This article is an excerpt from the Shortform book guide to "Emotional Intelligence 2.0" by Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves. Shortform has the world's best summaries and analyses of books you should be reading.
Like this article? Sign up for a free trial here .
Want to navigate workplace tensions with more grace, make better decisions under pressure, and build stronger professional relationships? In Emotional Intelligence 2.0, Bradberry and Greaves argue you can develop these capabilities by systematically improving your emotional intelligence through four core skills: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management.
This guide breaks down specific, research-backed strategies for developing each skill, from identifying your physical stress signals and managing your self-talk to reading body language and handling difficult conversations that preserve trust even during disagreement.
Originally Published: January 6, 2021
Last Updated: January 2, 2026
Editor’s note: This article is part of Shortform’s guide to emotional intelligence. If you like what you read here, there’s plenty more to check out in the guide!
How to Improve Your Emotional Intelligence
Bradberry and Greaves argue that you can improve your emotional intelligence by practicing specific strategies to develop each of the four skills. Again, the key is to work through them sequentially. Start with self-awareness, then add self-management. Next, turn your attention outward through social awareness, and finally bring everything together in relationship management.
Build Self-Awareness
Improving your self-awareness involves learning to recognize your emotions as they happen and gaining a better understanding of your own behavioral patterns. Bradberry and Greaves recommend these strategies for developing this foundational skill:
Understand your physical cues. Your body responds to emotions in specific ways, and learning to recognize these physical signals helps you identify emotions quickly. The authors suggest taking a few minutes to close your eyes and notice your heartbeat, breathing pattern, and muscle tension. Then recall a memory that triggers a strong emotion—perhaps a time you felt anxious or angry—and pay attention to how your body changes. You might notice that anxiety makes your stomach tighten and your breathing shallow, or that anger causes your jaw to clench and your shoulders to tense. Once you’ve identified these physical patterns, you can use them to tune in to emerging emotions before they overwhelm you in your daily life.
(Shortform note: Research suggests that interoception—the brain’s processing of signals from inside the body—isn’t a single unified ability. Different signals travel through distinct neural pathways that converge in brain regions like the insula. Being good at detecting one cue doesn’t mean you’ll be good at detecting others, so you have to practice paying attention to different sensations separately. Your brain doesn’t just passively receive these signals, but predicts what you should feel based on past experience. When you notice your heart racing, for example, your brain interprets that signal by drawing on past situations where you felt similar sensations and what they meant in that context.)
Identify your triggers. Triggers are the specific people, situations, or behaviors that, for you, provoke strong emotional reactions. Bradberry and Greaves explain that knowing your triggers lets you prepare for them instead of being caught off-guard. Make a detailed list of what sets you off—maybe you get frustrated when people interrupt you, anxious before presenting at work, or defensive when your partner criticizes you. Be as specific as possible. The more precisely you can name your triggers, the better you can anticipate the moments where they’re likely to arise, making it less likely that you’ll react poorly in the moment.
(Shortform note: The idea of identifying your triggers is grounded in cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), one of the most well-researched approaches to managing emotional reactions. Experts emphasize the importance of identifying the concrete situation that triggers you, rather than a general pattern. For example, instead of thinking “I get defensive when criticized,” you might realize, “I get defensive when my manager points out mistakes in my work in team meetings.” This helps you distinguish between what actually happens (a specific comment in a specific context) and the extreme conclusion you might jump to (”I can’t handle any feedback”). The more specifically you can name the trigger, the better you can prepare for similar situations.)
Don’t label emotions as “good” or “bad.” The authors emphasize that judging your feelings as good or bad adds an extra layer of emotion—like shame or pride—on top of what you’re already experiencing. This complicates your emotional state and makes it harder for you to effectively process the original feeling. When you notice an emotion, simply identify it without judgment: “I’m feeling frustrated right now” rather than “It’s bad for me to feel frustrated now” or “I shouldn’t feel frustrated.” This neutral acknowledgment allows the emotion to emerge, exist, and eventually pass without causing you to get tangled up in self-criticism or self-congratulation.
(Shortform note: The advice to avoid labeling emotions reflects a core principle of mindfulness. In Wherever You Go, There You Are, Jon Kabat-Zinn advises cultivating the ability to observe your experience without categorizing it. When you judge an emotion, you lock yourself into automatic reactions and create what Kabat-Zinn calls a “yo-yo” effect, where your mind bounces between judgments. The solution isn’t to stop judging, but just to notice when judgment arises. Kabat-Zinn suggests thinking of emotions as clouds passing in the sky: They appear, linger briefly, then disappear. This nonjudgmental observation creates space between your emotions and your reactions, giving you greater freedom from emotional distress.)
