Emotional intelligence, formalized by Salovey, Mayer, and popularized by Goleman, describes the capacity to perceive, understand, use, and manage emotional information — both in oneself and in others. Emotions are not noise in the cognitive system but a sophisticated information system evolved to guide behavior in complex social environments, and emotional intelligence is the cultivation of the capacity to read and respond to this information skillfully. The Sutras' analysis of the kleśas (afflictive mental states) is, at one level, a map of emotional unintelligence — the ways in which unexamined emotional patterns distort perception and generate suffering.
Patan