Emotional Intelligence: More Than Being “Good With Feelings”

I’m currently immersed in research exploring emotional intelligence, and it has prompted me to reflect on how often we misunderstand what it truly means to be emotionally intelligent.

Emotional intelligence — a term popularised by psychologist Daniel Goleman — is often reduced to being “good with emotions.” But in therapeutic work, it’s far more nuanced than that. It isn’t about being calm all the time, nor is it about being endlessly empathetic or emotionally expressive.

At its heart, emotional intelligence is about our relationship with emotion — our ability to notice it, understand it, regulate it, and respond to it with awareness rather than impulse.

And that’s where the deeper work begins.

Emotional Awareness: Noticing What Is Actually There

Emotional awareness sounds simple, but in practice, it’s one of the most complex skills we develop.

It involves recognising an emotion as it arises, accurately naming it, and differentiating it from our thoughts, bodily sensations, or the urge to act.

Often, emotions register in the body before they reach language. A tightening in the chest. Restlessness in the legs. A change in breathing. A flush of warmth. The body tends to signal a shift before the mind can interpret it.

In the therapy room, this is especially evident. Emotional shifts are often sensed before they are spoken.

Developing awareness means slowing down enough to ask:

• What am I actually feeling right now?

• Is this emotion, or is this a thought about the emotion?

• What is happening in my body?

Without awareness, we react. With awareness, we gain choice.

Emotional Regulation: Holding Emotion Without Being Driven by It

Emotional regulation is often misunderstood as suppression or composure. But regulation is not about eliminating emotion — it’s about staying present with it without becoming consumed or compelled to act it out.

It’s the ability to remain psychologically steady while experiencing something internally intense.

When we are regulated, we can say:“I feel angry”rather than“I am my anger.”

The difference may seem subtle, but it changes everything.

Regulation allows emotion to move through us without dictating our behaviour. It creates space between feeling and action. It means we can remain in relationship — with ourselves and others — even when something feels uncomfortable.

Empathy: Feeling With, Not Becoming

Empathy is another concept that is often simplified. It is commonly described as “feeling what someone else feels,” but in therapeutic practice, it is more layered than that.

Empathy involves sensing and understanding another person’s experience while remaining grounded in your own. It includes emotional attunement — picking up on shifts in tone, posture, pacing, silence — and cognitive perspective-taking, the ability to consider another’s inner world without assuming we fully know it.

True empathy is not emotional absorption. It is a resonance with boundaries.

It’s less about perfectly mirroring someone’s emotional state and more about communicating:“I am here. I am trying to understand. I am steady enough to sit with this.”

Often, empathy is conveyed less through what we say and more through how we listen.

Emotional Flexibility: Movement Without Collapse

Another dimension of emotional intelligence is flexibility.

Emotional flexibility is the ability to shift perspective or emotional stance when circumstances change — without losing stability.

It allows us to adapt without becoming rigid. To respond differently when needed. To soften, to assert, to pause.

Flexibility is sometimes confused with reactivity. But they are not the same.

Reactivity is automatic — emotion driving behaviour without awareness. Flexibility involves noticing emotional shifts and choosing how to respond.

The difference lies not in whether emotion is present, but in how we relate to it.

What This Means in the Therapy Room

In therapy, emotional intelligence is not something clients are expected to arrive with — it is something that develops within the work.

Many people come to therapy not because they “lack” emotion, but because their relationship with emotion feels overwhelming, confusing, or shut down. Some have learned to disconnect from their feelings simply, to cope. Others feel flooded by them. Some struggle to name what they feel at all.

Therapy becomes a space to practice noticing emotions. To slow down enough to identify what is present, and to differentiate between “I am anxious” and “Something in me feels anxious right now.”

It is also a space to strengthen regulation — learning how to stay with discomfort without immediately escaping it — and to experience empathy that is steady rather than engulfing.

Over time, clients often begin to recognise emotional shifts earlier. They find language where there was once only intensity. They pause before reacting. They respond rather than discharge.

That, to me, is emotional intelligence in action — not as a personality trait, but as a capacity that grows through awareness, reflection, and relational safety.

A Gentle Invitation to Reflect

As I continue my research in this area, I find myself less interested in whether someone appears emotionally intelligent and more curious about how they relate to their emotional experience.

So I’ll leave you with a few reflections:

• When you feel something intense, do you notice it first in your body or in your thoughts?

• How easy is it for you to name what you’re feeling — accurately and specifically?

• When emotions arise, do they tend to drive your behaviour automatically?

• Can you remain present with discomfort without needing to fix, avoid, or discharge it?

• When someone shares something vulnerable, can you stay connected without absorbing it?

• How flexible are you when emotional situations shift unexpectedly?

Emotional intelligence is not about perfection. It’s about awareness, steadiness, and choice.

And like all relational capacities, it can be strengthened — gently, intentionally, over time.