Practice Self-Management
Bradberry and Greaves write that once you can recognize your emotions, the next step is learning to manage them effectively. Becoming more skilled at self-management requires using your self-awareness to control your behavior and channel your emotions productively.
Focus on your breath. Your brain requires oxygen to function properly, but Bradberry and Greaves note that stress causes most people to breathe shallowly, depriving the brain of what it needs. When your brain lacks sufficient oxygen, it prioritizes basic functions like vision and movement over complex processes like rational thought and emotional regulation. When you feel strong emotions rising—anger during a tense conversation, anxiety before an important presentation—take several deep breaths through your nose, filling your stomach rather than just your chest. Breathing deeply calms your nervous system and reactivates your rational brain, giving you better control over how you respond to the emotions you’re experiencing.
| Why Deep Breathing Calms You Down The authors note that deep breathing helps because your brain needs oxygen to think clearly, and stress causes shallow breathing that deprives your brain of oxygen. Researchers have identified additional mechanisms that explain why deep breathing is so helpful for regulating your emotions. The primary mechanism involves the vagus nerve, which runs from your brainstem to your major organs. When you take slow, deep breaths, you stimulate this nerve, which sends signals to your brain to activate your parasympathetic nervous system (your body’s “rest and digest” mode). This counteracts the sympathetic nervous system (your “fight or flight” response), lowering your heart rate, blood pressure, and feelings of stress. Research suggests the act of exhaling may be particularly important. Inhaling increases your heart rate while exhaling decreases it, a normal phenomenon called respiratory sinus arrhythmia. This is why many breathing techniques emphasize longer, slower exhales, which maximize vagal activation and produce the strongest calming effect. Another possible mechanism behind deep breathing’s effectiveness involves carbon dioxide (CO2) rather than oxygen. When you slow your breathing and take in slightly less air, CO2 levels in your blood rise slightly. This is beneficial because CO2 acts as a vasodilator, opening your blood vessels and allowing more oxygen-rich blood to reach your brain and heart. |
Create “emotion versus reason” lists. When facing a difficult decision, the authors recommend making a two-column list. In one column, write what your emotions are telling you to do. In the other, write what logical reasoning suggests. Then, compare the two sides and consider where emotion might be clouding your judgment, as well as where logic might be ignoring important emotional information. For example, if you’re deciding whether to fire an underperforming employee, your emotions might say “Give him another chance,” while reason might say, “This is affecting the whole team.” Examining both perspectives helps you make a decision that balances emotional and rational considerations, rather than letting one dominate.
(Shortform note: The “emotion versus reason” list closely mirrors a concept from Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) called “wise mind.” DBT describes three mental states: emotional mind (making decisions based purely on feelings), reasonable mind (making decisions based purely on logic and facts), and wise mind (the integration of both). Wise mind allows you to acknowledge your feelings while also considering the facts. The authors’ emotion versus reason list is essentially a tool for accessing your wise mind: By writing out both perspectives, you create space to integrate them rather than letting one dominate your decision-making. DBT practitioners emphasize that accessing your wise mind is a skill that improves with practice.)
Keep your self-talk positive. The narrative of your inner voice—what the authors call “self-talk”—significantly affects your emotional state. Bradberry and Greaves explain that negative self-talk can turn a manageable situation into an overwhelming one, while positive self-talk helps you stay resilient. They recommend avoiding talking to yourself with absolutes like “I always mess this up” or “I never succeed.” These statements aren’t factual—they’re judgments that create unnecessary negativity. Instead, make factual observations: “I made a mistake this time” or “This is challenging, but I can work through it.” This shift keeps your self-talk grounded in reality rather than catastrophizing or generalizing from a single incident.
