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作者：Anonymous 在 罕见奇谈 发贴, 来自 http://www.hjclub.org
Raise Your Emotional IQ
he high marks Asian Americans get for emotional intelligence focus on our above-average academic and career attainments. In his bestselling Emotional Intelligence (Bantam Books, 1995) Daniel Goleman cites the fact that while the average IQ of Asian Americans is only 2-3 points above that of the American population, our achievements are commensurate with significantly higher IQ levels -- 110 for Japanese Americans and 120 for Chinese Americans. He credits this to traits like persistence and discipline, two key qualities he associates with emotional intelligence (which I'll call “EQ” here).
That's only half of it. As a matter of reality Asian Americans must overcome much more than the usual obstacles. American society contains enough racists and proudly ignorant bigots that Asian Americans are routinely ambushed by gratuitous racial offenses and discrimination in everything from career opportunities to restaurant service. Coping effectively with those kinds of persistent background conflicts is a key element of EQ for Asian Americans.
Goleman's EQ analysis is helpful in understanding why some people with high IQs derail while others with average IQs achieve outstanding success. Other qualities central to EQ, according to Goleman, are self-awareness and empathy. Overall, he sees emotional intelligence as being about four times as valuable as IQ in success. But the concept of emotional intelligence isn't new. It merely puts a new name on qualities that have been recognized for milennia as “wisdom”, “character”, and “grace”. Goleman's terminology has appeal in today's quantitatively-oriented culture, but the concept of emotion management or emotional control has always been recognized as the pillars of a successful life.
For Asian Americans the notion of EQ must include the ability to cope with the special stresses and conflicts arising from our status in a society that has only lately begun to recognize that Asian Americans are entitled to be treated with equality, fairness and dignity. Even an Asian American with the EQ to meet the usual demands of success can become derailed unless he can cope effectively with these additional challenges.
They typically take the form of emotional dilemmas. Here's an example. You have a nice home, drive nice cars and have kids who do well in school. This provokes envy and resentment. Some of the neighbors use racial slurs loudly enough for you to overhear. You would like to confront the offenders but your kids seem to be well accepted and you don't want to jeopardize their emotional security by becoming confrontational about race. At the same time you don't want your kids to grow up tacitly acquiescing to bigotry.
Here's another example. You are successful in your career. Officially, you enjoy respect and even some status in the company. You have become aware that several colleagues have formed a clique dedicated to subjecting you to a steady stream of petty racial offenses. They murmur slurs like “chink” and “gook” as soon as you pass by or when your back is turned. They share jokes about Asians within earshot. You are having trouble keeping your anger in check and want to confront them but don't want to appear hostile and defensive to others with whom you enjoy positive relationships.
These kinds of racial offenses mar the days of even the most successful and prominent Asians in America like Senator Daniel Inouye (“That little Jap.”), Houston Rockets star Yao Ming (gibberish mocking the Chinese language) and Dodgers Assistant General Manager Kim Ng (ditto), among a long list of others. I sometimes think of this as the “Asian American Tax”. Even those of us with exceptional emotional control can become angry, frustrated, bitter and depressed. I am convinced that the only way for Asian Americans to avoid falling victim to these additional emotional stresses is to adopt strategies that substitute positive, empowering responses for the negatives ones that can otherwise undermine us. Here are seven resolutions that embody these strategies.
1. I will accept and embrace the duality inherent in being an Asian American.
The ability to function while simultaneously holding two contradictory truths is the sign of a first-rate intellect. That's one of F. Scott Fitzgerald's more profound observations. This is precisely the mental skill Asian Americans must cultivate in order to function effectively in American society. On the one hand, we know that we are Americans, with the legal and moral claim to be treated as such. On the other hand, we know that many of our fellow Americans see us as aliens regardless of our acculturation or the number of generations our families may have been here. We must somehow reconcile these two conflicting truths in order to meet the demands of professional and social life.
One extreme is the person who fixates on the ideal of equality and turns each offense into grounds for a moral stand. This person would get so caught up in anger, frustration and bitterness that little or no energy would be available for the usual demands of professional, social and family life.
