Reviewing the literature on coaching and emotional intelligence in relation to how to manage human emotions and their influence on their daily behavior, various authors agree in highlighting that a person must develop some social skills to have impeccable interpersonal relationships.
Empathy, assertiveness, anger management, active listening , and other skills are frequently recommended by researchers as behavioral tools to have a better relationship with our peers. However, to date, few authors or personal growth texts mention Tolerance as a social skill tool.
You, dear reader, are probably an assertive person and say what you have to say at the right time, or you may also be empathetic and put yourself in the other person's place, or as they say, put yourself in the other person's shoes and understand or try to understand what your interlocutor feels, but these skills do not make you tolerant towards the other person.
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What is meant by tolerance?
Tolerance comes from the Latin tolerae, which designates a slovenia phone number certain type of approval, level of acceptance towards that which is contrary to us . For the Greeks, tolerance implies truly understanding the thoughts of others, listening to them and taking them into account, whatever one's personal opinion may be. Wow, what a profound concept!
The Athenians, for their part, maintained that: Tolerance is debate, that is, the possibility of freely expressing one's opinions without having to suffer any punishment. As we can see from ancient times, tolerance is related to language, communication, freely expressing our opinions, our thoughts and the right to be respected by others. To do otherwise is to be intolerant.
Intolerance manifests itself through acts of prohibition, exclusion or persecution. In this regard, I would like to quote Elie Wiesel (1928-2016) who in 1997 said:
“…Deaf to all reason, intolerance is not only the vile instrument of the enemy, but it is the enemy itself, since it denies the broad possibilities of communication offered by language. When language fails, violence takes over; violence is the language of those who have lost their words, and it is also the way in which intolerance is expressed, where hatred germinates.”
This prestigious North American author and survivor of the Nazi concentration camps of Auschwitz and Buchenwald , and winner of the 1986 Peace Prize, emphasizes that human beings must make every effort possible to maintain communication with their fellow human beings, an active communication that implies respect and recognition of the expressions of both interlocutors.
Today, how many people are intolerant of their coworkers, their partners, their neighbors, even the people with whom you buy food at the market? We do not talk, we do not converse, they try to impose their truths on others and many feel aversion, hatred for those who think differently. Without tolerance towards what others think, there will be no social reconciliation in the country.