((If your emotional skills aren’t there, if you lack self-awareness, if you can’t manage your own uncomfortable emotions, if you can’t empathize and build effective relationships, no matter how smart you are, you won’t get very far.))

- Daniel Goleman, Emotional Intelligence

Whether we realize it or not, we’re constantly training our children how to handle emotions. In fact, most of our interactions with our children are emotional exchanges of one kind or another. The way we, as parents, respond to our children’s emotions shapes their relationship with emotions—their own and others’—for the rest of their lives.

It’s certainly easier to silence or threaten an upset child than it is to help her process her emotions. Fortunately, children who know from experience that their emotions will be heard learn to regulate them. And because emotional coaching helps your child develop emotional self-regulation earlier than her peers, it actually makes parenting easier. But let’s not forget our other two big ideas here – self-regulation and enhanced connection. When we’re training our kids to deal with air turbulence, it’s crucial that we stay connected. In fact, when kids are in the grip of strong emotions, it’s a sign that they need to reconnect with us. And since our kids’ upsets inevitably trigger us, our ability to calm ourselves down determines whether we can coach them.

What is Emotional Intelligence (EQ)?

A person with a high EQ is smart about their emotions, just as a person with a high IQ is smart about their thinking. Scientists have found that while genes influence intelligence, the brain is like a muscle and can be sculpted and strengthened, allowing us to boost our innate intelligence. Similarly, while some of us are born calmer, or have a better ability to control our impulses, those tendencies can be honed and strengthened to boost our emotional intelligence. The key components of a high EQ are:

* The ability to calm ourselves down. The key to managing our emotional state is to allow, acknowledge, and tolerate our intense emotions until they evaporate, without getting caught up in them or doing something we later regret. Self-soothing is what enables us to manage our anxiety and distress, which in turn allows us to deal with emotionally charged issues in a constructive way.

* Self-awareness and acceptance of emotions. If we don’t understand the emotions that overwhelm us, they will frighten us and we won’t be able to handle them. We will suppress our hurts, fears, or disappointments. These emotions, no longer regulated by our conscious mind, have a way of suddenly emerging without control, as when a kindergartener violently spanks his sister, or when we (as adults) lose our temper or gulp down a pint of ice cream. In contrast, children who grow up in a home where boundaries are set for behaviors, but not for feelings, grow up knowing that all their emotions are acceptable and part of being human. This awareness gives them more control over their emotions.

* Impulse control. Emotional intelligence frees us from impulsive emotional reactions. A child (or adult) with high emotional intelligence acts, not reacts, and solves, not blames. That doesn’t mean you never get angry or anxious, but it does mean you never get mad. As a result, our lives and relationships become better.

* Empathy. Empathy is the ability to see and feel from another person’s point of view. When you’re good at understanding the mental and emotional states of others, you resolve conflicts constructively and connect deeply with them. Empathy, of course, improves our ability to communicate.

Why Emotional Coaching?

Most parents take their job as teachers very seriously. We teach our children colors, brushing teeth, and right from wrong.

But sometimes we miss two important lessons that all children need to learn: how to manage their emotions (and therefore their behavior), and how to understand the feelings of others. These two skills form the core of what psychologists call Emotional Intelligence Quotient, or EQ. It’s a fundamental part of human development, and while it may seem complicated, it’s important for parents to know.

Why is emotional intelligence important? We all know the answer, if we think about it for a moment. Emotions matter. You can’t tackle a big project if you’re overwhelmed by anxiety. You can’t resolve a marital dispute without understanding your partner’s perspective. You can’t handle a conflict at work or with a friend if you can’t manage your anger. In other words, a person’s ability to manage their emotions in a healthy way determines the quality of their life—perhaps even more fundamentally than their IQ. In fact, a child’s academic success is determined as much by their emotional intelligence as by their IQ, because intellectual learning depends on managing anxiety and motivating ourselves. Best of all for parents, children with strong emotional intelligence are better at managing their emotions and therefore their behavior, so they tend to be self-disciplined and cooperative at the same time. The kids benefit, and the parents benefit. Everyone wins.

How do children develop the essential traits of emotional intelligence? They learn them! Not from TV, not from school, but from you. You are training your child’s emotions every day. In particular, you are helping your child recognize and express her feelings in age-appropriate ways, which is the first step in self-regulation. Once she is freed from the grip of overwhelming emotions, she can take the helm of solving whatever problem is triggering those emotions. Let’s look at some specific strategies so you can master emotional training for your child during infancy. We’ll start with the way newborns build the foundations of emotional intelligence into the very structure of their brains.