The Journey of EQ

How do people start learning emotional intelligence… and what happens? From over a thousand comments, a powerful story emerges. Scroll down to see the stages, or download the full report!

Why do practitioners start their EQ journey and what happened when they joined? The answer lives in the intersection of purpose, work, and growth. Then, there’s a key insight, or first “Aha!” where they see their challenge clearly, and that a new way of engaging emotions will help them move ahead.

DISCOVERY

“Curiosity leads me to knowledge… then understanding… and I begin to feel a sense of purpose that sparks commitment.”

A PATH CALLS

“I see emotions and choices clearly, and that these create a path to live my Noble Goal.”

PRACTICING

“I can see the effectiveness of my EQ practice in the way others are responding to me.”

EXPANDING

“Sharing EQ with others, I can see the power of helping them develop.”

INTEGRATION

“Making EQ central to my life and work energizes me to be better – with others.”

CONCLUSION

Many of the comments in the surveys were profound and touching. Hopefully you clicked the buttons on this page to read details and many of the verbatim comments. Just one example to end with:

“EQ has given me joy, freedom, global connection, and the responsibility to live my life and work with deep understanding, intentional and empathic action to make a better world.”

While we saw a wide range of individual experiences, the powerful themes above emerged from the research. These stages combine to a “theory of change” mapping the milestones and obstacles that members of the Six Seconds community experience in the process of becoming an emotional intelligence practitioner.

If you’re somewhere on this journey of EQ, we hope this map serves to support you in imagining “what’s next” and some of the key steps to consider. Perhaps most importantly, the survey participants said something vital: If your goal is to live and lead more authentically — to connect with who you really are inside so that you can connect with others as they really are — emotional intelligence works.

Authors: Joshua Freedman & Tommaso Procicchiani, with Loreta Avdiu & Annie Chu.

Icons provided by the Noun Project

Download the full Journey of EQ report by filling in the form below – the PDF of the full report will arrive via email in a few seconds:

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