Raise Your Emotional IQ
he high marks Asian Americans get for emotional intelligence focus on our above-average academic and career attainments. In his bestselling Emotional Intelligence (Bantam Books, 1995) Daniel Goleman cites the fact that while the average IQ of Asian Americans is only 2-3 points above that of the American population, our achievements are commensurate with significantly higher IQ levels -- 110 for Japanese Americans and 120 for Chinese Americans. He credits this to traits like persistence and discipline, two key qualities he associates with emotional intelligence (which I'll call “EQ” here).
That's only half of it. As a matter of reality Asian Americans must overcome much more than the usual obstacles. American society contains enough racists and proudly ignorant bigots that Asian Americans are routinely ambushed by gratuitous racial offenses and discrimination in everything from career opportunities to restaurant service. Coping effectively with those kinds of persistent background conflicts is a key element of EQ for Asian Americans.
Goleman's EQ analysis is helpful in understanding why some people with high IQs derail while others with average IQs achieve outstanding success. Other qualities central to EQ, according to Goleman, are self-awareness and empathy. Overall, he sees emotional intelligence as being about four times as valuable as IQ in success. But the concept of emotional intelligence isn't new. It merely puts a new name on qualities that have been recognized for milennia as “wisdom”, “character”, and “grace”. Goleman's terminology has appeal in today's quantitatively-oriented culture, but the concept of emotion management or emotional control has always been recognized as the pillars of a successful life.
For Asian Americans the notion of EQ must include the ability to cope with the special stresses and conflicts arising from our status in a society that has only lately begun to recognize that Asian Americans are entitled to be treated with equality, fairness and dignity. Even an Asian American with the EQ to meet the usual demands of success can become derailed unless he can cope effectively with these additional challenges.
They typically take the form of emotional dilemmas. Here's an example. You have a nice home, drive nice cars and have kids who do well in school. This provokes envy and resentment. Some of the neighbors use racial slurs loudly enough for you to overhear. You would like to confront the offenders but your kids seem to be well accepted and you don't want to jeopardize their emotional security by becoming confrontational about race. At the same time you don't want your kids to grow up tacitly acquiescing to bigotry.
Here's another example. You are successful in your career. Officially, you enjoy respect and even some status in the company. You have become aware that several colleagues have formed a clique dedicated to subjecting you to a steady stream of petty racial offenses. They murmur slurs like “chink” and “gook” as soon as you pass by or when your back is turned. They share jokes about Asians within earshot. You are having trouble keeping your anger in check and want to confront them but don't want to appear hostile and defensive to others with whom you enjoy positive relationships.
These kinds of racial offenses mar the days of even the most successful and prominent Asians in America like Senator Daniel Inouye (“That little Jap.”), Houston Rockets star Yao Ming (gibberish mocking the Chinese language) and Dodgers Assistant General Manager Kim Ng (ditto), among a long list of others. I sometimes think of this as the “Asian American Tax”. Even those of us with exceptional emotional control can become angry, frustrated, bitter and depressed. I am convinced that the only way for Asian Americans to avoid falling victim to these additional emotional stresses is to adopt strategies that substitute positive, empowering responses for the negatives ones that can otherwise undermine us. Here are seven resolutions that embody these strategies.
1. I will accept and embrace the duality inherent in being an Asian American.
The ability to function while simultaneously holding two contradictory truths is the sign of a first-rate intellect. That's one of F. Scott Fitzgerald's more profound observations. This is precisely the mental skill Asian Americans must cultivate in order to function effectively in American society. On the one hand, we know that we are Americans, with the legal and moral claim to be treated as such. On the other hand, we know that many of our fellow Americans see us as aliens regardless of our acculturation or the number of generations our families may have been here. We must somehow reconcile these two conflicting truths in order to meet the demands of professional and social life.
One extreme is the person who fixates on the ideal of equality and turns each offense into grounds for a moral stand. This person would get so caught up in anger, frustration and bitterness that little or no energy would be available for the usual demands of professional, social and family life.
4. I will make my body a source of confidence.
Sheer confidence decides the outcome of most human encounters. As long as we are creatures of flesh and blood, our self-confidence will be rooted in our physical abilities. The knowledge that you run the marathon in three-fifty or bench press two-fifty-five or beat opponents to the punch gives you a level of confidence that translates directly into automatic respect from even hardened bigots and racists. More respect means fewer bad encounters to distract you from more important concerns. It's been my experience that, in fact, getting in shape is already one of the high-EQ traits of many Asian Americans.
