Emotional Intelligence – Sagar Satyal

On 14th November 2025, Sagar Satyal, co-founder of My Emotions Matter, was facilitating a skill-based session on Emotional Intelligence at the Embark College. Sagar has devoted his life to making people understand how to be self-aware, communicate, and have fairer relationships, and as he has many years of experience in education of emotional intelligence and worked with over 50 organizations in total, he committed his efforts to the specified domain. He has engaged UNICEF New York too regarding a worldwide social-emotional learning kit that is translated into 15 languages. His practical, concrete, and understanding style formed the basis of the insightful and transformational learning experience.

The session was designed in such a way that it focused on defining the emotional and behavioral patterns that define our daily interactions which we are not always conscious of. Sagar started by pointing out the four tendencies common to misunderstandings, stress and conflict including assuming, blaming, not communicating and demanding. Such trends are common in almost every relationship, be it personal and academic, as well as professional. The participants looked back and saw instances when they had been subjected to these patterns, and when they had involuntarily shown them to other people. This initial discussion served to help the group understand how these routine responses may have an impact wellbeing, clarity, and the quality of relations.

In order to encourage participants to switch to the behavior of automatic response instead of making conscious decisions, Sagar proposed a four-step emotional intelligence process. The framework helped the participants to become slower, reflective, and cognizant of what is going on within them when they are experiencing an emotionally charged situation. Every step was described using relatable examples, and brief activities were given, which made the participants use the concepts in practice in real life.

1.Waking up to the narratives that we write about ourselves.

Sagar described the way the human brain constantly processes situations and bridges the gaps with assumptions based on previous history, fears and expectations. These internal narratives would seem in factual cattle and may get emotions overheated. Under guided reflection, the participants explored recent events when they have acted on intuition and found out at a later time that, they were making conclusions that were neither complete nor accurate. This was to make them realize the need to stop and review the legitimacy of their interpretations before taking any action.

2.Finding out the feelings behind those stories.

The meeting proceeded into emotional awareness. Not all people can formulate the emotions they feel clearly when labeling them and hence respond in a certain manner which is not their expression. Sagar provided instruments to reflect participants separating the primary and the secondary emotions and to be more specific with feelings. The practice made the participants pay attention to the emotions that they either did not realize before or did not accept. Labelling feelings, Sagar pointed out, is a great step to being free of feelings and not the other way round.

3.Knowing the needs that activate emotions.

Continuing on the emotional awareness, the participants delved deeper to understand the unmet needs that trigger the emotional responses. Sagar explained that feelings are experienced not due to the actions of others but are caused by the presence or absence of fulfilment of some needs like clarity, respect, support and autonomy. In reflective exercises, the participants were able to recognize the needs of their own recent frustrations or conflicts. The solution most of them found was to understand that what they were responding to was not the situation itself but something of greater importance to them. This action enabled them to move off the blame game and onto the understanding game, to themselves and other people.

4.Making and receiving understandable requests.

In the last section of the session the topic of communication in particular how to transform needs into understandable, respectful requests was addressed. Sagar did not require or expect other people to know what we want instead Sagar prompted participants to express themselves in ways that initiate a conversation and not defensiveness. The participants learned to transform their needs into non-judgmental and Do-not-ask requests. They also learnt on how to accept requests of other people without them feeling like they are being criticized and pressured. The given practice helped to show how communication may transform into a reactive pattern and become more constructive, based on the requirements.

Sagar operated in an engaging, grounded and interactive learning environment throughout the session. Activities helped participants to relate the concepts with their real life experiences and this made the session practical as opposed to theoretical. Introduction to emotional intelligence by taking the step-by-step process through the self-awareness, emotional knowledge, identification of needs and communication skills, participants learned how emotional intelligence could be used to change their approach to thinking, feeling and relating to other people.

At the conclusion of the two hours, the participants were able to return to conscious awareness of the affective processes of the human being, understand their common reactions better, and have the useful tools to improve communication at the personal and work levels. The session has emphasized that emotional intelligence is not merely a soft skill, but a daily practice, which helps enhance wellbeing, improve relationships, and enables people to face challenges with a clearer and warmer readiness to face any situation with greater clarity and empathy.