I feel like I have grown emotionally in my 40s as I explored my self, my feelings, and my body's reaction to pain in the BDSM world. I feel like I have just grown some more recently when I realized that being open about myself with friends will make me feel more connected to them. I dunno, I feel like I have a deep emotional connection to many people that goes beyond myself. I will agree that I do see what you are talking about in many people.

I agree with the theory and the conclusions. Nevertheless, people who want to release their "arrested emotional development" can do so.

They only need to be seriously committed and open to self-reflection, honest self-analysis, and personal change.

Emotional intelligence and emotional competency, the behaviour associated with EI, can be learned. Sometimes the transition can be painful, but in my experience, i have seen many accept the challenges successfully.

The following article demonstrates some of the EI developmental goals. Their list is certainly not all inclusive, but it is an accurate view into what Emotional Competency needs to look like.

[psychologytoday.com]

As for what it takes to develop our EI, an article in Scientific American on the subject of developing EI began as follows.

"A cautious answer is that psychologists still are not sure whether adults can enhance their emotional intelligence. Current research suggests, however, that people can almost surely increase their emotional competence."

For science to agree to anything conclusively requires years of research, especially when it it's about human behaviour. We haven't arrived there yet on EI or EC. But the fact that emotional competency can be learned certainly suggests that EI can also be developed.

Nevertheless, and even though the empirical data has not yet been developed, practitioners have seen the increase in emotional competencies when people decided to work at developing the requisite skills and abilities. Follow ups on personal and work-place relationships have also confirmed that we can develop our emotional competency if we are prepared to risk change and changing, even with the potential pain involved.

Science has proven this. You cannot successfully enter the next stage of your life until you successfully complete the one you are in. So, if you became emotionally stunted at 5 - there you go. At 15, yeah, you, too.

That was a good read. Interesting.