Emotional Intelligence in Love and Relationships

Learn why emotional intelligence (EQ) matters in romantic relationships and how you can use it to strengthen your partnership, increase intimacy, stay connected, and build a love that lasts.

Photo by Arun Prakash on Unsplash

How emotional intelligence (EQ) impacts relationships

Emotional intelligence (EQ) is the secret of lasting intimate relationships, mainly because it makes us highly aware of the large and small changes constantly occurring in ourselves and others. By building your EQ, you’ll have the sensitivity we continuously seek in a significant other. Through active awareness and empathy, you'll automatically sense the little shifts in the dynamics of your romance that signal a need for action.

We can attain the kind of love we all dream of — deep intimacy, mutual kindness, genuine commitment, soulful caring — simply because of empathy and our innate ability to share an emotional experience. But to reach the height of romance, we need all the skills of a high EQ: sharp emotional awareness to avoid mistaking infatuation or lust for lasting love; acceptance to experience emotions that could harm a relationship if left to fester; and a vigilant active understanding to appraise us of what’s working and what isn’t.

Building emotionally intelligent romantic relationships

We don’t have to choose the wrong lovers, end up in multiple failed marriages, or let the romance seep out of our long-term relationships. We don’t have to let conflicting needs and wants to come between two people who love each other. We don’t have to resign ourselves to boredom or bickering in our love lives.

We can attain the kind of love we all dream of — deep intimacy and mutual kindness, real committed, soulful caring — simply because of empathy and our innate ability to share an emotional experience. But to achieve those relationship goals, we need all the skills of a high EQ:

• astute emotional awareness to avoid mistaking infatuation or lust for lasting love
• acceptance to experience emotions that could harm a relationship if left to rot, and
• vigilant active attention to apprise us of what’s working and what isn’t.

Fortunately, your EQ doesn’t need to have peaked before you embark on love. In fact, for many people, falling in love serves as motivation for re-educating the heart. That’s why some of the most intensely passionate lovers are in their eighties: They discover that two high EQs add up to a romance that never stops growing, never loses excitement, and always strengthens them both, individually as well as collectively.

Actively seek change in your relationship.

When you ride out your fear of change, you discover that different does not necessarily mean worse. Things often come out better than ever on the far side of change. Relationships are organisms themselves and, by nature, must change. Any relationships not nudged toward the kind of growth you want will drift into a change of another kind — maybe one you don’t want. Your ability to embrace change pays off in courage and optimism. Ask yourself, does your lover need something new from you? Do you need to schedule some time to reevaluate together? Are external influences demanding a change in your respective roles? Are you as happy as you used to be? Without EQ, such questions are often too scary to face, so many lovers ignore change signals until it’s too late.

View the challenges you encounter as opportunities rather than problems.

Your courage and optimism allow you to view dilemmas not as problems but as challenging opportunities. How creative can the two of you be? When you don’t need to blame each other for your emotions, you’re not controlled by negative emotional memories and are alert not to repeat the same old mistake. When you have a high EQ, you’re liberated from ruts and resignation and can get down to resourceful problem-solving. You can meet differences between you and inevitable crises, as invitations to find each other, challenges to get closer and emerge individually and collectively stronger.

Respect all the feelings you have for each other.

We’re not always delighted by the discoveries we make about the person we love, but it’s necessary to accept them all when it comes to emotions. Being in love doesn’t mean feeling angry, disappointed, hurt, or jealous. How you act on your emotions is up to you; what’s important is that you touch them. Blames have ruined many relationships, and millions of couples have missed out on deep intimacy because of shame. Both are cruel reminders of unfelt anger, fear, and anxiety. If you’ve done the work of building EQ, you’ll experience the emotions and get on with your life together.

Keep the laughter in your love life.

To avoid intellectualizing emotions, you need acceptance, and a big part of your acceptance comes from laughter. Lovers who can’t laugh together about themselves probably aren’t very accepting of their relationships. They may not be able to tolerate its unique flaws and inevitable stumbles any more than they can put up with their own. They’re also less likely to be open to a relationship’s most pleasant surprises. Your high EQ, in contrast, means you can keep improving your relationship, but you’ll never get trapped by intolerant expectations of perfection.

Pay attention to how you feel when your lover is not around.

Fortunately, you have an excellent way of monitoring your relationship: Use the three well-being gauges to figure out how the rest of your life is going. Are you feeling restless or irritable in general? Do you drag through your day at the office or school after a night of marital bliss? Do you resent family and friends even though the two of you are spending every available minute alone together? Love never benefits from tunnel vision. If you don’t feel energetic, clear-headed, and benevolent all the time, it doesn’t matter whether you coo like doves when you’re together. If the sex couldn’t be better but you’re slipping at work, if you feel safe and cozy hearing “Hi, honey” when you come home at night but are having trouble getting up in the morning, something’s not right — even though everything feels warm and fuzzy in the castle.

When this happens, all the information about you, your lover, and your relationship that your emotions and intellect have gathered will steer you to the best solution.

