A Tale of Two Wolves
Ever Thought About Your Emotional IQ?
There are certain aspects of Native American Spirituality that I love, especially those that radiate profound wisdom that unexpectedly invades the heart of the listener. This morning I’m thinking about a Cherokee “Tale of Two Wolves.”
One evening an old Cherokee Indian told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said, “My son, the battle is between two ‘wolves’ inside us all. One is Evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.
The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith.”
The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather: “Which wolf wins?”
The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”
Wow! Can you feel the profound wisdom from this story told so simply?
The life we’ve been given to live leads us through myriads upon myriads of events, because of which one or the other of our “inner wolves” rises to the surface. When those events are traumatic, our emotions run amok. It is so easy to “feed” those emotions until they rule our behavior, behavior that does hurtful things to ourselves and to others.
For me, part of growing spiritually, part of my healing, has been in educating my Emotional IQ, so that I know for sure which emotion I’m experiencing. That’s the best way I know of to be able to do something that is genuinely helpful in “getting over it” or “getting through it” sooner than would otherwise be possible. And then to ask myself “What is the creative way through this?”
I found an emotions wheel online. The wheel is divided into 6 emotion categories: Alone, Dislike, Sad, Afraid, Embarrassed, and Angry. The category “Angry” has 27 nuanced emotions in it! “Dislike” has 19 emotions that range from “Dismissive” to “Loathing.” The entire circle has a whopping 126 shades of the emotions that we call “negative!” Looking at this wheel from time to time has helped me to see precisely what I’m feeling in a particular moment. Then I can see how I might be “feeding” it and what I might do to counteract it.
The same website also has a positive emotions wheel. It is divided into 5 categories: Confident, Interested, Excited, Loving, and Accepted. Across all categories there are 123 nuanced emotions! Here are a few select examples: In the Confident Category: optimistic and authentic; Interested Category: inquisitive and responsive; Excited Category: energetic and amazed; Loving Category: kindhearted and joyful; Accepted Category: validated and appreciated.
I know which wolf I want to feed. How about you?
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