Navigating emotions in crisis: A guide to finding strength and resilience

No one else is responsible for our emotions; we own them and must know how to handle them. Anxiety, fear, apprehension, uncertainty, and stress are natural outcomes when experiencing a crisis. The good news is that improving emotional self-awareness and responding more positively and constructively is within our control.

Learning to manage and strengthen your EQ, or emotional quotient, is akin to building new muscle. Unlike your IQ (intelligence quotient), which is essentially fixed by the age of 20, it allows you to understand, use, and manage your emotions positively to relieve stress, communicate effectively, empathize with others, overcome challenges, and defuse conflict.

That’s why leadership books abound—building stronger EQ increases empathy, self-awareness, and otherness, which are some of the most important ingredients for successful managers.

Recognize the emotional progression

Recognize that feelings and emotions go hand in hand. What’s critical is your awareness of when you’re being dragged down into a rabbit hole of emotional distress. It’s helpful to understand the linear progression of how and when this can happen:

1. The initial event occurs, triggering your immediate interpretation (or possible misinterpretation).
2. The feelings you experience stem from automatic responses in your brain.
3. The triggering of your emotion occurs, a state of mind resulting from your body’s physiological sensation.
4. Your reaction or overreaction to the event dictates your response. It sends a message to those around you, whether you are in control, confident, or self-assured about a new way forward or in a more reactive state of panic, worry, or fright.

Navigating emotions during crises

How should you attempt to navigate your emotions through a crisis? Said another way, how do you develop stronger emotional intelligence to lead more effectively through the sudden changes that crises often sweep in? The science behind emotion tells us that self-management techniques can be learned and strengthened to handle stressful situations more effectively.

Five steps for emotion management

There are methods for preempting emotional flareups as well as recovering from emotional hijacking, which might look like this:

Step 1: Slow down. Pay attention to your physical body and self-talk. Emotions are hardwired, but not something that we can’t overcome with the appropriate level of self-awareness and self-discipline.

Step 2: Avoid negative self-judgment. Recognize the emotion. Monitor your mental chatter for stressful thoughts. Acknowledge how you’re feeling without judging yourself. Ask yourself why you may be feeling a certain way. (Internal honesty requires a high level of self-awareness.)

Step 3: Recast initial negative thoughts. Pay attention to your inner dialog, which tells you how you feel. Listen specifically for negativity in your self-talk. You can change negative self-talk into more positive thoughts, which leads to more productive and positive actions. Becoming more self-aware is about acknowledging and controlling your negative thoughts while focusing on solutions within your control.

Step 4: Focus on solutions that are within your control. Use logic to reframe your emotions to neutralize negative ones. Shift your emotional state to think positively, not negatively. Small wins are wins, nevertheless. In times of crisis, focus on putting one foot in front of the other to redirect energy in a new, more positive direction.

Step 5: See yourself in the eyes of others. Emotions strike hard and fast. You suddenly feel different. Leaving emotions unchecked can negatively impact your relations with others. Remember that self-management is self-control. Mindfulness stems from managing your emotions while showing empathy for others. Judge no one. When in doubt, err on the side of compassion. But help others find and restore their peace of mind to the greatest extent possible. Follow the adage “What you want for yourself, give to another.”

Taken from The First-Time Manager: Leading Through Crisis by Paul Falcone. Copyright © 2023 Paul Falcone. Used by permission of HarperCollins Leadership, an imprint of HarperCollins Focus, LLC. www.harpercollinsfocus.com/

Paul Falcone (www.PaulFalconeHR.com) is principal of Paul Falcone Workplace Leadership Consulting, LLC. Find the complete list of his books at Amazon.com/author/paulfalcone. Subscribe to his YouTube channel at www.youtube.com/@paulfalconeHR.