The document discusses emotional intelligence and related concepts from Indian philosophy. It defines emotional intelligence as the ability to understand and manage one's own emotions and understand others. Indian views see the self as a unity of consciousness across time. The concept of "Sthitaprajna" or stable intellect from the Bhagavad Gita describes acting without attachment to rewards and maintaining equanimity through self-control. True success comes from detached pursuit of duties in harmony with nature.

1. GRK Murty

2. The wise man beholds all beings in the Self and the Self in all
beings; for that reason he does not hate anyone.
--The Isa Upanishad

3. Are we, as our name—Homo sapiens—indicates, wise
human beings? Are we, as Hamlet proclaimed, “noble in
reason, infinite in faculty! … in apprehension like a god”
or as Eliot remarked, with a “headpiece filled with
straw?”

4. True, reflections of this kind obviously leave one in
doubt about oneself. And axioms such as—“three things
extremely hard in the universe—Steel, a Diamond, and
to know one’s Self” only strengthen one’s doubts
further. Knowing oneself, though difficult, is perhaps
achievable—at least for those whose emotional
quotient is high.

5. Those who are not angry at the things they should be
angry at are thought to be fools, and so are those who
are not angry in the right way, at the right time, or
with the right persons; for such a man is thought not
to feel things nor to be pained by them, and, since he
does not get angry, he is thought unlikely to defend
himself...
— Aristotle
What is Emotional Intelligence?

6. Peter Salovey and John D Mayer formally defined EI in 1990 as
the ability to monitor one’s own and other people’s emotions,
to discriminate between different emotions and label them
appropriately, and to use emotional information to guide
thinking and behavior.
It is the emotional competency, which includes awareness of
our own emotions, ability to identify and empathize with
other’s feelings, understanding the impact of one’s emotions
on others and sensitivity to cultural sanctions for expression of
emotions that constitute EI.

7. Emotional Intelligence: Constituents
EI has often been said to include five basic elements:
Self-awareness
Self-regulation
Motivation
Empathy
Interpersonal skills

8. Self-awareness
It is the ability to understand and interpret one’s own
feelings through internal reflection.
The ability to critically analyze one’s own thoughts and make
changes in behavior leads to better understanding of self and
of others.
Self-awareness guides a person through interactions with
colleagues and in the process brings perfection in job
performance. Self-awareness nurtures confidence with which
one can handle any crisis.

9. Self-regulation
Self-awareness of emotion automatically enables an
individual to regulate his/her emotions. The ability to
regulate emotions particularly during conflict, pressure, stress
situations, helps smooth progress of the project. It paves the
way for positive, effective working relationships among the
team members.
The ability to regulate emotions automatically pushes us to
the task first while relegating the emotions to the
background. Thus, it helps in attaining the goal.

10. Motivation
Motivation pushes us forward through the positive and
negative shades of life. It is the seed for initiation,
perseverance and dedication to the goal and keeps one
focused on the goal.
It generates a strong sense of optimism and channels energies
towards achievement of life goals with consistency in values,
emotions and behavior.

11. Empathy
It is defined as the ‘capacity to see the world from another
person’s perspective’. It enables one to understand and
interpret colleagues’ feelings in their perspective and identify
with them resulting in excellent rapport with people from
different ‘walks of life’.
This leads to appreciation of differences among the team
members resulting in better environment for the team to
function.

12. Interpersonal skills
They are essential to build positive and effective relationships
with colleagues and pave the way for prevention and
resolution of conflicts at workplaces. They help in dissipating
tension at workplaces and stimulate cooperation, collaboration
and team spirit among the members.
People endowed with social skills effectively inspire colleagues
by guiding them to perform well. It results in all-round,
improved performance.

