A Volcano Doesn't Erupt Overnight: How to Build Emotional Intelligence Before You Break

Amethyst Roberson (00:00)
so many

Ralph Owens (00:00)
Okay.

Amethyst Roberson (00:00)
times as a leader, I walked in riding on character. So I got my shoulders squared up and I'm looking tough, but inside I'm tore up. My mama just died and this, this, this.

Ralph Owens (00:09)
Mmm.

Terry Baylor (00:09)
Mmm.

Amethyst Roberson (00:13)
a volcano doesn't erupt overnight. And if there's no emotional intelligence in that person's heart

Ralph Owens (00:16)
Mmm.

Amethyst Roberson (00:20)
When that break happens, It erupts. And that's where we get a culture that really needs to be dealt with.

Ralph Owens (00:23)
Wow.

Amethyst Roberson (00:28)
We have to have a constant structured audit of what's going on internally so that when it shows up outside, we know exactly where it came from.

Ralph Owens (00:29)
Yeah.

Terry Baylor (01:15)
Yeah. So question number two, emotional intelligence for leaders starts internally. Now this was a point that you talked about in that, mean, again, a light bulb went off for me, right? Because Ralph and I, talk a lot about EQ. And as we talk about that, that tends to be more how we exercise our emotional intelligence in, in relationship to others.

Amethyst Roberson (01:25)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Terry Baylor (01:39)
But

the light bulb went off when you were like, EQ is how are you relating to yourself? I'm like, what? What do you mean? How I relate to myself? And then what really opened that conversation up when you stated that, I made a statement and you're like, Terry, you're spot on. I said, because I see what you're saying. I talk to myself more than anybody. I have more conversations with me. And I'm like,

Amethyst Roberson (01:42)
It's a side job.

Ralph Owens (01:49)
Yeah.

Amethyst Roberson (01:53)
Mm-hmm.

Terry Baylor (02:06)
my gosh, you're right. How am I treating me? So can you dig into that?

Amethyst Roberson (02:09)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, that that ruggabilly me, the way that you said it was so significant, it's an inside job. Like that was it. That's that's a book. No, sir, that's a it all. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, when I think about that aspect, it is an inside job. And so I always keep in mind that like clinically,

Ralph Owens (02:18)
You

Terry Baylor (02:20)
This is said it is like set it off. It's a dissatch.

Ralph Owens (02:22)
That's it. Yes, sir.

So good.

Amethyst Roberson (02:37)
When we talk about emotional intelligence, we're talking about stabilization versus solutions. So there's a time for where it's all out solutions, performance, we got to get it done. But what happens before we get to that point is what we're talking about, that inside job. So I'm really big on framework and questions to get people thinking and moving and motivated to make changes. so management under pressure

has to ask three questions or four questions. What do I think? What do I feel? What do I really wanna say? And what do I wanna do? Why is that? That's the internal conversation that Terry is referring to. You have to self-regulate before you regulate. Because that's what's happening, right? You're regulating as a leader, but if you're not self-regulating, then the team might not know what you're thinking.

Ralph Owens (03:13)
Hmm.

Mmm, good.

Mm.

Amethyst Roberson (03:31)
what you're feeling, what you really wanna say and what you wanna do. It also gives them a cue, again, remember that data, for them to be more emotionally intelligent, meaning sharing what's going on inside of them. And I'll give you an example of that. It would be, I don't know why I'm using board meeting so much this morning, but let's just say you're in a team outing or something and you're in your regular mode, performance mode.

Ralph Owens (03:45)
Mm.

Amethyst Roberson (03:59)
We don't know that one individual on the team, they lost their mom the day before, right? So emotional intelligence would say, what do you think about what happened in your life? How are you feeling? Did you have anything you want to say about that? What is it that you feel like you need to do for you to be OK?

Ralph Owens (04:05)
Hmm.

Mm. Mm.

Hmm.

Hmm.

