Emotional Well-Being Simplified: Definition, Benefits, & Measurement
Discover the transformative power of our comprehensive approach, designed to assess, guide, and empower you on your journey to emotional well-being.
The EI3.0® System: A Holistic Approach to Emotional Well-Being
The EI3.0® System revolutionizes emotional well-being with its comprehensive, three-pronged approach:
Assessment: Gain a deep understanding of your emotional well-being starting point.
Guidance: Follow a clear, actionable roadmap to develop your emotional health.
Empowerment: Utilize powerful tools and strategies to create lasting, transformative change.
THE SYSTEM
The Call to Nurture the Emergence of EWB
A Call for Research
In 2018, two significant calls were made to advance the field of Emotional Well-Being (EWB).
Sophie Feller, Enrico G. Castillo, Jared M. Greenberg, Pilar Abascal, Richard Van Horn, and Kenneth B. Wells proposed a national EWB initiative, emphasizing the need for structured measurement and identification of EWB drivers.
Concurrently, the NIH sponsored a roundtable discussion to propel research forward, focusing on intervention strategies to enhance EWB.
These calls were driven by growing awareness of EWB's impact on overall health.
A Lack of Cohesion
Longitudinal studies have shown that high EWB is associated with improved general health, enhanced disease-specific outcomes, decreased disability rates, and reduced mortality rates.
Despite the spotlight, a lack of integration and harmonization persists in EWB research.
In 2022, Jessica Koslouski, Christine Wilson-Mendenhall, Parisa Parsafar, Simon Goldberg, Michelle Martin, and Sandra Chafouleas found no consistent definition of EWB, with measures varying widely across disciplines. They concluded that conceptual integration and harmonization of measures are needed to advance EWB knowledge and measurement.
The State of the Heart 2024 Global Report revealed alarming trends:
The world has entered an "emotional recession" with declining well-being and high burnout.
Global emotional intelligence scores have declined for four consecutive years.
Gen Z faces a mental and emotional health crisis fueled by loneliness and social isolation.
Burnout increased in 65% of workplace sectors from 2021 to 2023.
This decline can be linked to the ongoing mystery surrounding EWB. Without knowing how to develop it, the decline may continue.
Despite these challenges, progress has been made in unifying the field.
In 2023, Chrystal Park, Laura Kubzansky, Sandra Chafouleas, Richard Davidson, Dacher Keltner, Parisa Parsafar, Yeates Conwell, Michelle Y. Martin, Janel Hanmer, and Kuan Hong Wang conceptualized a working definition and framework for EWB, contributing to a more cohesive body of work.
However, advances in a unified approach, measurements, and identification of drivers remain disjointed.
The research presented on this site responds to the call to action in these three areas, aiming to advance the emerging field of EWB through a more integrated and harmonized approach.
THE MODEL
The Emotional Intelligence 3.0® Approach to Emotional Health
Dr. Tomi White Bryan has created a comprehensive emotional health gestalt that addresses Emotional Well-Being (EWB) for individuals and organizations.
The EI3.0 System of Emotional Well-being (SEW) focuses on individuals, while the EI3.0 System of High Performance (EI3.0 SHIP) targets organizations.
This unified approach combines systems thinking with research on a newly created instrument designed to assess emotional well-being.
The EI3.0® Approach
The development approach of EI3.0® includes:
Assessments
Multidimensional model
Clearly articulated development paths
Workshops, Guides, and activities proven to nurture EWB development
The Journal of EWB
The development of this gestalt is explained in the five-part article series "Unraveling the Mysteries of Emotional Well-being with Systems Thinking," published in our Journal of Emotional Well-being. These articles:
Establish boundaries around EWB, placing it in its rightful spot within the larger well-being system
Identify connections to existing theories
Bring transparency and clarity to this emerging discipline through multidimensional models, reliable and valid assessments, clear development paths, and proven tools
Research reveals that EWB significantly impacts every facet of life, including:
mental health,
physical health,
relationships,
resilience,
sleep,
grief,
and loss.
However, there is a widespread lack of proficiency in managing emotional health. Considering the profound impact of EWB on quality of life and the current global deficiency in emotional health, a simple model seemed insufficient to address this challenge.
