Introduction
People are social creatures, and the majority of them cannot live isolated. It means that individuals engage in multiple communications every day and meet many persons who have different peculiarities. Under these conditions, cultural and emotional intelligence acquire the top priority as they help to understand people better and achieve improved outcomes. Moreover, the enhanced understanding of your own peculiarities and emotions is a key to a happier life and future successes. For this reason, I am sure that the course is a vital step towards the achievement of better results in the future as it provides us with the essential information about cultural and emotional intelligence, ways to understand ourselves, and methods to discover our strengths to use them in different situations. Reflecting on my experience gained during the course, I am sure that it contributed to the formation of the improved vision of my current state and my future progress that can be achieved by the further investigation of the discussed concepts.
Emotional Intelligence
Emotional intelligence was one of the basic concepts mentioned in the course, and I think it is linked to its importance in the life of every person. The ability of an individual to manage and control his/her emotions, as well as to monitor and control the emotions of surrounding people, is fundamental for the contemporary society that presupposes multiple contacts and interactions during a day (Bradberry and Greaves 23). From my personal experience, I can say that there are numerous situations when people fail to understand each other because of strong emotions that prevent them from expressing their thoughts in clear and understandable ways. That is why I believe that an improved understanding of the basics of emotional intelligence is critically important for those people who are focused on interactions with others or work in the sphere that presupposes communication. Moreover, emotional intelligence can make the life of a person easier and more productive as instead of disregarding some strong feelings, he/she can understand how to manage them to avoid anxiety and stress.
RAIN framework is one of the tools we practiced in the course. For me, it became a step towards a better understanding of my own life and how I can become happier. I think that the concept of allowing is one of the most important ideas of the emotional intelligence paradigm. In numerous cases, we try to fight negative emotions or avoid them, as they are considered unnecessary or undesired parts of our lives. However, it is better to acknowledge and accept them to reduce tension and stop suffering as allowing makes it easier to move forward and deal with this feeling (Bradberry and Greaves 65). It is also essential to determine the source of emotions to be ready to manage them. For instance, by using the RAIN framework, I revealed that fear or anxiety are two feelings that often affect me and deteriorate the quality of my life. Analyzing my behavior, I concluded that public presentations or activities triggered these emotions. The process of identifying the source was important for acknowledging my problems and moving towards their resolution. As a result, now, in the majority of situations, I can understand the cause of negative feelings, including fear and anxiety, and manage them by accepting their irrational nature. Considering these reasons, I am sure that the RAIN framework will be very useful in the future as I will learn how to control negative emotions and do not allow them to influence my decisions, which is fundamental for cooperation and successful communication.
Personal Strengths
I believe that another critical advantage of the course is its contribution to the improved understanding of your personal strengths. I am sure that many persons do not have a clear idea of their strong sides or abilities that can be used to achieve certain goals or improve their communication with other individuals. For me, the course became a perfect opportunity to investigate my own personality and outline features that are a vital part of me. For instance, individualization, or the ability to see each person as one of a kind is my strength. I believe that every person is a unique creature, and I am interested in his/her qualities and character. I think it is a result of the improved knowledge of emotional and cultural intelligence. I can determine a person’s weaknesses, strengths, and other features, which are critical for successful cooperation and communication. That is why the course is so beneficial for future achievements and the ability to succeed in the complex modern environment.
The presence of leadership qualities was also proven by using the basics of emotional intelligence as it helped me to better understand myself. I have always preferred to be in charge, to command, rather than to follow. However, due to the course, I realized the peculiarities of my leadership style, which I think is important for teamwork. I am an open person and am ready for discussions, which means that I am a democratic and tolerant leader (Rath 76). At the same time, I can accept my weaknesses or drawbacks, which evidences that there are opportunities for improved collaboration and communication. I think that this knowledge is vital for building relations with colleagues and working on projects that can help me to build a successful career and became a true leader. These achievements show the high practical utility of the course, and, at the same time, the importance of emotional intelligence as one of the ways to understand yourself better and employ your strengths to move towards a certain goal.
I am also a creative person. It means that originality, innovation, and looking for unusual ways to solve some problems are important parts of my personality. I am sure it is a vital quality for any person and can be useful in future life. Still, its analysis from the perspective of emotional intelligence makes this feature more valuable. Creativity can be viewed as the ability to put yourself in other people’s shoes, which is vital for better interpersonal and intercultural communication as different individuals might have different perspectives on the same issue, and it is dangerous to consider a particular vision as the only correct one. It can result in the appearance and development of a conflict situation and deterioration of relations (Rath 89). For this reason, I think that it is necessary to realize the fact that there are no bad ideas, and creativity can help to transform any suggestion into an effective way to solve a particular problem or achieve the desired outcome. It will demand developed emotional intelligence, however, results are worth working on it.
Another strength in the list is related to the analytical qualities of my brain. It always remains active and analyzes the environment and people surrounding me. I think this part of my personality is important for emotional intelligence and improved cooperation with other individuals. From the course, we know that attention to detail and people’s features helps to engage in better collaboration because of the ability to understand the current situation and vision of other people, which is central for interpersonal communication. Against the popular view that communication is easy and does not demand any specific skills, I believe that critical thinking and the brain’s ability to analyze the situation are fundamental parts of emotional intelligence as they provide individuals with the information needed for the selection of appropriate communicative strategy and achievement of desired outcomes.
