Self-Awareness

 

 

 

 

Personal Response Paper

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Introduction

In order for an individual to be authentic, they must develop self-awareness and be comfortable in their skin. Different factors are involved in the path to self-awareness. Two of those factors are emotional intelligence and being comfortable with vulnerabilities. Emotional intelligence ensures that an individual is always in control of their emotions and they have a balance. When a person is comfortable with their vulnerabilities, they become more confident in themselves than when they attempt to keep them concealed. Both emotional intelligence and owning and exposing vulnerabilities are vital in the quest to attain self-awareness.

Background

The foundation of a person realizing their authentic self is for them to develop self-awareness. In the grand scheme of things, when an individual attempts to discover their true north, self-awareness is right at the center of that compass. It is correctly said that every person is a total of the experiences that they have gone through in life. It then means that the way to develop self-awareness is to relive their life experiences and find meaning in the experiences that have led them to their present. Reliving these experiences also helps the individual understand the perceptions they have about certain things and people and the parts of themselves that they suppressed as a result of these lived experiences. Having understood that, it is then possible for a person to begin the process of peeling off parts of them that were shaped by lived experiences and, in so doing, unveiling their authentic selves.

Emotional Intelligence

Developing emotional intelligence is a crucial part of attaining self-awareness. Most of the time, people do not know how to react to particular circumstances or people around them. Based on their fears and insecurities, they end up misreading a situation or a person’s intentions towards them. Emotional intelligence helps individuals to be able to react appropriately to different circumstances and to be in check of their emotions, and not let external circumstances affect their emotions which may, in turn, compromise the decisions they make. For the long term, it had been thought that intellectual intelligence mattered more in leadership than emotional intelligence, which has since been disproven with research now indicating that emotional intelligence is more critical (George, 2015). This means that to get the best out of a team of people, emotional intelligence helps leaders connect with their subordinates more. It makes them more inspirational to their teams because they can connect and empathize with their emotions. When individuals are emotionally intelligent, they become self-aware because they can respond to external triggers with more control and restraint. Durk Jager, who is a former CEO of Procter & Gamble, failed as a leader because he lacked emotional intelligence (Momtaz, 2021). He did not attain self-awareness and, as such, lacked emotional intelligence, which made him out of touch with his team-leading to eventual failure. In order to achieve self-awareness and individual must work on their emotional intelligence.

Vulnerability as A Power

When an individual can comfortably expose his vulnerabilities to people, he has essentially turned his vulnerabilities into power, an essential part of attaining self-awareness. An individual’s fear that their vulnerabilities can be exposed can compromise the clarity of thought in decision making. It may also lead to people acting in specific ways to overcompensate these feelings of fear. John Hope Bryant admits that as he grew up, he never knew his true north partly because of the fear of people seeing his vulnerabilities, and it held him back for a long time (Bryant, 2010). When people are afraid of their vulnerabilities being exposed, they do not live up to their potential because they are afraid to draw too much attention to themselves that would expose their vulnerabilities. There is a direct correlation between a person feeling good and comfortable in their skin and accepting their vulnerabilities (Bryant, 2010). When people are proud of their vulnerabilities, they can get more done. Those around them are drawn to them because they see them as relatable to their circumstances. This makes them good leaders, but more importantly, it leads them to self-awareness because they have a clear understanding of their strengths and shortcomings. By accepting and owning their vulnerabilities, individuals can begin to turn their vulnerabilities into power, leading them to self-awareness.

Conclusion

Emotional intelligence enables people to attain self-awareness because they become more in control of their emotions. When an individual has emotional intelligence, they can be aware of their emotions at any given time and make the connection to how they could be affecting a particular situation. Emotional intelligence also contributes to self-awareness because the individual can understand the triggers for certain emotions and be proactive in either avoiding them or knowing how well to manage dicey situations emotionally. When people are comfortable with their vulnerabilities, they turn them into power, and the vulnerabilities are no longer weights that shackle them back from their potential. Also, when an individual freely exposes their vulnerabilities, it frees them to be themselves without developing traits that they otherwise would not hide these vulnerabilities. In this way, the individual sheds off traits that have been used to mask vulnerabilities, and they become more self-aware.

 

 

 

 

 

References

Bryant, J. H. (2010). Love leadership: The new way to lead in a fear-based world. John Wiley &

Sons.

George, B. (2015). Discover your true north. John Wiley & Sons.

Momtaz, P. P. (2021). CEO emotions and firm valuation in initial coin offerings: an artificial

emotional intelligence approach. Strategic Management Journal, 42(3), 558-578.