Silence is a powerful emotional tool most families never use intentionally. We’re taught to talk things out, explain, discuss, debate — but not to pause. Not to let quiet space do the heavy lifting.
And yet, some of the strongest emotional intelligence comes from moments when we say nothing at all.
Silence and emotional intelligence are working together.
How Quiet Reflection Builds Resilience and Self-Control
Think of silence like the body’s cool-down after a run. Without that recovery time, the muscles tighten, the heart stays racing, and the system never resets.
In the same way, without silence, the emotional brain never cools down. It simply reacts, jumps, triggers, and spirals.
But when we give the mind quiet space, something extraordinary happens, reactions soften, thinking sharpens, and awareness rises. This is where silence and emotional intelligence meet — in the gap between stimulus and response.
Why Emotional Intelligence Needs Stillness
Emotional intelligence, at its core, is about awareness — knowing what you feel, why you feel it, and what you want to do with those feelings. But awareness doesn’t happen in noise. It happens in pause.
Silence is where emotions reveal themselves honestly
Ronit Baras
In 1994, psychologist Peter Salovey, one of the pioneers of emotional intelligence research, described EQ as “the ability to monitor one’s own feelings.” You can’t monitor anything when your brain is in fast-forward.
Silence is the emotional microscope. It lets us zoom in on our internal world.
Noise pulls the brain outward. Silence brings the brain inward.
Adults need this internal focus to reflect before reacting. Children need it to understand what’s going on inside their bodies and minds and all children need an agent to do that.
This is why families who practise small, intentional quiet moments create more emotionally intelligent children — not because they talk more, but because they listen inwardly more.
Silence and emotional intelligence feed each other like sunlight and growth.
The Power of Pausing Before Responding
Most conflict — at home, school, work — doesn’t come only from what we feel. It comes from how fast we react.
You take two people, going through the same experience, they won’t react the same way.
Why?
Because the incident in front of them won’t trigger the same feeling and if it will, it won’t produce a reaction in the same speed.
Inside us there is much mess and triggers of threat. Remember? Our body’s job is to keep us safe. If we won’t take the time to pause, we might discover our immediate reaction hurt someone we really love, even if we didn’t mean to.
Imagine the brain like a snow globe.
Shake it (an argument, a misunderstanding, a stressful moment) and everything blurs.
Let it sit in silence, and the snow settles. Clarity returns.
This “snow settling” effect is backed by science.
In 2000, neuroscientist Joseph LeDoux discovered that emotional reactions fire before rational thinking. The amygdala reacts first, then the prefrontal cortex catches up. We react before we think about the consequences of our action. (Yes, you and me, it is human, the more stressed we are the greater the gap between the reaction and the thought. Pausing makes all the difference.
A short moment of silence:
- lowers the emotional spike
- activates the rational brain
- helps us choose instead of reacting
This is why people say, “Let me think” — they intuitively know silence creates space for wiser decisions.
When I work with parents I encourage them to adopt this phrase whenever they are in conflict with their children (or bosses or partners). Taking the time off to “think” creates a manual pause and gives the prefrontal cortex ( the thinking brain) time to catch up before we say anything silly.
Children learn this too. When they pause before reacting, they learn control, patience, and empathy. When they watch you taking breaks, they learn that silence is not empty; silence and emotional intelligence are deeply intertwined.
How Silence Strengthens Self-Awareness
In families, self-awareness is one of the hardest skills to teach — because you cannot teach it by talking. You can only teach it by modelling reflection. I love this model. Reflective parents, raise reflective children. Even my parenting program is called Happy Parents Raise Happy Kids.
In 2012, researcher David Vago studied mindfulness and found that even brief moments of silence change activity in the insula — the brain region responsible for noticing internal sensations like heartbeat, tension, and emotional shifts. This means silence literally trains the brain to notice emotions sooner.
Adults begin to catch themselves before exploding. Children begin to sense frustration rising before it erupts.
Silence is not passive. It is active noticing.
Our body sends us so many messages and speak to us in a language of feelings and sensations. Everything is so loud and full of words and nose, we simply don’t learn to listen.
Think of silence like the dimmer switch that reveals emotional truth gently. When everything is loud, kids miss the subtle signals of their own feelings. When things get quiet, they start to sense:
“My tummy feels tight — I think I’m worried.”
“My throat feels warm — I think I’m about to cry.”
“I feel shaky — I think I’m scared.”
This is silence and emotional intelligence in action: using quiet to light the inner world.
It took me many years of suffering to start listening to my own body. I was sick, I had no friends, I was a horrible student, troubled child, angry and frustrated and when that wasn’t enough, I used to scream and shout until I lost my voice with everything that simply didn’t work the way I wanted to.
My house was loud; it was a scary jungle.
And then I woke up and I started listening, to myself. Some people call it intuition, and I don’t think I was born with that intuition. I developed it.
I went inside myself and listened to my own thoughts.