Finally, trying to outline my strengths and weaknesses, I concluded that my mind is mentally focused, but, at the same time, I can be irritated by other people if I am concentrated. I think this part of my personality is vital for successful interpersonal communication as it should be considered to avoid conflicts or the emergence of problematic situations that can evolve into serious problems. The ability to focus helps in multiple cases when it is vital to perform a certain task in a limited period of time. I consider it a part of emotional intelligence as the improved knowledge of your own unique features is critical for better interpersonal communication.
Altogether, concluding about my strengths, I should say that their improved understanding becomes possible due to the enhanced vision of emotional intelligence and its basics. It does not mean that I did not have the idea about my advantages; however, due to the course, I now realize how these aspects can be employed to achieve success in interpersonal communication and achieve better goals by negotiating some disputable issues (Rath 98). In such a way, the following list can be offered
- Individualization is my first strength. I also think that it was improved due to the RAIN framework as it helped to understand my and others’ emotions better, which is important for this aspect.
- The presence of leadership is another advantage that I managed to enhance due to the course. It became possible due to the better vision of people’s differences.
- Creativity. It is closely related to the emotional sphere and emotional intelligence makes this feature more valuable.
- One more strength in the list is the analytical qualities of my brain as they help me to cooperate with people better.
- Finally, the mental focus of my mind is critical for emotional intelligence as it helps to avoid unnecessary emotions. It was also improved by applying the RAIN framework.
Cultural Intelligence
Reflecting on the course and its aspects, I cannot but mention cultural intelligence and its improved understanding. It can be determined as the ability to understand the cultural peculiarities of other people and work effectively across cultures (Thomas and Inkson 44). The concept acquires the increased importance regarding the current tendencies towards globalization and the disappearance of borders between states. Today, people do not have to spend half year reaching America or other continents as there are various means of transport that help them to do it. For this reason, we always meet representatives of other cultures and interact with them. Unfortunately, there are still many biased or stereotypical ideas or representations about different nations that can precondition the failure of attempts to build meaningful relations. That is why cultural intelligence is crucial in the contemporary world as it helps to communicate interculturally with greater effectiveness and manage diversity peculiar to modern organizations (Thomas and Inkson 44). As for me, I am sure that it stimulated my personal and professional growth as I formulated the following outcomes:
- the ability to consider the unique features of people who surround me is fundamental for improved cooperation in society.
- cultural intelligence stimulates changes in mentality vital for the appearance of objective and tolerant judgments and views.
- Globalization demands improved cultural intelligence as it is a potent tool for the destruction of biased judgments and attitudes.
- Tolerance is a part of cultural intelligence that is crucial for contemporary society as it guarantees the achievement of better results.
Future Goals
In such a way, I am sure that the course became a serious facilitator of my development. The ideas of cultural and emotional intelligence triggered various processes in my mind and helped me to understand my own peculiarities better. At the same time, I think that another advantage of the course is that it cultivated an improved understanding of my future and the goals I want to achieve. As I have already stated, I recognize the importance of this knowledge and want to move in this direction to improve my interpersonal and intercultural communication skills. This intention impacts my plans for the future. First of all, during the next six months, I want to continue learning about emotional and cultural intelligence. I recognize a significant scope of these issues and think that the collection of additional information about them is important for successful outcomes.
Considering the long-term plans, I also have some ideas that I want to follow. First, during the next year, I want to master my skills in interpersonal communication by interacting with the persons who surround me. It can be my friends or other unfamiliar people who are interesting to me or can contribute to my personal and professional growth. I believe that it will help to employ my new skills acquired due to work on cultural and emotional intelligence, and my strengths revealed when working on my self-assessment. I also have ideas about what I will do in two years. Because of the significance of intercultural communication, I want to focus on this aspect. To me, it seems more complex than the previous one as it demands emotional intelligence and the ability to understand people regardless of their culture. For this reason, in two years, I would like to discover other cultures and engage in cooperation or relations with people representing them to ensure that I possess the appropriate level of skills to succeed in this field.
That is why my goals are:
- To master the sphere of emotional intelligence
- To master the sphere of cultural intelligence
- To learn how to communicate and cooperate with people regardless of their nationality
- To continue analyzing myself to acquire a better vision of my strengths and weaknesses
These purposes can be achieved by hard work that presupposes learning, practical tasks, and the in-depth investigation of my personality to ensure that my features are employed in the ways that can help to achieve better outcomes.
Conclusion
Altogether, I am sure that the course became a perfect opportunity to stimulate my personal and professional development. First of all, the improved understanding of cultural and emotional intelligence preconditioned the evaluation of my own skills, emotions, and feelings. It resulted in a better vision of my strengths and weaknesses, which is vital for the achievement of positive outcomes or the creation of meaningful relations. Moreover, it triggered the evolution of interest towards the given sphere and the recognition of the need to engage in additional learning to continue development and become successful in different areas of activity or life. I am sure that I managed to make big progress, and I plan to move forward.
Works Cited
Bradberry, Travis, and Jean Greaves. Emotional Intelligence 2.0. Talent Smart, 2009.
Rath, Tom. Strengths Finder 2.0. Gallup Press, 2007.
Thomas, David, and Kerr Inkson. Cultural Intelligence: Surviving and Thriving in the Global Village. 3rd ed., Berrett-Koehler Publishers. 2017.