Emotional intelligence is how you process emotions in order to produce a positive result.

The left frontal lobe is the part of your brain that empowers you to be emotionally intelligent. To demonstrate the importance of emotional intelligence, and your left frontal lobe, there’s a fascinating real world story of what life would be like if that part of your brain was removed.

Phineas Gage, was an excellent railroad foreman involved in building the Burlington Railroad in the 1840s. Besides being a skilled worker, he was also, polite, calm and cool under pressure, which made him well liked by his peers.

However, one day while blasting away rock, a standard procedure wasn’t followed. Normally, powered dynamite would be placed in a crevice, then sand would be poured over and a dense metal rod, known as a tamping rod, would be slammed down to make a very precise blast.

Unfortunately, sand was not placed on top of the dynamite so when Phineas brought the tamping rode down it made direct contact with the dynamite, launching the rode through his head like a rocket.

The rod went through his skull, removing his eye and left frontal lobe.

Miraculously, he survived the accident and 6 months later was for the most part physically recovered. But one key thing was missing, how he responded to emotions.

Instead of responding to emotions in his normal reasonable and rational way, emotions seemingly exploded unfiltered into action, resulting in him showing up late, being angry, and unreliable,

Because his left frontal lobe was removed, he lost the rational part of his brain, and therefore the ability to process emotions. Don’t take your left frontal lobe for granted, and use it to be emotionally intelligent.