Painful as it may be a significant emotional event can be the catalyst for choosing a direction that serves us - and those around us - more effectively. Look for the learning.

The school made it very clear that women were entitled to positions of authority. That sense of entitlement allowed us to feel that we have a natural place in leadership in the world. That gave me a mental and emotional confidence.

Leadership must be likeable affable cordial and above all emotional. The fashion of authoritarian leadership is gone. Football is about life. You can't be angry all day.

What I look for when I see a piece of art for the first time is some kind of emotional intellectual experience that's a combination of both of those things and is informed by my knowledge and something new that I see the artist doing.

Religious speech is extreme emotional and motivational. It is anti-literal relying on metaphor allusion and other rhetorical devices and it assumes knowledge within a community of believers.

We have three centers: the emotional center the intellectual center and the physical body center. Each one of them has its own intelligence. How much better would we be if all three were working in unison?

I need to add that my work on multiple intelligences received a huge boost in 1995 when Daniel Goleman published his book on emotional intelligence. I am often confused with Dan. Initially though Dan and I are longtime friends this confusion irritated me.

I take parenting incredibly seriously. I want to be there for my kids and help them navigate the world and develop skills emotional intelligence to enjoy life and I'm lucky to be able to do that and have two healthy normal boys.

Emotional intelligence begins to develop in the earliest years. All the small exchanges children have with their parents teachers and with each other carry emotional messages.

When I went on to write my next book Working With Emotional Intelligence I wanted to make a business case that the best performers were those people strong in these skills.

But once you are in that field emotional intelligence emerges as a much stronger predictor of who will be most successful because it is how we handle ourselves in our relationships that determines how well we do once we are in a given job.

The emotional brain responds to an event more quickly than the thinking brain.

I've studied a technique called the Sanford Miesner technique that teaches you how to focus. It's mainly about daydreaming. And the technique's really about imaginary circumstances. Using your imagination to sort of daydream about stuff. It makes you emotional in a scene.

I'm an emotional sort of person in general and I have a vivid imagination so I feel the whole spectrum of emotion strongly when I write.

I think films about men are often about characters who don't want to express their feelings. You're supposed to kind of admire them for not expressing their feelings. And I feel that's a bit dull. Women's stories often have stronger emotional content which I enjoy doing. What I really love doing is mixing that with humor.

Humor is a very important thing. It is a natural predilection. It is an emotional release.

It's great to be able to connect parents with children both emotionally and through humor. I look forward to exploring family entertainment once again and examining the specifics of our day-to-day lives against the backdrop of an extraordinary adventure.