Emotional Intelligence and Politics

Where have I been, you ask? 

Truthfully, I’ve been in kind of a funk since the end of the year.  It seems that every time I sit down at my computer I find myself googling political commentary – mostly commentary that I agree with – and reassuring myself that I’m not the only one in a funk.  This at the expense of writing.  If it weren’t for running I’d probably completely devolve into a bon-bon eating, political-commentary-watching couch potato.

I exaggerate.  It’s really not that bad and we’ve actually done some fun things so far in 2017.  I will write about those things, I promise.  But now I want to write about emotional intelligence in the context of politics. 

The 2016 election was one of the most divisive – and emotional – in the history of our great nation.  In fact, it would be interesting to understand just how many votes were cast based on emotion rather than facts or qualifications.  Although I doubt there’s a way to capture that information because I don’t think anyone will admit that they voted based on emotion.  I do know several people who told me they voted for “the lesser of two evils.”

The results are in, and regardless of how we feel about the new president, he is our president.  There are times that I watch him in action and think, “he totally lacks emotional intelligence.”  There are other times that it seems like he not only has significant emotional intelligence, but also knows how to play the emotions of others for maximum advantage. 

This is my opinion only.  I am not qualified to assess the level of emotional intelligence of the President of the United States, or anyone else.  I can use my own emotional intelligence, in this case, self-awareness and self-management, to bring myself out of the current funk and back into being creative.  Self-awareness helped me to recognize that my emotional state has taken me down a proverbial rabbit hole that I need to climb out of. 

Self-management comes next.  Now it’s time to take better action than watching Keith Olbermann.  The good news is that I can.  If there’s something I feel strongly about, I can write my senators and my congresswoman.  I can write our governor – and I have!  And once having taken action, I can get back to living my life and doing the things that I choose to do.  And of course, get back to writing.

I’m back.