Emotional literacy: Need of the hour

 The Importance of Emotional Literacy

Emotional literacy is the need of the hour. It should be taught in every schools.We are unable to handle our emotions. Children should learn how to balance their uncontrolled emotions in public places. They are the most vulnerable victims of emotional illiteracy. This has to be changed. Instead of worrying about the lagging scores in Maths or English, Parents should concern more about their children's emotional illiteracy. We care more about how well school children can read and write than whether they will be alive  next week.

Our children are experiencing mental pressure. Being unable to bear the mental pressure, children commit suicide. We have heard about many cases related to this. A student from Ariyalur named Kanimozhi committed suicide due to the fear of failing the NEET exam. A 19 year old boy named Dhanush from Salem ,Tamilnadu ended his life just hours before the exam and more other cases..

What happened to these children? How couldn't they face the situation boldly? Parents are equally responsible for their premature death. They inject fear and shame in the minds of their children. This will create a mental trauma in them. Failing the NEET or any other exam is not the end of life. These are only experiences. Noone will measure your personality based on this aspect. Keep in mind, Failure is the stepping stone to success.

Another blooming case nowadays is  love murder. If the love is rejected by someone,the so-called lover stab or shoot her. We are familiar with such brutal cases. When he was arrested he says that he had done all this because of his LOVE. Don't you see the irony?

Children , nowadays,are experiencing withdrawal or social problems, attention or thinking problems. They are anxious and depressed. This emotional malaise seems to be a universal price of modern life for children. No children, rich or poor are exempt from this emotional trauma; these problems are universal.

To tackle such problems,we have to practice emotional skills like self awareness, identify ing, expressing, managing feelings, impulse control  and handling stress and anxiety. A key ability in impulse control is knowing the difference between feelings and actions and learning to make a better emotional decisions by first controlling the impulse to act then identifying alternative actions and their consequences before acting. Many competencies are interpersonal: reading, social and emotional cues, listening, being able to resist negative influences, taking other's perspectives and understanding what behaviour is acceptable in a situation. These are the core emotional and social skills for life.