| The Neuroscience Behind Self-Talk Neuroscience research reveals that how you talk to yourself physically changes your brain’s activity patterns. Studies using functional MRI scans show that positive self-statements activate regions of the brain called the ventral striatum and ventromedial prefrontal cortex. These are the same areas that light up when you receive a tangible reward, which suggests that positive self-talk essentially “rewards” your brain. This has the effect of making you more receptive to challenges and less defensive when facing threats. Furthermore, the specific words you use matter. Research shows that replacing absolute statements like “I always fail” with factual observations like “I made a mistake this time” doesn’t just sound different—it engages different neural pathways. This factual approach to self-talk activates executive function regions that help you problem-solve, while catastrophic statements activate stress-related networks that impair clear thinking. Studies also find that talking to yourself using your own name (rather than “I”) creates psychological distance that helps you give yourself better advice, similar to how you’d counsel a friend. However, the picture is more complex than “positive is always better.” Recent research comparing positive and negative self-talk found that negative self-talk can sometimes improve performance by reducing overconfidence and increasing motivation to avoid failure. This suggests that the most effective self-talk might depend on the situation—positive statements work well for building confidence before challenges, while more critical (but still factual) self-assessments might help when you need to stay sharp and avoid complacency. |
Develop Social Awareness
After you’ve developed the ability to recognize and manage your own emotions, you can turn your attention to understanding others. Building your social awareness means learning to accurately read other people’s emotional states and understand what drives their behavior.
Listen actively. Bradberry and Greaves emphasize that real listening requires focusing completely on the other person: not just their words, but their tone, volume, and pacing, which often reveal more than the content of what they’re saying. Stop what you’re doing, make eye contact, and give the person your full attention. Don’t formulate your response while they’re still talking, and resist the urge to interrupt. Someone speaking quickly and quietly might feel intimidated or nervous. Someone whose voice has more edge than usual might be frustrated even if their words seem neutral. Active listening helps you pick up these cues and respond appropriately to what the person is feeling, not just what they’re saying.
Observe body language. The authors explain that people’s bodies routinely reveal emotional information that their words might not. Learn to watch for key signals: Are they maintaining eye contact (usually indicating sincerity and comfort) or avoiding it (suggesting discomfort or dishonesty)? Is their smile reaching their eyes (genuine) or confined to their mouth (forced)? Are their shoulders raised and tense or relaxed? Is their posture open or closed off? These physical cues can help you understand someone’s true emotional state. If a colleague says they’re fine but their shoulders are tense and they’re avoiding eye contact, their body is telling you they’re not actually OK—and you can adjust your approach accordingly.
| How Your Brain Integrates Multiple Cues to Understand Others Bradberry and Greaves’s emphasis on active listening and observing body language reflects a truth about how we understand others: Our brains don’t process these cues separately—they consider these different sources of information simultaneously. Neuroscience research shows that when we interact face-to-face, our brains automatically combine what we hear with what we see to understand someone’s emotional state. We rapidly process both verbal and nonverbal information together, even before we’re consciously aware of it. This integration is why the authors stress paying attention to both what people say and how they say it—your brain needs both streams of information to accurately read emotional states. But their advice to make eye contact and watch for physical cues assumes you’re interacting with them in person. When, instead, we communicate through screens (like via video calls), our brains still try to combine audio and visual information, but the visual cues are incomplete or distorted. Video compression blurs facial expressions, camera angles prevent eye contact, and limited views mean we miss body language. Because our brains are working with degraded information, we have to expend extra cognitive effort trying to piece together a complete picture of what someone means. This disruption has measurable consequences: Technical glitches during video calls reduce trust and lead to harsher judgments, and the absence of functional eye contact makes conversations less efficient and productive. |
Practice empathy. Empathy means actively putting yourself in another person’s position to understand their perspective and feelings. Bradberry and Greaves recommend thinking about how someone has responded to situations in the past, considering their background and experiences, and observing how they behave in different environments. This helps you understand why they’re reacting the way they are. If a normally engaged team member suddenly seems withdrawn, empathy might lead you to consider whether something in their personal life is affecting them, or whether something at work has made them uncomfortable. This understanding allows you to respond to their actual needs rather than making assumptions.
(Shortform note: Psychologists debate what kind of empathy is most valuable. In Against Empathy, Paul Bloom distinguishes between emotional empathy, or feeling what others feel, and compassion, or caring about others without mirroring their emotions. Bloom argues that emotional empathy is exhausting and can cloud moral judgment, while compassion enables more sustainable kindness. Jamil Zaki (The War for Kindness) argues that Bloom’s distinction is too rigid and that, in practice, empathy and compassion work together. Bloom has clarified that his critique targets emotional empathy only as a moral guide—and he’s concerned that some have misused his argument against empathy to justify callousness toward vulnerable people.)
Strengthen Relationship Management
Finally, relationship management brings all three previous skills together. This is where you use your self-awareness, self-management, and social awareness to learn how to build and maintain strong relationships with others.