Amethyst Roberson (04:20)
But we're also asking ourselves that question too. This is the audit that we talked about, the internal audit before we even get into the room. What am I feeling right now? What am I thinking? And so that's how you get that internal conversation going. It's real, it's just like what we do on the outside. We're taught how to communicate, how to be more efficient, how to manage conflict. But do we turn that on ourselves? Now, I always do this thing, I do what's called the turnarounds.

Ralph Owens (04:25)
Mm-hmm.

Okay.

Amethyst Roberson (04:48)
Have I communicated to myself? Am I influencing myself? Am I managing myself well? Am I experiencing conflict? That's the EQ. That's how you manage yourself and walk it out every day. So that's the internal audit. What do I think, feel, say, and do? Yeah. Yeah. And what do I need to? What do need to?

Ralph Owens (04:50)
Mm.

Mm.

Terry Baylor (04:55)
Mmm.

Mmm

Wow.

Wow.

Ralph Owens (05:04)
Wow.

Wow. ⁓

Amethyst Roberson (05:12)
Yeah, so many

Ralph Owens (05:12)
Okay.

Amethyst Roberson (05:13)
times as a leader, I walked in riding on character. They know I said I'm going to show up, going to be there. So I got my shoulders squared up and I'm looking tough, but inside I'm tore up. My mama just died and this, this, this. But I have to do, here's another aspect of emotional intelligence, honesty versus

Ralph Owens (05:17)
Mm-hmm.

Mmm.

Terry Baylor (05:25)
Mmm.

Ralph Owens (05:28)
Mm-hmm.

Amethyst Roberson (05:36)
another layer of sharing. Honesty is I can say that Ralph has on a black top, a shirt, and Terry has like a teal or a blue. That's obvious what's going on in the room. But how do I be vulnerable? Vulnerability is sharing with me what I don't even know to ask about. That's when you have an emotionally intelligent team.

Ralph Owens (05:42)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Hmm.

Hmm.

Amethyst Roberson (06:00)
when they share with you what you don't know to even ask about. That's a different level of relationship. And again, we're talking in terms of professionalism, but this is our own relationships with our spouses, with significant others, with church. It doesn't matter the setting, but it matters our EQ and how we manage ourselves internally. So yeah. Yeah.

Ralph Owens (06:04)
wow.

Mm-hmm.

Mm, I hear so much in that. I'm hearing

Terry Baylor (06:26)
Yeah.

Ralph Owens (06:27)
a team dynamic EQ. How well am I in touch with what they need or do they feel even comfortable enough to share with me? Which a lot of times is built on trust, what takes time, things of that nature. But can you just repeat those questions that you should ask yourself? I thought that was just so powerful because I.

Amethyst Roberson (06:30)
seen.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely.

Terry Baylor (06:46)
Yeah.

Amethyst Roberson (06:47)
Yeah. What do you think? What do you feel? What do you want to say? And what is it that you want to do? And what do you need? That's the internal check. then that honesty versus vulnerability. Honesty is we do a lot of performance says what's in the room, right? Performance is always connected to what we can see and measure.

Ralph Owens (06:49)
Mm.

Mm.

Mm.

Mm, that's good.

Amethyst Roberson (07:09)
But there some things like the volcano effect. There are some things going before a volcano doesn't erupt overnight. It happens after hundreds and thousands of years of rock and the ground just battling itself out. And then there's a break in it. And if there's no emotional intelligence in that person's heart or in that team or in that system,

Ralph Owens (07:12)
Mm-hmm.

Terry Baylor (07:16)
Mmm.

Ralph Owens (07:16)
Mm.

Mm-hmm.

Terry Baylor (07:20)
Mmm.

Ralph Owens (07:26)
Mm-hmm.

Mmm.

Mm-hmm.

Amethyst Roberson (07:35)
When that break happens, that's the volcano effect. It erupts. And that's where we get a culture that really needs to be dealt with. It doesn't happen overnight. We have to have a constant structured audit of what's going on internally so that when it shows up outside, we know exactly where it came from.

Ralph Owens (07:40)
Wow.

Terry Baylor (07:46)
Mmm.

Ralph Owens (07:47)
Yeah.

