Your Emotional Intelligence and the Future of Your Relationship
By Couples Therapists Bill and Robin Shearer
Most long-term relationships will not be successful. It's estimated that 70% to 75% of long-term relationships will not turn out well, either ending in divorce or separation, or being very unsatisfying.
How about your relationship? We are assuming that like most people, there is nothing more important to you than your long-term relationship succeeding, but will yours succeed? Will you be in the 25% to 30% that hit the jackpot? Well, it all depends on your choices — and you EQ.
It's more than luck and being in love is not enough. Much of your success will depend upon your self-awareness and your ability to self-manage or self-regulate your emotions while dealing well with the emotions of others. In other words, your emotional intelligence or EQ.
So, what is emotional intelligence? It's your ability to be mindfully aware of your emotions and the emotions of others. It involves intentionally and consciously responding rather than mindlessly reacting out of habit. It means skillfully and assertively communicating your emotions and your needs while being very accepting, understanding, and respectful of the needs and feelings of others it's being able to have empathy, even when you strongly disagree. It's about skillfully turning conflict into relationship growth and satisfaction.
Most people aren't very good at these things, but they can be.
As much as 40-45% of everything you do, say, think, and feel is a habit, and if you are like most people, you are on autopilot much of the time. Habitual knee-jerk responding with criticalness, contempt, avoidance, or defensiveness can destroy your relationship— and these behaviors over time damage or destroy most relationships.
No matter how much you love each other, the odds aren't very good, but again, it all depends on your choices and your personal commitment to learn and grow in self-awareness and self-management. Hi EQ already? You can continuously improve over your lifetime.
The good news and the bad news?
Let's start with the bad news first. Most relationships will not be successful and that's because most partners don't handle conflict without increased anxiety, defensiveness, blaming, or avoidance. Also, most partners don’t know how to deal constructively with common relationship issues such as sex, finances, child-rearing, household responsibilities, relationship insecurity, or commitment to the relationship.
The good news? You can raise your emotional intelligence. You can equip yourself to deal with any relationship challenge that arises. Unlike IQ, your emotional intelligence, or EQ is flexible and subject to new learning. Are you coachable? Are you willing to work on your personal relationship competencies instead of focusing on how your partner needs to change?
The two of us are relationship coaches whose mission is for our clients to thrive in their relationships, not merely survive. Our coaching is mostly about developing emotional intelligence skills within the context of co-creating a great relationship. Our client is your relationship and we invite you to grow in your ability to co-create the relationship you’ve always wanted and needed.
The two of you can become conscious and intentional, able to co-regulate as well as self-regulate emotions and reactivity. You can systematically build powerful and enduring relationship habits — habits of emotional intelligence.
Relationships thrive when two people are growing together, each contributing to the relationship by greater awareness, skillful self-management, unwavering commitment, and practice — lots of practice. You can become quite masterful at being a relationship partner, and if the two of you are on the same journey, your relationship can be magical.
The following is our Couple’s Emotional Awareness Scale. People toward the low end of the scale are disasters in relationship. People at the higher end of the scale consistently show up in their relationship with high emotional intelligence and superb relationship abilities.
People on the high end of the chart rarely come for couples therapy, particularly if they have a partner with similar emotional intelligence. This is because couples on the high end of chart chart are less reactive, less defensive and demonstrate good emotional self-regulation.
People on the higher end of the chart also tend to be happier. If your relationship is going well, you are probably doing well.
let’s take a look at several examples. These examples do not represent actual patients but are simply examples we have created to illustrate aspects of emotional intelligence.
First we will look at the lower end of the chart, below the “linguistic barrier.“
Jane was taught to suppress her feelings by a harsh punitive father. She regularly received invalidating responses, sometimes being told she was "too emotional," and sometimes even being punished for having feelings. As a result, Jane doesn't feel safe talking about her emotions. In fact, she doesn't know how to talk about her feelings or even know clearly what her feelings are. Out of fear, Jane has always been a people pleaser, stuffing her own needs and feelings and harboring well- hiden and well-disguised resentments. Her stuffed emotion, particularly her unexpressed anger occasionally bubbles to the surface and erupts like Mount Saint Helens, leading her to feel guilty and frightened, quickly retreating back to "nice Jane.” She doesn't see the connection between suppressing emotion and her high level of generalized anxiety. Increasingly she is having panic attacks.
Ken hates conflict. Whenever he finds himself in a conflict situation, his anxiety skyrockets. He feels queasy and disoriented. It’s hard to focus. He tells himself he is a great peacekeeper, but in actuality he will do anything to avoid conflict. With his wife, he perceives harsh criticism where only constructive feedback is intended. He shuts down and becomes numb rather than voicing his feelings. This pattern causes great distress for his wife, who feels emotionally abandoned and terribly frustrated. With others Ken is almost always polite and friendly, and he works to project an image of someone who is unruffled and in control. Most of Ken's friends are shocked by an occasional outburst of anger, and ken himself is rattled and frightened by a recent episode of road rage. He can’t understand how he can be so afraid and avoidant of conflict while sometimes out of control with his anger. Not surprisingly, his marriage may not survive.
Now let’s take a look at the upper end of our chart, the area above the “linguistic barrier.”
Alice has learned to have healthy boundaries. As a child she had weak boundaries and was easily manipulated or intimidated. As a young adult her anger and resentment led her to protect yourself by having walled off boundaries. Now she has grown beyond the passivity of her childhood or the defensive aggressiveness of her teen years. She has learned to be assertive and “tell it like it is.” She is kind, caring, and respectful but also confident in her ability to tell others what she feels, what she wants, and what she doesn’t want. She believes she has a perfect right to be an authentic Alice. Others admire and respect her, and they know they can count on her openness and honesty. Alice doesn’t fear conflict or disagreement. She works well with others and is superb at getting their support and cooperation. Her team members readily turn to her and perceive her as someone who is consistently empathic and understanding — someone they can trust.
Fernando is patient and understanding, even when his wife is annoyed and seems to be in attack mode. He accepts these instances as a normal part of a long-term couple relationship, and he quickly slows down and centers himself, becoming a calm non-anxious presence He’s a great listener, even when his wife is angrily complaining. He is expert at putting his own agenda on the back burner and listening attentively, not reactively. He is able to put himself in her shoes, and focus on understanding his wife’s unique awareness of her world, including her deeper feelings and unmet needs. He is able to re-envision his wife not as someone trying to punish him or control him, but as someone he chooses to love, day by day, and who is at this moment hurting or wounded in some way. He is empathic and compassionate, but also able to effectively communicate his own needs and feelings. He seeks compromise or collaboration, win-win solutions, based on accurate understanding by each partner of each partner’s needs and feelings He is good at describing his feelings, never attacking with them. Easily turns conflict into an opportunity for relationship growth. Not surprisingly, Fernando is very happily married.
Alice and Fernando have high emotional intelligence. It’s not genetic, it’s learned. For each, emotional intelligence has been growing over their lifespan, and will continue to grow. Intelligence, or IQ, can only get you so far. Emotional intelligence is the key to showing up in your relationships as the best possible version of you, and nothing is more important to your happiness and well-being.
A word of caution! Occasionally a client will tell us: “I know all about emotional intelligence. I’ve read a lot about it and I’m very familiar with the concept.” Knowing is not enough! Reading is not enough. Understanding the concept is not enough. It takes practice, and a lot of ongoing consistent practice.
Emotional intelligence is something that develops over a lifetime, and you can always be in the process of getting better.
It’s a journey, a never-ending journey, but richly rewarding at every