Be open and take interest. Bradberry and Greaves explain that being open and sharing appropriate personal information helps others understand your behavior and motivations, which reduces the chance of misunderstandings. When you explain your background, preferences, or reasoning, people can interpret your actions more accurately. Similarly, take genuine interest in others’ lives (beyond just work topics). Ask about their backgrounds, families, and interests. This builds connection and gives you context for understanding their choices and reactions. For example, if you know a colleague has young children at home, you’ll better understand why they need to leave promptly at 5 p.m., rather than interpreting it as lack of commitment.
| How to Strike the Right Balance of Openness and Curiosity The authors’ advice to share personal information and take genuine interest in others aligns with work by researcher Brené Brown (The Power of Vulnerability) which shows that meaningful connection requires both being willing to be seen for who you are and being curious about others. But Brown emphasizes important nuances about both sides of this equation. On self-disclosure, she found that some of the most authentic leaders actually share very little about their personal lives, while leaders who overshare might be performing connection rather than creating it. The key is to think about your intent when you consider sharing information about yourself. On taking an interest in others, Brown’s research reveals that we can’t actually recognize what someone is feeling just by observing them—we have to ask and listen. She calls being a good listener “story stewardship,” which means honoring what someone shares by staying curious, affirming their experience, and believing them when they tell you what something meant to them. The greatest threats to this are either shutting people down when we feel uncomfortable or hijacking their story to make the conversation about us. Brown notes that genuinely being open to others doesn’t have to look a certain way—it’s about listening, holding space, and communicating that the other person isn’t alone. |
Show appreciation consistently. Bradberry and Greaves emphasize that recognizing others’ contributions strengthens your relationships and builds trust. When someone does good work, acknowledge it immediately. When they go beyond expectations, show gratitude. You don’t need to make grand gestures—a sincere thank-you, a brief note, or buying someone lunch can powerfully communicate your appreciation. Making a consistent effort to show your appreciation shows that you notice and value what others do, which makes them more likely to collaborate with you and support you when you need it.
(Shortform note: Writer George Saunders offers a deeper perspective on why showing appreciation matters. In his view, small acts of recognition aren’t trivial—they’re what hold relationships and communities together. Saunders argues that gratitude is essentially “realism”: a recognition of how easily things can go wrong each day and an appreciation of the effort someone else makes to ensure things go right. This means that when you thank people for their contributions at work, as Bradberry and Greaves recommend, you’re acknowledging that their effort actually mattered and made your life better. This realism, Saunders suggests, is the foundation of building genuine connections with other people.)
Handle difficult conversations effectively. The authors suggest a step-by-step process for navigating conversations where there’s disagreement or tension. First, start by establishing common ground—something you agree on or a shared goal—to create connection. Then, ask the other person to share their perspective while you actively listen. Once you understand their view, explain your position, being mindful of their emotional state. Finally, move the conversation toward resolution. Afterward, check in periodically to rebuild trust if the discussion was particularly difficult. This approach preserves or even strengthens relationships because both people feel heard and respected even when they don’t fully agree.
| Restoring Safety When Conversations Derail Bradberry and Greaves’s advice for handling difficult conversations assumes you’ve created a safe environment where both parties feel comfortable sharing honestly. But in Crucial Conversations, Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, Ron McMillan, and Al Switzler explain that hard conversations often get derailed because people no longer feel safe. When people feel attacked, disrespected, or unheard, they respond by either withdrawing (going silent, giving minimal answers) or attacking (getting defensive, raising their voice, dismissing your concerns). To get the conversation back on track, you have to pause and address the safety issue directly. One effective technique is “contrasting”: Clarify what you don’t and do intend. For example, you might say, “I don’t want you to think I’m questioning your competence—I do want us to figure out how we can collaborate more effectively.” Once safety is restored, you can return to the issue. Understanding why this works requires recognizing what makes difficult conversations feel unsafe in the first place. In Difficult Conversations, Bruce Patton, Douglas Stone, and Sheila Heen explain that defensiveness often arises because people hear criticism as an attack on their identity: their competence, character, or worth. When you’re delivering difficult feedback, the other person may be asking, “Does this mean I’m incompetent? Am I a bad person?” The contrasting technique addresses these concerns directly. By explicitly stating what you don’t mean (“I don’t want you to think I’m questioning your competence”), you reassure them about their identity, which restores the safety needed to discuss the actual issue at hand. |
———End of Preview———
Like what you just read? Read the rest of the world's best book summary and analysis of Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves's "Emotional Intelligence 2.0" at Shortform .
Here's what you'll find in our full Emotional Intelligence 2.0 summary :
- What emotional intelligence is and why it's essential for your workplace success
- The 4 reasons you need to work on your EQ
- How you can use EQ to better manage relationships
