Hello and welcome back! It has been a little while that I have written here as some of you may understand that the continual lockdown orders and restrictions really do take a toll personally sometimes. As we all should take every once in a while regardless of a pandemic, a break is great to reset the system. During my little break I found an amazing podcast with Dr. Brene Brown called Unlocking Us. If you do not know about Brene Brown, she is a professor that has spent her career studying courage, shame, vulnerability and others (feel free to look at her TED talks and podcast!). On her podcast, she was speaking with Dr. Mark Brackett and sharing his research studies about emotions in his new book Permission to Feel.
Emotional Intelligence - the capacity to be aware of, control, and express one's emotions, and to handle interpersonal relationships judiciously and empathetically. (definition via Oxford Languages)
When I started working for Four Seasons, as leaders, we spoke in length about Emotional Intelligence and how it influenced our way of life and work. The ability of being aware on how to express and handle situations out of your control via your emotions is a very powerful tool in any environment. When I started listening more and more about this topic, it has always intrigued me how little we know about our emotions and how easily we get caught in the conversation of looking at people and say: "they look happy or sad". There is such a vast conversation to be had about this and how to be more in tune with ourselves and our well-being. Needless to say that after listening to the podcast, I immediately ordered his book. As soon as it arrived, I felt like I started a new journey with Dr. Brackett.
"how are you?" - such a simple question and yet how many times have we ever stopped to truly receive an honest answer?
At the beginning of the book, Dr. Brackett poses the question and thought of a trivial question we ask one another every day - "how are you?" or "how are you feeling?"- and how little we know how to answer it or if we do and answer honestly, nobody will probably ever want to ask us the question again. In that moment, perhaps fives pages in, I was hooked. Growing up, we learn manners and most of the time within those manners your parents taught you how to say hello and ask people how are they doing, etc. In that exact instant, the question becomes so insignificant and part of a 'have to' ask everyone, that we have most likely never stopped and answered honestly or even ask to actually want an honest answer back. We are so easily involved with our "busy" lives, social media, professional endeavors, and many other things that we fail to interact with ourselves and our emotions.
How do you move forward? How do I make the time?
How can you give the best of yourself to others if you don't know yourself?
I've mentioned before, friendship is such a hard road to follow and the efforts of keeping those friendships are even harder to keep up with. My goal during this journey is to have a better understanding of myself, my emotions, my intentions and be able to reciprocate that to all my relationships. Perhaps is the pandemic, the fact that I have an unknown departure date from the U.S. or best friends that are going through harder times that I could ever imagine right now, however I reflect on how many times I fail to take a moment with them and talk, just talk. That being said I do believe that for the first time in our adulthood we are making strides on what it means to make time for our friendship, what it means to make time for ourselves, stop and ask "how are you? but how are you truly feeling?". During our lockdowns in different cities, we separate specific times every week to talk to each other via facetime, we have created a "show/movie" club that we decide on a show or movie to watch so we have something to look forward to and speak about during that week, we talk about new makeup trends/products and how they are working for us, so many more ideas that you can take advantage of - start today!
Remember: Honest answers will always mean honest friendships and sincere feedback.
Most of all, I can't wait to share this journey with you guys as I continue the book!
Listen to the podcast: Permission to Feel on Unlocking Us.
xo,
Valeria Michelle
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