I just got back from a weekend in Daytona for the Daytona 500 — NASCAR’s biggest and most exciting event of the year. My family and I have gone to every Daytona 500 since 2007 and it’s something we look forward to every year. This particular year, there was a horrifying wreck on the final lap of the Nationwide race where Kyle Larson’s car got thrown into the catch fence. Debris and a tire with the suspension still attached got launched into the grandstands, injuring a total of 28 fans. At the same time, my favorite NASCAR driver, Tony Stewart won the race.

It all happened so fast, we hardly had time to process what happened. My dad and I were happy that Tony Stewart had won. We high-fived each other and were super thrilled. Then we see all the fans around us move to the edge of the upper tier to look below and see the people being carried away on stretchers. We immediately went from being thrilled to feeling terrible for those that were hurt no more than 300 ft away from us. Our emotions went from one end of the spectrum to the complete opposite in mere seconds.

This brings me to the issue of “Emotional Intelligence”. If you follow my book list in the Books and Resources section, you’ll notice at the bottom that the last several books I have read are trending more towards business and management. Well, I came across the idea of Emotional Intelligence while reading these business books because EQ plays a huge role in your success. So I picked up Emotional Intelligence 2.0, a quick, but excellent read on how to become more aware of your emotions and the emotions of others, and how to handle them appropriately. After reading the book, I came to the conclusion that Forever Alones have low emotional intelligence, but believe that they are better than most. Just because you like to talk to women about their feelings and think you understand women better than “alpha-male-jerks” does not mean you are emotionally intelligent. It may even indicate a deficit in that skill-set if you aren’t reading those women properly and/or are caught up in your own emotions.

Those with high emotional intelligence also have a high level of self-awareness. There are tons of parallels between what we advocate here on becoming a better man and what is being emotionally intelligent. High EQ also correlates with better perception of others, like body language for example.

On one side, you have some Forever Alones who “care so much” and want nothing more than to love and be loved, that they are unaware that their own world view is turning many women away. On the opposite end, you have other Forever Alone’s who walk around with a chip on their shoulder, and radiate anger without even knowing it, repelling anyone who might otherwise like to get to know them.

In both cases, the Forever Alones have low self-awareness and let their emotions control their actions.

This book can help a lot of people become socially intuitive — in school, the workplace, and in every day relationships. Highly recommended.