How do our emotions, empathy, brains, and physical features help us adapt and jump the hurdles in our constantly changing and often challenging environment? As homo sapiens (Latin: “wise man”), the species to which we all belong, we are uniquely distinguished from all other creatures on the planet. We possess superior mental development, social intelligence, articulate speech, and an upright stance. Thanks to our neocortex, our brains are undoubtedly the most advanced compared to other mammals and continue to enhance, adapting to our evolving world. During human evolution, emotions, reading of emotions, and empathy for others and their emotional state have emerged and played an enormous role in our survival in everyday challenges.
The psychological challenges of the 21st century
In Yuval Harari’s book, “21 Lessons of the 21st Century”, he emphasizes expected future disruptions in technology, politics, religion, immigration, terrorism, and war. As believed by Harari, unpredictability is one of our most significant challenges in the future.
Essential skills to build
Harari states how crucial it is to start investing in emotional intelligence and mental balance to build the cognitive flexibility needed to manage future transitions.
He goes on to express that this is more essential than learning any particular skills like Chinese or how to code computers. Although Harari’s statement is unquestionable, this is, without doubt, only one aspect.
Harari is not alone in his observation. Alvin Toffler, writer and futurist from the 1970s, wrote,
“The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn.”
Although this all sounds quite alarming, there is no need to panic. The unique traits that set us apart from other mammals allow us to change our characteristics, transform our mindsets and grow into the beings we desire to be and may even “need” to become.
The good news is that adult brains are not hard-wired against change
Neuroplasticity describes the brain’s ability to change. Enabling us to think, do, and focus on actively changing our brain’s physical structure and functioning. Whenever we repeatedly practice a new habit, the brain begins to build new neural pathways, like new roads that can transfer information from one part of our brain to another.
No matter how bumpy, foggy, or challenging the new neural roads might feel when we begin to change certain aspects of ourselves, new habits become easier to master as soon we complete these roads. If we want to keep our brains flexible as we age, we should become more aware of how we think and react to situations. As adults, we can still build up our emotional intelligence, get more in tune with our intuition, and practice becoming more flexible in our daily routines. These mindful actions impact our brain’s ability to grow and change positively.
In my next blog, learn how Harari’s findings and the development of emotional intelligence-(EQ) are related.
