True Emotional Intelligence (not just learning scripts)

Stop learning things like "turning casual into listening to you." It’s hard to remember and useless in practice. The essence of emotional intelligence involves four abilities: recognizing emotions, managing emotions, understanding others' emotions, and influencing others' emotions.
The first step in recognizing your own emotions: label your emotions. Instead of vague feelings like "feeling terrible," be specific—Is it anger? Disappointment? Or anxiety? The University of California categorizes emotions into 27 types, so you need to build your own vocabulary.
Second step: grade your emotions. Divide anger into levels 1-5, so you can clearly judge which level you're at right now. Third step: reflect daily. Ask yourself: Why did I do that? Was I angry? Was my reaction excessive?
Managing emotions isn’t about suppression but about adjusting how you express them. The key is to slow down—our physiological instinct is to erupt immediately, but society requires us to process emotions before expressing them. When emotions run high, deliberately slow down or simply do nothing.
Have a self-dialogue. Remind yourself: What emotion am I feeling right now? What am I doing? How should I express it? With practice, you'll become more rational. Also learn advanced expression techniques—observe how characters in movies and TV handle emotions, and deliberately imitate them.
Understanding others' emotions: first, grasp what the other person is expressing. Many people don’t understand subtle refusals, like "Let’s talk in a couple of days," which actually means no. Repeatedly inviting only shows a lack of social awareness.
Enhance your empathy—step into the other person’s thinking pattern to experience their feelings. The key is to share your life with close friends and family, and through data exchange, become familiar with "non-self" thinking. If someone shares a tragic story, don’t laugh.
Observe language beyond words. Crossed arms = disinterest; wandering eyes = inattentiveness; rushing to leave after a conversation = not engaged. There are many techniques, but only what you observe yourself is truly useful.
Influencing others’ emotions is the highest level. First, make yourself approachable—loners and closed-off people can’t influence anyone. Then improve your expression: start with the conclusion, list reasons clearly, put important points first, and use metaphors effectively.
The final step: influence the other person’s emotions. This isn’t just a single skill but a comprehensive application of all the previous abilities. Being able to manage yourself, perceive others, and communicate clearly naturally allows you to influence others. That’s the ultimate goal of high emotional intelligence.
Emotional intelligence isn’t a stockpile of scripts but a complete operating system from self-awareness to influencing others. Practicing this is much more useful than memorizing 100 high-emotional IQ responses.