The phrase emotional intelligence surfaced in the 1960s but only entered popular consciousness in the nineties with a bestselling book. Yet even now, in the age of therapy apps and mindfulness podcasts, many of us remain emotionally illiterate. The cost is steep: frayed civility, eroded cooperation, an epidemic of loneliness. Rage flares in our feeds and bleeds into daily life. Small disagreements spiral into shouting matches or silence. Do you flip a board game in anger, ruining the experience for everyone? Sob over a minor disappointment? Reach for that third cupcake that was “calling your name”?
In his new book, Shift: Managing Your Emotions—So They Don’t Manage You, University of Michigan psychology professor Ethan Kross offers science-backed tools to help us stay steady in turbulent times without numbing ourselves or pretending we don’t feel. The next time you hear “Get a handle on your emotions!”—whether from your own inner voice or someone else—you’ll be prepared.
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Dawson: Why is learning to regulate our emotions especially urgent in this moment, socially, politically, and in the age of constant online connection?
Kross: Well, that’s a great question. I think it’s always been tremendously urgent. I mean, look at one of the first stories of the Bible, the story of Adam and Eve [who were unable to fight temptation]. It’s a story about the failure to manage our emotions. Difficulties of emotion regulation have been perplexing for people, likely as long as human beings have been roaming the planet.
It feels incredibly urgent right now because we’re being pulled in lots of different directions, with social media providing distractions. Politically, I think there’s a ton of uncertainty and turbulence in the world, and we know that turbulence and uncertainty are conditions that people don’t really like. We like to know the world is orderly and predictable…But let’s not forget, there have been many other very uncertain times.
Read the complete article in the John Templeton Foundation
