This was sent to me from a friend and illustrates the ‘everyday-ness’ of EQ in action which, sometimes, is the best kind!
From a Six Seconds Network member (with a fabulous sense of humor, by the way!):
“My daughter and I walked into Peet’s coffee on a Saturday morning. We had trouble approaching the front door because of the massive group of runners gathered just in front of it, and all over the sidewalk. When we made our way in, I said something witty to the woman behind the counter, Barbara (who I know because it’s my neighborhood Peet’s) about having to serve all those people and what the lines must have looked like and why in the world anyone let the running club know that this Peet’s was open on a Saturday, etc. The crowd had clearly already been inside; the coffee house itself was almost empty by the time we were in there. When she handed me my coffee, she said it was “on her”. When I looked surprised, she said (something like) it was because I had a sense of humor and could look around and appreciate what it must have been like to have been deluged with all those customers, that I could see she had worked hard..
So that’s it. I was just being myself…sort of witty and empathetic and appreciative (on a good day, anyway), and it so blessed another person that she wanted to give me a free cup of Peet’s (which is like gold, in my book). As I reflected on the whole wonderful exchange, I felt like it was empathy in action, aided and abetted by humor, which is almost always a great combo, if delivered sensitively. The principle seemed to be that we all need to have our reality, our hard work, our moment of affliction, our success, our effort, our “little life that we’re living” ACKNOWLEDGED from time to time. It blessed her to have someone recognize what she had just endured, and help her laugh off the stress of it all. Don’t we all need that? Wouldn’t the world be better if we could all do that for each other more often, more easily?!”
Do you have EQ moments every day? How do the competencies play a role in everything we do?
