“Emotional intelligence” and movement behavior

I think most of us who exercise have a sense of how helpful movement is for us–mind, body, and spirit. However, it might be worth spending some time being mindful of just how connected your physical movement behaviors are to your emotional health.

“Emotional intelligence” has been a buzzy term from quite some time, but what does it really mean? To me, it’s about first developing the emotional awareness to know when you need to change something, to adapt, or to find a physical outlet for your emotional stress. Good emotional intelligence tests are rather lengthy (the short, pop culture ones seem pretty sketchy), but if you are interested you can follow this length to learn more about EI (emotional intelligence) and how the tests work. https://positivepsychology.com/emotional-intelligence-tests/ Given how important emotional intelligence is now considered for success in the workplace, there’s a good chance you’ll encounter more about EI in the coming years at your place of work.

At some point we all reach the moment of frustration where it might feel good to do something we shouldn’t, like throw a folder of papers at a boss. Regardless of whether or not they might deserve it (and deserve has so little to do with life as we must live it), we must keep our emotions in check for the good of the team, to feed our children, or other pragmatic daily concerns. But we can’t just “stuff it down” all day, each day. If we do, at some point we are likely to break. So what can we do?

Physical movement has many benefits, including cardiovascular health, body fat regulation, and better balance and coordination. It also helps us to process difficult emotional stress we all must deal with at some point. And, there are many options for just how you move, what movement behaviors you adapt. Are you experiencing intense emotional stress or trauma? Consider how you might adapt your movement behavior and perhaps you’ll have less need for anti-anxiety or pain medication. Stress can make you sick–if movement behavior can counter this, why not try it?

If you already exercise regularly, you may find you benefit from switching up your routine. Try another workout, such as running or yoga or lifting. Try something new. If you don’t have a regular movement behavior practice, begin with breathing and stretching. Breathe deeply into your belly for four or five seconds through your nose, feel the air in your belly and perhaps even give your diaphragm a little “squeeze,” then breathe out thinking “slow and relaxed” for several seconds. Just doing some breathing practice can be a great start to mindfulness and greater awareness of your emotional struggles. I use a two minute timer to practice mindfulness or to do breathing exercises–you may want to practice longer once you get more talented in your practice, but start with no more than two minutes at a time. If you’re stressed, slow down, breathe, and pay attention to how you feel. Self-awareness can be the first step to greater control.

In some cases you may need more intense movement. There are times when I benefit from my 100 pound boxing bag. If I really need to work out some frustration, I can strap on my gloves and give it a good MMA beat down with kicks and punches. Working on the bag is a much more acceptable and positive behavior than letting your anger or pain “bleed out” onto the lives of others. Help others keep their stress lower, too. If you can do that, not only will you benefit, but you will help those around you and provide a good example of a positive response to emotional stress. I know I’m hardly perfect here–I’m still working on it. I know I’ll never be perfect, but I know I can spend effort each day allowing myself to learn and get better.

In recent student success courses I have taught, I have been surprised at the number of students (often more than half of a class) who have been to “anger management” classes. The students claim the classes don’t work…but I wonder just how deeply these students have committed to the positive, alternative behaviors they studied in the anger management class. Behavior can be very difficult to change–we are often very committed to our old, broken, emotionally “dumb” scripts–but if we don’t commit to new scripts and new ways of adapting and learning in terms of our emotional health, we certainly have zero chance to change. Try making a 32 day commitment to create a more positive behavioral response to emotional stress. You have to start with day one–why not start today?

If you are experiencing a great deal of emotional stress, consider how much time you are spending on your body, and how you might take advantage of how your body can help you “process” and make sense out of all the pressure or pain you feel. For me, Tai Chi, MMA workouts, and lift days make all the difference. I breathe and stretch and push myself almost every day of the year, and it has made a positive difference for me. If you are in great pain, find a way to regularly push it through your body in order to feel better and do better each day.

The lies we tell ourselves

As human beings, we seem uniquely talented at self-deception. These well-known words by Sir Walter Scott seem to apply not only to how we deceive others, but to how we deceive ourselves: “Oh, what a tangled web we weave/ when first we practise (sic) to deceive.” Most of us must spend some time unraveling that “tangled web” if we are to unlock our true potential.

As a student success instructor for the last year, and having trained to teach student success since 2015, I have been forced to unravel some of my own “webs” of self-deception. I texted this to my life partner Sonja recently, and she gave me permission to share it for publication: “I try to get it when you talk about your eating disorder and seeing yourself differently than you really are, but with my body I think I am pretty realistic…maybe even a little bit extra optimistic. 😆 But I was depressed and really feeling like a failure for so long before CVID, ADHD, and ASD diagnoses…I don’t really see myself for what I am and what I can be. My view is distorted and twisted still from my past experience. I am sorry I still struggle with that. I am trying to see myself with ‘fresh’ eyes. I can see better and do better.” Sonja and I have talked for years about how she sees, mentally, her body differently than it really is. I have read many women are impacted by this condition, but more and more men are struggling with issues of body image as well. This is certainly one area where we tend to lie to ourselves.