5. I will draw lines in the sand at my convenience.
Those with strong self-images often see ourselves as representatives for all Asian Americans. This sense of duty makes us sacrifice our own personal comfort and convenience to stand up for racial dignity and equality. This is a noble impulse. The EQ issue here is whether it's wise to go ballistic at every suspected racial offense.
A high-EQ individual recognizes the strategic disadvantage of giving others the power to disrupt one's life at the time and place of their choosing. We can't dictate the timing of racial offenses but we can decide when drawing a line in the sand is a good use of the limited time and energy we can devote to confrontations with bigots. Giving yourself the power to make that decision will increase your emotion control and make you a more effective advocate for Asian American dignity and equality.
In making the decision to turn an offense into a full-blown racial encounter, consider how sure you are that a racial offense was intended, whether you enjoy a high probability of a positive outcome, and whether you are willing to risk spoiling that particular occasion by focusing everyone's attention on an unpleasant aspect of life. Remember that there will always be plenty of racial offenses that merit your moral indignation, but the occasion may never come again.
I remember a Sunday afternoon about ten years ago. I took my grandparents out for dinner at a pricey restaurant. I wanted the occasion to be memorable. As the meal progressed I became increasingly angry. Not only did our waiter treat us with what appeared to be disdainful aloofness, he didn't bring our dinners until the plates were lukewarm. By dessert I was boiling over at what I took to be racially bigoted service. Despite my grandparents' protests, I stormed off to find the manager and raised hell. The manager tried to smooth things over but the the mood had been spoiled for my grandparents and for me.
I can't say that I would have been happier had I swallowed by indignation, but I suspect that my grandparents would have enjoyed the dinner more. That turned out to be the last time I saw my grandfather as he passed away a few months later.
6. I will give my kids the benefit of my experience in handling bigotry.
The toughest dilemma for Asian Americans is knowing when to shelter loved ones from racial offenses. Several years ago my approach was to insulate my wife and kids from anything that might dampen their mood. On countless occasions I had seethed with anger at offensive remarks that only I had heard while trying to feign interest in the conversation. I felt handcuffed by my reluctance to expose my family to racism and bigotry.
I changed my approach after my wife told me that our son, then a third-grader, had received detention for kicking a classmate who had pulled out the corners of his eyes at him. That was when I was forced to accept the truth I had been avoiding: my kids were going to suffer racial offenses no matter how much I tried to shield them. I decided that it was wiser to give them the benefit of my own hard-earned experience in coping with racial offenses than to continue my charade.
While I can't say I came to look forward to racial offenses, I began seeing them as opportunities to teach my kids. I showed them to use humor and wordplay to counter offensive words and behavior. If we heard a pointed “It's nippy out,&rduqo; I taught them to say, “Don't get the hiccups,” with extra emphasis on the “hic”. If we heard people using slurs like “jap” or “chink” or “gook”, I taught them to say, “I keep hearing hicks and rednecks,” or “Oooh, can you just smell the ignorance and hate?” If we were mistreated at a store or restaurant, I taught them how to show ire, leave small tips, complain to the manager or even write letters to corporate headquarters, as the situation merited.
Gone were the days when I would seethe alone. Now we join in making life unpleasant for racial offenders. This approach has given my kids more, not less, confidence, and brought us closer together.
7. I will appreciate the advantages of being an Asian American.
The many challenges of being an Asian American can sometimes make us ask, “Why couldn't I just have been white or born in an Asian nation?” The truth is that every burden carries the potential for a corresponding advantage. Being an Asian American may hinder relations with some people, but it enhances our connection with twelve million other Asian Americans. This is one advantage that white Americans don't enjoy. Members of a majority don't share an automatic camaraderie. Instead they create divisions among themselves by focusing on subtle socioeconomic or cultural distinctions.
The instant connection we Asian Americans enjoy is a valuable advantage that often translates into friendships and career opportunities. By recognizing and using this and other blessings of being an Asian American, you will feel empowered rather than burdened by your identity.
http://goldsea.com/Parenting/EQ/eq3.html
作者：Anonymous 在 罕见奇谈 发贴, 来自 http://www.hjclub.org |
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