In the beautiful town of Kanazawa, Japan, there is a gentle soul who teaches in class, everyday, something that I never even knew existed until just a couple months ago: emotional intelligence.
I’m not a parent yet, so I can’t say how much I would want to protect my children from the pains of life. But I think allowing children to discover happiness and pain, and guiding them to be emotionally intelligent, is a critical missing piece in our education system.
At the end of my MBA, I took the MSCEIT assessment and learned a lot about how I perceive and emit emotions. It’s really helped me understand why I do or say something, and other times, how differently to approach situations.
I am great at perceiving the emotions and moods of others. I read people really well, and my gut instinct is right-on. However, I am horrible at describing how I feel and allowing others to read me – which on the positive side, allows me to control extreme rage.
I venture to guess that most people go through life without ever being aware of their emotional being and the impact of their words and actions on others. Life is perhaps easier this way.
But I can’t help but think how much better the world, the workplace, and families would all be, if people weren’t so naïve about their actions and reactions to each other.
No matter how old you are, I think there are good lessons to be learned from this series, “Children Full of Life”.
When the kids outline their bodies and fill it in with who they are, where they’ve come from, it reminds me of the personal collage I did at my closing residential retreat.
Here’s to all the wonderful teachers in the world… inside and outside the classroom:
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