I was a lucky girl because it happened to me at the age of 15. I had no model of quiet or reflection. No example of mindfulness. I’m guessing this is what led me to study emotional intelligence and offer children this realization from an early age. My work with parents became an extension of that purpose.
Quiet reflection is the strongest teacher of emotional honesty
Ronit Baras
Listening Without Interrupting
Interrupting is the opposite of emotional intelligence. Listening is its partner.
But listening is not just keeping your mouth closed — it’s keeping your mind quiet.
Parents often think listening means waiting until the child finishes speaking. But real listening means pausing judgment, pausing solutions, pausing assumptions, pausing the urge to fix.
I hate it when parents use the phrases “ Did I finish talking?” “ I’m speaking you need to listen” “don’t interrupt when adults are speaking” “are you listening to me?” Or worse “ you are not listening to me”
All those phrases don’t teach listening skills they are simply other ways to tell children to “shut up” and they turn on survival instincts that turn you into the modern “lion”.
It is not about taking turns in listening either. It means using silence as a way to absorb, not analyse.
In 2011, researcher Graham Bodie studied deep listening and found that silent listening significantly increases empathy and emotional understanding.
When we listen without interrupting:
- Kids feel valued
- Partners feel understood
- Conflicts soften
- Resentment decreases
international listening is not passive. It is a gift.
The more families practise this, the stronger their relationships become. Because when we combine silence and emotional intelligence we teach children that listening is not waiting — it’s caring.
Listening is not just keeping your mouth closed — it’s keeping your mind quiet
Ronit Baras
Practical Quiet Moments That Build EQ
Emotional intelligence grows from small, repeatable habits — not from lectures.
Here are practical ways families can use silence and emotional intelligence to build stronger EQ and incorporate quiet moments into the day to day family life.
The Silent Check-In (1 minute)
- Each person silently notices how they feel.
- Adults model it by saying afterwards, “I felt tight. I think I was stressed.”
- Children learn to do the same.
The “Look First, Talk Later” Rule
- Before responding, look at the person’s face.
- Silence helps you read the emotion. Children learn to do the same.
Three Silent Breaths Before Problem-Solving
- Remember, we can’t take deep breaths when we are under a threat.
- This lowers emotional reactivity instantly.
The Silent Observation Game
- Parents and children silently notice five things about a situation or feeling.
- It builds attention, focus, and emotional detail.
Shared Quiet Time Before Bed
- Just two minutes strengthens emotional bonding and self-awareness.
- Silence does not require meditation, candles, or a mountain retreat. It just needs intention.
- Families who weave these tiny moments into daily life become more emotionally resilient and less reactive.
- This is how silence and emotional intelligence slowly reshape families.
Why Silence Makes Emotional Intelligence Easier for Kids
Children naturally live in the world of noise — sensory noise, emotional noise, mental noise. Silence helps them slow the world down enough to understand themselves.
We, the adults in their life, their agents, can’t possibly be there at all times to filter challenges and we have a role to prepare them for independent life.
If they learn the recognise their own feelings, manage them, recognise other’s feelings and help and support others to manage their feelings, they have all levels of EQ, therefor they have high emotional intelligence.
We simply can’t do all of it for them. We have to give them the tools to do it on their own. Teaching them to how silence and relationship work together, Teaching mindfulness are very easy ways to teach children self-control.
When children learn quiet reflection:
- Their tantrums decrease
- Their decision-making improves
- Their empathy increases
- Their stress drops
- And their communication becomes clearer
In 2018, researcher Richie Davidson found that children who practised brief moments of mindful silence showed improved emotional regulation after just eight weeks.
Davidson did it with a group of children in research. He didn’t know those kids. I’m here to tell you that when you do it with you own children or children you are familiar with (as a teacher, a grandparent or a family member) the time drops by half.
Silence is a skill. Emotional intelligence is a practice. Together, silence and emotional intelligence become a superpower.
This is why incorporating silence and emotional intelligence into family routines makes such a profound difference.
Quiet Moments, Stronger Hearts
We all want to pass good habits, skills to our children and guarantee they’ll travel the world safely.
When we understand the connection between silence and emotional intelligence, we stop trying to teach emotional skills through endless talking. Instead, we create space for reflection, awareness, and choice.
I know, some parents are very scared of the word “choice”. I think it is because they don’t trust themselves they did a good job in modelling choice.
When you react, without a pause, you don’t really choose. Your amygdala, the primitive part in your brain that supposed to protect you, made the choice for you. Long before your thinking brain realized what was happening.
Take a deep breath!
Go into the warmth of the silence inside of you. The quiet place that feels like home.
Silence gives adults clarity.
Silence gives children emotional maturity.
Silence gives families connection.
The next time your home feels loud — not from sound, but from emotion — try quiet first. Let silence do what words sometimes cannot: create space for understanding.
And if you want deeper support building emotional intelligence in your family, visit Be Happy in LIFE.
Quiet transformation begins with one silent breath.
Join me next time on the sixth chapter of the silence series that goes deep into the parenting aspect of choosing silence to be a happy, healthy parents.
Hugs,
Ronit
The Power of Silence