For me, the distortion comes in how I view myself in a social context. I sometimes have a very negative view of myself, despite how others may see me. As I share with my students, it took me 12 years to finish a bachelor’s degree. I struggled with depression throughout that process, but was never treated successfully. Finally, in my late 30s, I was diagnosed with CVID, a primary immunodeficiency. No wonder I had so many pneumonias. No wonder I was exhausted so frequently. And no wonder it was hard to finish my degree. I had a long, uphill road to manage all I had to manage and successfully negotiate college. I began IV treatment for CVID in 2011, and have since stayed much healthier and been able to exercise consistently.

I also struggled to finish my graduate degree. I was accepted into a PhD English program in 2001, the year I finished my BA, but I didn’t manage to finish a graduate degree until 2016. Why? I was diagnosed with ADHD in 2013, the year I began my most recent attempt at a graduate degree. I received treatment and thrived in graduate school, finishing while working and attending part-time. I was even honored by the program my last year, and finished with a perfect 4.0 average. I never would have expected to finish with an “unblemished” GPA, but I did it.

So who am I? Apparently, I’m a 4.0 student. However, I don’t see myself that way. I still see myself as the struggling student, the struggling person, the depressed person on the verge of a complete nihilistic meltdown. It’s time for me to begin seeing myself the way I am, not the way I was. This is easier said than done, but I know I have to keep working on it.

Most recently, in 2017, I was diagnosed with high functioning autism. In some areas I am very high functioning…but in other areas, I tested lower than what used to be called “Asperger’s syndrome.” I have some significant deficits when it comes to social interaction. I jokingly told Sonja, “What! I flunked Asperger’s?” But I do feel that way at times. It’s hard for me to see myself and my deficits in a realistic way–I just want to be like everyone else and live like everyone else. SPD, or sensory processing disorder, is a major component of my autism and of the way I “sense” the world. While I can do well enough one to one, or perhaps talking with two other people, I really struggle with larger groups of peers. Teaching is much easier for me–it’s scripted, and I can play my role well enough to manage a classroom and provide a solid community for my students. Sometimes I need to use headphones to manage sound input–I tend to do this at home. Perhaps I am embarrassed to do this publicly? I can struggle with smells and tastes as well, so I frequently opt out of public gatherings where food is served. I try not to be a “pain” about my issues, but if I try to force myself into the “norm,” into the standard, it is excruciating for me. I do wish that people would become more educated about SPD, as that would make my life and my children’s lives much easier.

Ultimately, I’m still trying to better understand and unravel my own self-deception. I know enough to know I’m not who I thought I was…but who am I? The more I understand, the easier it is to function well. I can “cut myself some slack” if I understand where a behavior or misperception originates. I have a logical mind, but there is sometimes a significant disconnect between my own logic and my “feeling,” my perception of myself. I have to keep untangling this web of misperception if I am to be the person I want to be and achieve what I want to achieve.

Are you deceiving yourself? If so, how? It’s worth meditating on your own thoughts and feelings in a way that allows you to really “see,” who you are and what you can do, and not be the victim of your own self-directed lies.

There is no “perfect”

“Perfect” is a silly word, and it deserves disinvention. I present here my argument why. Despite the logic, knowing what I know and feeling how I feel have disconnected. This is my attempt to inhabit the world I know to be the most “real,” and hardly “perfect.”

Perfection is an off or on, black or white, falsely constructed binary. Perfection does not exist in our natural world, but only in our imagination. We can trick ourselves into a “fixed” mindset or victim mindset. If I can’t have the “perfect” body, why work on my diet behavior? Why work on my movement behavior if I won’t look like the folks on TV? We see an unreachable goal and give in to the despair of imagined permanence. And sadly, it isn’t even “real,” but a trick of the mind.

There is no “perfect.” I realize now that I will never do my tai chi form perfectly, despite my years of practice. There is always learning. There are always mistakes. I am getting better at understanding this. It is a process of improving in motion.

There is no perfect job. No perfect house. No perfect life partner. No perfect child. No perfect person. No perfect…life.

Even when we have achieved “perfect,” we know how imperfect it really was. My “perfect” 4.0 for my recent master’s degree was far from it, because I know the revision and extra work I had to put in to even get close to deserving those grades. I am still shocked I did it–I know how “in process” I still am as a student and human being.

There is just “getting better.” Keeping at it. Improving. Finding a better version of yourself. Finding peace with the imperfection of ourselves and our world.

It’s one thing to know something logically, but quite another to feel it, to own it, to make it part of your daily practice. That has been my issue with the “prison” of perfection, and it remains a challenge for me still. Though I “let go” of perfection in one area, I hold tight in another, even to the point of self-destructive behavior. I have to keep focusing on seeing the world as it really is, and not as my inner critic and inner defender would claim it to be. I have to work every day toward my “creator” or “growth” mindset.

The peace seeking faiths of our world teach us this concept–we forgive the sins of others, but understand we ourselves deserve that same forgiveness as we inevitably make mistakes. This wisdom is thousands of years old, but still applies to our daily lives.

The hard part is “feeling” it, owning it, making it part of ourselves. Like many of the things we must feel, logic can only go so far. At some point we have to “let go” and know that perfection not only doesn’t exist in our future, but it never existed at all.

This YouTube performance by Prince Ea and others demonstrates this concept quite beautifully: https://youtu.be/LySC3v5geAc