The EI3.0® approach offers a comprehensive, holistic system to effectively address these critical issues.
THE MEASUREMENT SYSTEM
Measuring Individual and Organizational Emotional Well-Being
The Emotional State Indicator® (ESI) is the assessment developed for the EI3.0® System of Emotional Well-being (SEW).
This extensive tool evaluates the balance of a person's emotional operating system and has undergone a meticulous process to ensure its robustness and credibility. Data was collected seven times, allowing for thorough reliability and validity analysis. The ESI® significantly contributes to the field by providing an empirically tested tool for measuring Emotional Well-Being (EWB).
Once the balance of a person's emotional operating system is known, various behaviors can be predicted.
The ESI results can be configured in multiple ways for use with organizations:
The Executive Presence Indicator: Measures leaders' executive presence
The Power Style Indicator: Measures a person's conflict style (destructive or constructive) and is useful for improving team performance
The Leadership Fit Indicator: A pre-hire assessment for leadership positions
The Culture Fit Indicator: A pre-hire assessment for individual contributor positions
Additionally, organizational health questions have been added to the ESI® to create The Cultural Diagnostic Assessment, which measures organizational health and generates a Cultural Wellness Profile.
The individual development journey to emotional well-being involves a from-to movement:
It begins with the three constructs of poor emotional well-being: anger, resistance, and defensive communication.
These patterns form the Entanglement Triangle (also known as the Dirty Triangle) and act as a protective shield to keep a person's heart safe from further emotional overwhelm.
The movement is towards the opposites of these constructs: peace, allowing, and open communication, which form the Engagement Triangle.
The ESI measures where a person is on this continuum to determine emotional balance, the key determinant of EWB. Clients receive a report summarizing their patterns of inner emotional presence.
The organizational development journey to EWB also encompasses a from-to movement:
The starting points are ineffective leadership and followership, destructive conflict, and Below the Line culture, which form the Low Performance Triangle.
The movement is towards effective leadership and followership, constructive conflict, and Above the Line Culture, which form the High-Performance Triangle.
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The results for the Executive Presence Indicator, The Leadership Fit Indicator, and the Culture Fit Indicator offer a summary of a person's patterns of outer emotional presence in the form of a Profile, detailing their impact on others and culture.
The Cultural Diagnostic Assessment provides results to HR or the Leadership Team in the form of a debrief, measuring and identifying where the organization is on the journey of the from-to movement.
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The ESI® is available through the EI3.0 Assessment Center, a part of Tomi Bryan Consulting, and requires EI3.0® Certified Practitioner status for access.
The organizational assessments have been licensed to EI Guides and are available through that organization.
The Emotional Well-Being Tools of EI3.0®
Dr. Tomi White Bryan's journey to develop tools that promote Emotional Well-Being (EWB) began over two decades ago as she sought to answer the three existential questions:
→ "Who am I?"
→ "Why am I here?"
→ "What difference will I make?"
As she discovered tools that helped her find answers, she began sharing them with family, friends, and coaching clients.
Every tool offered in the EI3.0® System of Emotional Well-being (SEW) and the EI3.0 System of High Performance (SHIP) has been used before, with some tools being utilized over 40,000 times and others 20 times (due to their applicability at the very high end of emotional balance, where only a small percentage of the population resides). Each tool has received rave reviews from users.
These tools are specifically designed to nurture the from-to movement of both SEW and SHIP.
As holistic systems, SEW and SHIP include a development matrix that identifies the specific EWB structure the client is in from a systems perspective, the work of that structure, and the appropriate EI3.0 Guide.
The EI3.0 Guides serve as unlocking maneuvers that transform the client to the next location in the system.
Some of these unlocking maneuvers are available for free or at a low cost on Tomi Llama, making them accessible to a wider audience.
The remaining individual tools are reserved for use by EI3.0 Certified Practitioners, ensuring that clients receive guidance from trained professionals. The organizational tools are licensed by EI Guides, who specialize in implementing the EI3.0 approach in a corporate setting.
By offering a range of tools tailored to different stages of emotional well-being development and making them available through various channels, Dr. Tomi White Bryan and the EI3.0® systems aim to support both individuals and organizations in their journey towards greater emotional balance and overall well-being.