10 Ways to Love Smart

If you’re new to love or new to EQ, your course will be surer if you remember to stick to these tips:

1. Let the three gauges of well-being inform you about your romantic choices. If you feel energized, mentally clear, and more loving, you’re in a relationship with a future.
2. Let your lover know what you feel. If you’re going to communicate anything, express what you think — as it defines who you are. If you pretend to be someone or something you’re not, you’ll never feel loved.
3. Listen from emotional experience. Attune to your lover’s feelings as you listen to their words.
4. Show the support and love that your lover needs. One person may find a suggestion or a helping helpful hand or comforting; another may find the exact action intrusive. Not everyone likes to be touched in the same way, enjoys being affectionate in public, or responds the same way to receiving gifts. Let empathy guide you.
5. When in doubt, ask. Love doesn’t guarantee that you’ll know everything, and you'll never know if you don’t ask how your lover feels about something.
6. Be prepared to work on the relationship. Why do so many people believe their work is done once they’ve found true love? Relationships grow and thrive with attention or wither and die of neglect.
7. Learn from your lover. Active awareness keeps you from relying on past assumptions.
8. Watch out for emotional memories. Emotional reminders of past hurts are most dangerous with those we love today.
9. Remember that the only problem with making mistakes is not admitting them. The complexities of relationships guarantee error, but even mistakes are opportunities for growth if met without blame.
10. Use change as an opportunity to grow your relationship. Any change is stressful, but also a chance to renew and revitalize your relationship.

Finding “the one.”

When you first fall in love, how can you tell whether this person is “the one”? How do you know whether you’re in love with a natural person or just in love with love? How can you avoid repeating your mistakes if you've been burned before?

Listen to your body, not your mind.

We choose a mate for reasons that do more with what we think than how we feel. We conduct our relationships based on how things should be or have been, and this is precisely where we go wrong. We don’t lose love because we let our emotions run away with us but because we allow our heads to run away.

People think they’re in love for many reasons — lust, infatuation, desire for security, status, or social acceptance. They think they’ve found true love because the prospect fulfills some image or expectation. But unless they know how they feel, their choice will be wrong.
Whenever your daydreams of a prospective lover take the form of mental debates justifying your choice or agonizing over it, breathe, relax, and focus on getting out of your head and checking in with your body. If a feeling that something’s wrong persists or grows, chances are your choice is probably wrong. If you let mental images versus physical sensations guide you, you’ll never know what you want.

Heed the messages from your entire body.

For most people, it’s hard to get clear signals from the whole body during new love because they’re often drowned out by sexual desire, so it’s important to notice other, more subtle feelings. Muscle tension, migraines, stomach pains, or lack of energy could mean your passion is not what you need. On the other hand, if an increase in power and liveliness accompanies the glow of love, this could be the real thing.
If it’s more than infatuation or lust, a benefit will be felt in other parts of your life and relationships. Ask yourself these high-EQ questions:

1. Is this relationship energizing the totality of my life? For example, has my work improved? Am I taking better care of myself?
2. Is my head on straighter? Am I more focused, creative, and responsible?
3. Do my “in love” feelings go beyond positive caring for my beloved? Do I feel more generous, giving, and empathic with friends, coworkers, or strangers?

If the answers you get from your body aren’t what you want to hear, try to push beyond the natural fear of loss we all experience. Finding out now that you haven’t found true love can spare you the pain of a pile of negative emotional memories — a legacy that can keep you repeating the same mistakes or sour you on love altogether.

Take a chance to reach out.

We’re often on guard with someone new, and we automatically build barriers to getting to know each other. Leaving yourself open and vulnerable at this stage can be scary, yet it’s the only way to discover if real love is possible between you and if you’re falling for a natural person or a façade. Try being the first to reach out — reveal an intimate secret, laugh at yourself, or show affection when it seems most frightening. Does their reaction fill you with warmth and vitality? If so, you may have found an empathic, kindred soul. If not, you may have seen someone with a low EQ and have to decide how to respond to them.

What you need to feel loved vs. what you want

To find the person who is really “the one,” know the difference between what you can’t live without versus what you’d like. The following exercise can help.

1. Select five qualities or characteristics in descending order that feels most important to you as a lover. For example: neat, humorous, adventurous, considerate, emotionally open, athletic, attractive and stylish, protective, creative, conversational, intelligent, affectionate, monetarily successful, well known, well respected, popular charismatic, maternal/paternal, spiritual, nurturing, empowering.
2. As you consider each characteristic, ask yourself whether it energizes, calms, and stirs you emotionally. Is the experience pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral?
3. A desire will be fleeting or superficial, while a need will register more profoundly.
4. Do the exercise several times to better understand the differences between your desires and your felt needs in love.
5. Does this person you think you’re in love with fulfill these needs?

Responding to a low-EQ romantic partner

We don’t all grow emotional muscle at the same rate. If you’re ahead of the one you love, here are some high-EQ ways to respond to low-EQ behavior and poor listeners.

• Take time to consider the feelings as well as the words that you want your partner to hear. Your message may be mixed up if you’re unclear about what you need and why you need it.
• Select a time when you and your partner are not rushed or hassled. Take a walk together or make a date for brunch or dinner, but watch the alcohol if you want them to remember the discussion.
• Send “I feel” messages about your needs if you want your partner to hear something is wrong with them. For example, “I feel like making love more often, but I have this thing about the odor of onions and garlic, so would you be willing to brush your teeth before coming to bed?
• If your partner reacts defensively to your feelings, repeat their concerns: “You’re afraid that if I take this job, you and the kids will be neglected.”
• Repeat your “I feel” message, then listen and keep up the process until you’re satisfied you’ve been heard.