Wow, wow, wow, wow, that is so good. That is so good, that is so good. I love that, you know, you know, just cementing the point that the conversations that leaders should have with themselves, right? You know, are you having that conversation with yourself or are you going in the room, in the boardroom guns blazing and you have no idea where you really are. That's good. That is so good, that's so good.

Amethyst Roberson (07:56)
Yeah.

Absolutely.

Ugh.

my god. Let's do it.

Terry Baylor (08:24)
You know, one of the things that brings, so I had a conversation, ⁓ Amethyst, and let me see if this falls inside that framework. Because sometimes we have conditions or I'll use the word frameworks again, that we've been kind of raised under, right? Or ideologies, I'll use ideologies. And so a person shared something with me the other day, actually this week, and we were talking and

Amethyst Roberson (08:26)
because like, mm-hmm.

Okay.

Mm-hmm.

Absolutely.

Terry Baylor (08:50)
And the person shared, know, man, I was really humbled by this situation because I ended up taking an opportunity that I normally wouldn't take, but I needed to take this opportunity to sustain. so, and the conversation had, it was more so around, had, you know, typically when, typically when I'll say this, when church folks talk about I was humbled, it has to do with a level of, you know,

I had to get better or I was too hard. know how that, and you know, so what was interesting is when the person shared with me, they ended up taking this opportunity. I said, I will be honest with you. I thought something totally different. When you share with me, you took that opportunity. Here's where I thought, I thought, man, they getting that grind on now. Now they learning how to be resilient. Now they learning how to get that entrepreneurial hustle on. Right there.

Amethyst Roberson (09:16)
⁓ huh.

Mm-hmm.

Mmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah.

Terry Baylor (09:40)
They're learning that the perfect scenario doesn't have to exist for me to excel. And I told him, said, look, and I'm gonna give you my direct words. I said, bro, how much more do we have to be beat down? I mean, we're pretty low on the rung here. How much more humbling do you need? Do we need, I mean, really? I mean, come on.

Ralph Owens (09:47)
Hmm.

Amethyst Roberson (09:47)
Mm-hmm.

See ya.

Ralph Owens (10:02)
you

Amethyst Roberson (10:02)
Yeah?

Yeah. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Terry Baylor (10:06)
So

I think it's a vocabulary game, honestly. I think the vocabulary that we've been given is when something is that we have to go through that is uncomfortable, something that we have to go through that we didn't plan, it wasn't my plan, God had to take me through this to get me here. I'm like, but why did it have to be a struggle? Why couldn't it have been? Man, I grew out of this.

Amethyst Roberson (10:10)
Mmm.

Ralph Owens (10:11)
Mmm.

Mm.

Amethyst Roberson (10:18)
Who does food? ⁓

Ralph Owens (10:19)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

you ⁓

Amethyst Roberson (10:31)
man

Terry Baylor (10:33)
I learned something about myself that I didn't know before. found my grind, I found a level of resilience in me. I said, man, honestly, I think it's a vocabulary game. I don't really know that it was that. Now I can't say that, but from my perspective, I saw a toughness in you established that you didn't have before.

Ralph Owens (10:36)
Mmm.

Amethyst Roberson (10:36)
Yeah.

Mmm.

Ralph Owens (10:40)
Mmm.

Mm.

Mm. Mm.

Amethyst Roberson (10:51)
That's it. That's it. Yeah. That's

good. And it is a book. Yeah. Yeah.

Terry Baylor (10:54)
I said, I'm not God. I'm not God. But that's just how

I saw it.

Amethyst Roberson (11:00)
It is, it is, it is a language game. That separates the generations, the language. Like my generation didn't have the language for what we went through, right? We just had to kind of make it up. We're still making it up to be honest. We're making it up. We just like, take you by the look, you're gonna do this. But now this generation has language for it. They have skill for it. They have technique. And I think that's what you're talking about.

Terry Baylor (11:05)
Mmm.

Ralph Owens (11:05)
Hmm.

Mm. Mm.

Terry Baylor (11:10)
Ooh.

Ralph Owens (11:13)
You're right.

