Self-Awareness

A huge part of Emotional Intelligence is Self-Awareness. To be attuned with those around you, you must first be attuned to yourself. This includes your thoughts, feelings, and emotions.

So this weekend I tried to work on my Self-Awareness. The first part of Self-Awareness is the Emotional. Throughout this weekend I often reflected on how I was feeling in different situations. I found this to be a great help because when I acknowledged what I was feeling, it allowed me to better understand why I was feeling that way. This allowed me to make better decisions at the moment and understand the situation I was in.

Another part of Self-Awareness is Self-Assessment. This is measuring your strengths and limitations.Throughout the weekend I assessed my strengths and weaknesses in different situations. For example, all of my Clifton Strengths are in Relationship Building, so when a friend was distraught I knew that I was well-equipped to handle a situation like that. However, when it came to my computer having issues, I knew I wasn’t technically inclined to fix it and that I’d have to rely on someone else.

As a part of my research in Self-Awareness, I assessed my strengths. These were my top 5. As you can see, my strengths lie in relationships. However, none of them are logistical or strategic strengths. Now, I know that for the future I can work on those strengths or surround myself with people who can balance mine out.

The last part is Self-Confidence. I tried to not be so hard on myself this weekend and let myself be proud of the work I’ve done. For an assignment in my Ecology class, I could’ve felt bad about my poor drawing skills, but I let myself be proud that my sketch at least resembled a Red-tailed Hawk.

All of these parts make up the sphere that is Self-Awareness. By recognizing my emotions, assessing my strengths, and having self-confidence, I will be able to recognize other people’s emotions, strengths, and help build their confidence. I had to develop my personal awareness before I could develop my social awareness.

By developing my Emotional Intelligence skills in parts, I can really concentrate on that specific area enough to improve it significantly. I feel much more attuned to myself and this will allow making it easier to develop the other parts of Emotional Intelligence such as Social Awareness or Empathy.