13. EI: Why it matters
According to Goleman, the US psychologist, it is by being aware
of one’s own emotions and being able to express them rightly
that one can maintain improved personal health and
relationships with others.
Leaders with high emotional quotient can effectively motivate
every employee to stay focused on organizational objectives,
which in turn improves overall productivity. It helps reduce
stress at workplaces by fostering healthy relations among the
group members.

14. Indian View of Man
Atma va are drastavyah [See the Self]
-- The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad

15. In Indian psychology, man is viewed in terms of a succession
of states of consciousness or streams of consciousness,
which connects past, present and future. The conscious self
of a man is a unity of all these that makes his activities
meaningful and purposeful. The mind’s greatness is
measured by its capacity for integration and unification, not
by its ability to reason out.

16. In Indian psychology, the search for external reality and the
abiding spirit in man, go hand-in-hand. The object here is
self-analysis, which implies restoring man to mental
wholeness through spiritual discipline.
Indian seers have thus put the ‘Self’ on high pedestal in
man’s pursuit of harmony with nature. Indeed they have
gone a step further by asking men to shun all their instinctive
reactions and be undisturbed by pleasures and pangs, gains
and losses in life, and do the duties for the sheer pleasure of
doing them.

17. Sthitaprajna
A Concept Beyond EI
He who burns with the bliss and suffers the sorrow of every
creature within his heart, making his own each bliss and
each sorrow, is the highest of all yogis.
— The Bhagavad Gita

18. The Bhagavad Gita ordains that : “A man should not hate
any living creature. Let him be friendly and compassionate
to all”. Cultivation of such a faith fosters in us a different
attitude towards the material world. It makes us not to see
nature as existing for us to grab and encash exclusively for
personal gains. Instead, it prompts an attitude of ‘sharing’
amongst us. It fosters in us a kind of trusteeship towards
nature.

19. The concept of ‘trusteeship’ leads us to yet another tenet of
the Bhagavad Gita, which states that you have a duty or right
to work but “no right to the fruits of work” and therefore
“you should renounce attachment to fruits”.
There are several gains of working without attachment: it
frees us from the “anxiety for the results”.

20. Such working alone frees us from the delusion of absolute
selfhood. This approach helps us see things from the
viewpoint of others and annihilates the longing for
possessing the world.
This leads to peace and serenity of mind. It ultimately
facilitates ‘Self-realization’, that highest need of mankind, as
identified by Maslow.

21. Here, we need to reflect for a while on the universal question
in ethics—“Why should one do good?” Undoubtedly, what
immediately comes to everyone’s mind is the “underlying
reward”.
But working for rewards ensures only ‘barter system’ and
barter type ethics is ultimately no ethics. It is merely a
reflection of selfishness. Indian ethos offers a different
answer to this question: the concept of “Sthitaprajna”—
stable intellect.

22. The prerequisite of a Sthitaprajna is the giving up of
desires of the mind and delight in one’s own self. The
second requirement is forbearance, which means courage
to face the challenges of life.
Simply put, Sthitaprajna is “a person with established
intellect, who is not disturbed in misery, who is not elated
amidst pleasures and who is free from all attachments,
fear, and anger”.

23. A third condition expects him to be “one who behaves the
same when compliments are paid to him, who does not
retaliate for injury done to him, or flatter those who do good
to him”.
The fourth and the most important characteristic of a
Sthitaprajna is self-control. It helps synthesize action and
knowledge, passion and reason, psychology and logic, intellect
and intuition, and thereby nurture ‘equanimity’ in one’s mind.
Self-control enriches life and promotes harmony by
sublimating emotions.

24. The Indian concept of knowing the ‘Self’ beyond all spatio-
temporal relationships, compels one to transcend all
constraints and maintain a state of “Sthitaprajna”, stable
intellect. Being freed from the anxieties of fruits of work,
one can excel oneself at whatever endeavor that one
undertakes. Such a ‘detached-pursuit’ of work alone can
lead to success that is in harmony with nature.

25. Thank You
Extract from the book:
Soft Skills for Success
by GRK Murty,