactions are key to keeping your team focused and on task as you navigate a tense situation. It is also essential to shed some emotional insight to show that you are an authentic leader, but this must be controlled to show that you are in command when things get rough.

The other piece to balance and mitigate is the internal affects that an emotional situation elicits. You know that feeling when you are uneasy and you feel like you are going to explode? Your heartrate goes up, your vision is not as good and you tend to see with tunnel vision. All of those things are normal, and you must honor the feelings while not allowing them to control your reaction. While there are times that you may feel like you want to scream and yell, you must resist that temptation and lead in a controlled and calm manner. In order to do this, you must focus on the facts and the solutions to the problem, rather than the problem or the people that created the problem. This will allow you to avoid the emotional trap that can lead to a loss of control. You control your response, and that is the only thing that you control. So, manage your response while honoring those emotions and feelings.

As I develop as a leader and a person, I know that I have a way to go in keeping my emotions in check. This is something that I am aware of and constantly looking to improve my ability. Emotions can take you to all new heights, but they can also take you to all new lows. Managing this and understanding this will provide you with an opportunity to control those emotions and begin to leverage them for successful outcomes.