Terry Baylor (11:14)
Right, right,

right.

Ralph Owens (11:18)
Yeah.

Amethyst Roberson (11:27)
And you're right, we didn't have resiliency. What's resiliency? What is it? You better get your butt in there and do whatever I told you to do.

Terry Baylor (11:30)
Yes. ⁓

Amethyst Roberson (11:33)
And as you look, putting in church context is a whole nother language, right? So yeah, the language is the bridge that we have to use to walk over generationally. And so when that's missing, like when there's abuse, and I know we're not in that vantage point, but when there's abuse, even corporately in church, home, ministry, the difference in all of those, not the difference of the similarity is the language.

Terry Baylor (11:37)
Yes.

Ralph Owens (11:37)
Yeah.

Mmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm.

Mmm.

Amethyst Roberson (12:00)
That person

who was abused didn't have the language. They didn't have the experience yet to get it out. They didn't have, what's language, what's after language? My understanding. Because guess what? I can speak Chinese and you can speak Spanish. We both have language, right? But we still can't get through the door because we're talking two different languages, right? So what's the common denominator between if our language, and I think what you were saying was,

Ralph Owens (12:03)
Mm. That's good.

Hmm.

Mmm.

Terry Baylor (12:11)
Mmm.

Ralph Owens (12:18)
Bye.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Amethyst Roberson (12:28)
your perception and that perception of that person was different, right? How do we get through that? We slow it down a little bit. We understand, we talk about not what we can see, but we talk about that vulnerable part of me. Now we're not just talking with our voices. We're using the idea of, I'm going to just go over to the door and I'm going to twist the knob. I'm going to show you.

Ralph Owens (12:37)
Mm.

Mm-hmm.

Amethyst Roberson (12:54)
how to do that. So that's where emotional intelligence comes in. Emotionally in the performance arena, I'm just going to tell you the data and I want you to perform, right? Emotional intelligence says, let me walk with you to process this with you. Matter of fact, I'll open the door because our languages are different. Let me turn the knob for you. And we both walk through there.

Ralph Owens (12:55)
Hmm

Mm.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Terry Baylor (13:13)
Mmm.

Amethyst Roberson (13:21)
And we'll do that until we both get it and we're both on the same page. But that's a process, right? That's a mentorship. That takes time. And that's what you were really communicating to that person. And along in that journey is when you get the resiliency and the things that you named and you're teaching that person. I see something in you that I didn't see before we walked through this.

Ralph Owens (13:25)
Mmm.

Mm. Mm.

⁓ wow.

Terry Baylor (13:46)
Correct.

Amethyst Roberson (13:47)
and teaching them how to do that. I can say so much about that. That point is so powerful. But as it happens, it happens so quickly within all aspects of relationships. it's needed. Most situations that improve or even get worse are based upon that aspect of communication that you just made to people speaking different languages.

Ralph Owens (14:07)
Mm.

Amethyst Roberson (14:09)
We see the door, but we can't get through because we can't find the bridge to make it happen. And then we add gatekeeping in there. That's a whole nother conversation.

Ralph Owens (14:14)
Mm. Mm. ⁓

Terry Baylor (14:14)
Mmm. Mmm.

Ralph Owens (14:19)
Thank

Terry Baylor (14:20)
But no, I appreciate that. Yes, yes. No, I appreciate that. And you hit on something, right? There is a lot of abuse in the workplace. A ton of it, right? People use language. People use, you know, little remarks, passive aggressive. They're all kind of, man. So I appreciate you just even hitting on that.

Amethyst Roberson (14:20)
I'm just, I mean, as I'm visual. Yep, yep, I'm visual. Yeah, so good job.

Okay, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Ralph Owens (14:33)
Yes.

Amethyst Roberson (14:40)
Micro oppressions, yep. Absolutely.

Ralph Owens (14:42)
Yeah.

Terry Baylor (14:45)
And if someone is

Amethyst Roberson (14:45)
Yeah, that's a big thing.

Terry Baylor (14:47)
listening today, if you, you you're not just, you're not imagining it basically.