Amygdala Hijack and Stress Control!

Hi...this is our second post and today I want to share about how stress controls our emotions if we do not control stress!

In my work with senior management I have not found a single soul whose behaviour has not been controlled by stress at one point or the other.

Hence every leadership guru emphasizes that the higher one goes in an organization, the more important is the role of emotional intelligence. It’s been found that managers with higher emotional intelligence are able to manage stress better.

For those in leadership positions, emotional intelligence skills account for close to 90 percent of what distinguishes outstanding leaders from those judged as average.

When reading Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman, I came to know about Amygdala - the fascinating almond-sized-and-shaped brain structure. It is the centre of our emotional mind.

All incoming sensory data—sights, sounds, smells, sensations—pass through the amygdala where they are instantly analyzed for their emotional value before they go for further processing.

Amygdala, is rightly termed as Sentry and the Strategist of the brain. Too much stress “turns on” the amygdala creating an oversensitive heightened state of emotion.

Compounded stress buildup can make the amygdala a hair trigger, ready to hijack us into anger or panic at the least provocation. This situation is described by Daniel Goleman Amygdala Hijack’.

This explains how individuals and also quite a number of evolved leaders lose a significant amount of ability to “control” their emotions, thus becoming temporarily less emotionally intelligent!

Its interesting how understanding the physiology behind the psychological behaviour can help us attain better understanding of human behaviour hence leading to empathy and compassion.