Up until late in the 20th century, the discussion around intelligence was narrowly defined in academic circles and was often measured by IQ. There was little consideration given to what it might mean to be emotionally intelligent. Today, there is a discussion that’s opening up, originated by research that was done by two psychologists, Mayer and Salovey. In 1995, Daniel Goleman published a widely acclaimed book entitled Emotional Intelligence, which launched greater discussion around this vital topic.

The consideration of emotional intelligence tends to be dominated by psychologists who are often in the business of dealing with clients who have severe emotional difficulties. So naturally, the discussion of emotional intelligence can revolve around what can go wrong for people and what it might mean to gain a level of emotional functionality that would allow a person to cope in the world.

There is also some interest in emotional intelligence in business circles, with the idea that people will become more effective as organizational leaders if there is an increase in emotional intelligence.

I am glad for the work that has been done thus far to open up this field. But there is the potential of missing the point as to what’s breaking through in human consciousness, which goes well beyond the ability to cope or the ability to exceed in business with increased emotional intelligence. I believe that we need a definition of emotional intelligence that sees it in the context of our creative potential as human beings.

The real evolution that is occurring in human experience is a breakthrough to true emotional fluency. Emotional fluency is speaking the language of the soul and the language of Creation. It is the capacity to speak what is true in a way that is true. It is the capacity to give expression to exactly what would be most creative now, in the present moment. This is in contrast to emotional expression that is in reaction to what has occurred in the circumstances surrounding a person. Emotional expression on that basis is seldom creative. It demonstrates emotional disfluency.

There is a growing awareness of the urge to give creative expression emotionally to whatever would serve in a given moment, whatever would be truly appropriate—not just socially appropriate but at a higher level of appropriateness that is participation in the process of Creation. After all, we are Creator-beings. The words and the music of our creating has to be aligned. Both the form of our expression and the emotional component have to be aligned with our creative intention if we are to lead a creative, fulfilling life.

Most people would be loath to admit that they are looking out at their world through their emotional body. As it is said, we may be looking through a glass darkly. We may find ourselves looking through an emotional body that has all kinds of scarring in it, all kinds of patterns, all kinds of cloudiness. That is true of the emotional body of humanity as a whole. So it wouldn’t be surprising if our own experience is affected by the larger phenomena. In consequence, even though we may be looking out at the world and assuming we are seeing what’s really there, that may not be so. We are seeing through the emotional body. Of course, we’re not just looking at the world—we’re looking at each other and seeing each other, not necessarily through rose-colored glasses but through muddy glasses. When we relate to the very pulse of life that’s within us, even that relationship with life itself can be colored by the lack of emotional fluency and transparency.

The significance of the study of emotional intelligence in this day is that an awareness is breaking through to the surface of human consciousness. That awareness is something that was known to be needed by the prophets of the ages. Any spiritual leader with vision down through the millennia has known that the day would have to come when humanity finally came to a point of emotional fluency and transparency.

The spiritual prophet who is looked to in Western civilization most often, Jesus Christ, made this statement:

Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.

How beautiful! It is hard to come to terms with these words outside of a real transparent understanding of the truth. The average Christian might think it blasphemy if you or I said that we see God through a pure heart.

Seeing God—that means that we are seeing the reality of God wherever we look—in other people and in the Creation around. We are knowing that reality and we are seeing it. And yes, we are seeing something else too: we are seeing the human world, the smokestacks and the asphalt and all the rest, and we are seeing within humanity something that is blocking the creative power of God that is within all people and within all things. Yes, we can see what is blocking the reality of God, but with a pure heart we can also see that reality that is in all people and in all things.

Today, many have stopped even thinking about purity of heart. It has ceased to be a goal for them because they see purity of heart as irrelevant. That’s understandable given the goody-two-shoes, puritanical ideas about what purity of heart might be—some kind of chastity, some immature understanding of being good. If I thought that this was what purity of heart meant, I’d reject the idea too.

A truly pure heart is an emotionally fluent heart. It’s a heart that’s emotionally intelligent. And what is emotional intelligence? Is it not being connected deeply to the power of Creation and to the Creator Himself and Herself? Isn’t it knowing that power within oneself in one’s own creatorship?

Emotional fluency is not some kind of static, pristine state of purity, but a very dynamic state, moving with the power of Creation, being a creator and expressing creative power that moves through the emotional body. The truth is that we live every aspect of our life, and we function in every range of our humanity, through our emotional body. We think with energy that has to move through the emotional body. And by the way, if that emotional body is agitated we’re not thinking very well.

When we relate to other people, we’re relating through our emotional body. We might like to pretend that we’re being oh-so-intelligent about things, oh-so-appropriate about things. But for many people, the words and the music just don’t make sense—they don’t come together. There’s the outer form of their words and action, but the emotional energy of what is being shared in relationship is something else altogether. It all comes together for us when the words and the music come together, when the form of how we’re living in our life is matching the energy that’s coming through the emotional body.

This is where the rubber hits the road. It is such a simple thing, actually, and it shouldn’t be that hard to learn to be emotionally fluent—to get over the things that stop us from expressing what’s appropriately creative in any moment. However, it seems to be quite a hurdle for all of humanity. Look where you will—politics, personal relationships, relationships between nations—the words that are spoken and the actions being taken are, for the most part, expressing through a reactive, cloudy emotional body. That’s why it’s coming out as it is. The prophets of the ages knew that it would come to this—we will live or die as a race depending on whether we gain emotional intelligence. We move on to fulfill our destiny as a race if we become emotionally intelligent, if there’s a purity of heart that allows the power of the Creator that’s within us to come out clearly and effectively. It is coming down to that, and nothing else will do.

Religion by itself will not do. Religion as it is will not get us to a place where we’re living creatively on Planet Earth and not only surviving but thriving with each other and living harmoniously. You cannot get there by just being religious. A person has to become emotionally intelligent if they are to embrace the power of Creation that is within their own soul.

You cannot get there by just being spiritual, as you might think of it, unless being spiritual means coming to a place of transparency in yourself where the energy that’s coming through you is the energy of the Creator that’s within you, and it’s clear and appropriate and accurate for the creative step that should be taken exactly now in the process of Creation relative to whatever is at stake in the process of Creation in your field now. If that’s being “spiritual,” that’s what’s needed. But without that, you could be as spiritual as you want, and you can channel the Pleiadians, and you can reach nirvana, salvation, ascension or anything else you want to attempt, but it won’t achieve what must be achieved if we are to fulfill our destiny as human beings and as a human race without a change in your emotional state.

We must become emotionally intelligent. And being emotionally intelligent is being emotionally transparent so that the reality of the Creator that we are comes through.

I have a vision of a culture of emotionally fluent people. Today, it is more vision than reality. Because even though I know emotional fluency personally, to whatever degree, and I share that experience with a relatively small circle of people, the general experience for humanity as a whole is of emotional reaction. That limits the emotional fluency of a person severely. For many people, it makes their emotional capacity, with its potential for upset, anger, resentment and fear, feel more like a burden than a blessing.

Let’s create a culture of emotional fluency! Let’s speak the language of the soul and the spirit of the Creator into the world on a positive basis that affirms life and brings the power of love.

In next week’s Pulse of Spirit, I will be exploring further the relationship between emotional intelligence and the constellation of the Reality of Being in our human experience.