Top 40 Travis Bradberry Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Social awareness is your ability to accurately pick up on emotions in other people and understand what is really going on with them.”

— Travis Bradberry

2. “Relationship management is your ability to use your awareness of your own emotions and those of others to manage interactions successfully.”

— Travis Bradberry

3. “Self-management is more than resisting explosive or problematic behavior. The biggest challenge that people face is managing their tendencies over time and applying their skills in a variety of situations.”

— Travis Bradberry

4. “The biggest obstacle to increasing your self-awareness is the tendency to avoid the discomfort that comes from seeing yourself as you really are.”

— Travis Bradberry

5. “Remember, feedback is meant to address the problem, not the person.”

— Travis Bradberry

6. “Everything you see – including yourself – must travel through your own lens. The problem is, your lens is tainted by your experiences, your beliefs, and, without question, your moods. Your lens prevents you from ever obtaining a truly objective look at yourself, on your own. Often, there is a big difference between how you see yourself and how others see you. This chasm between the way you view yourself and the way others view you is a rich source of lessons that will build your self-awareness.”

— Travis Bradberry

7. “As the first component of social competence, social awareness is a foundational skill. Social awareness is your ability to accurately pick up on emotions in other people and understand what is really going on with them. This often means perceiving what other people are thinking and feeling even if you do not feel the same way.”

— Travis Bradberry

8. “Remember, planning the future and reflecting on the past are valuable exercises, but doing this throughout your day interferes with what is in front of you – your present.”

— Travis Bradberry

9. “You do control the thoughts that follow an emotion, and you have a great deal of say in how you react to an emotion – as long as you are aware of it.”

— Travis Bradberry

10. “The more we understand the beauty and the blemishes, the better we are able to achieve our full potential.”

— Travis Bradberry

11. “Anyone can become angry – that is easy. But to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way, this is not easy.”

— Travis Bradberry

12. “The surprising thing about this strategy is that just paying attention to your emotions and asking yourself good questions like these are enough to help you improve.”

— Travis Bradberry

13. “When you don’t stop to think about your feelings – including how they are influencing your behavior now, and will continue to do so in the future – you set yourself up to be a frequent victim of emotional hijackings. Whether you’re aware of it or not, your emotions will control you, and you’ll move through your day reacting to your feelings with little choice in what you say and do.”

— Travis Bradberry

14. “Good decisions require far more than factual knowledge. They are made using self-knowledge and emotional mastery when they’re needed most.”

— Travis Bradberry

15. “Even when you can’t do or say anything to change a difficult situation, you always have a say in your perspective of what’s happening, which ultimately influences your feelings about it.”

— Travis Bradberry

16. “Trust is a peculiar resource; it is built rather than depleted by use.”

— Travis Bradberry

17. “Part of self-awareness is knowing what you’re going through even if you can’t totally change it. Admit to yourself that your bad mood is hanging a cloud over everything you see, and remind yourself that your moods are not permanent. Your emotions change all the time, and low moods will pass if you allow them to.”

— Travis Bradberry

18. “The biggest challenge to developing self-awareness is objectivity. It’s hard to develop perspective on your emotions and tendencies when every day feels like a new mountain to climb.”

— Travis Bradberry

19. “Closing your eyes and thinking of emotionally arousing events is simply training for the real thing – spotting the physical signs of your emotions on the fly.”

— Travis Bradberry

20. “The tricky thing about your brain is that, once a negative mood takes over, you lose sight of what’s good in your life, and suddenly you hate your job, you’re frustrated with family and friends, you’re dissatisfied with your accomplishments, and your optimism about the future goes out the window. Deep down, you know that things aren’t as bad as they seem, but your brain just won’t hear it.”

— Travis Bradberry

21. “Emotions serve an important purpose – they clue you into things that you’ll never understand if you don’t take the time to ask yourself why.”

— Travis Bradberry

22. “People high in self-awareness are remarkably clear in their understanding of what they do well, what motivates and satisfies them, and which people and situations push their buttons.”

— Travis Bradberry

23. “Intelligence is your ability to learn, and it’s the same at age 15 as it is at age 50.”

— Travis Bradberry

24. “Self-awareness is the process of getting to know yourself from the inside out and the outside in.”

— Travis Bradberry

25. “Greeting someone by name is one of the most basic and influential social awareness strategies you can adopt. It’s a personal and meaningful way to engage someone. If you have a tendency to withdraw in social situations, greeting someone by name is a simple way to stick your neck out; using someone’s name breaks down barriers and comes across as warm and inviting. Even if you are a social butterfly, greeting people by name is a strategy to live by.”

— Travis Bradberry

26. “Rather than avoiding a feeling, your goal should be to move toward the emotion, into it, and eventually through it.”

— Travis Bradberry

27. “A single cell can grow 15,000 connections with its neighbors. This chain reaction of growth ensures the pathway of thought responsible for the behavior grows strong, making it easier to kick this new resource into action in the future.”

— Travis Bradberry

28. “The secret to winning this culture game is to treat others how they want to be treated, not how you would want to be treated.”

— Travis Bradberry

29. “Physical appearance is more straightforward – what you wear sends a pretty clear, established message about how you feel. For example, wearing old sweatpants and ratty T-shirts and having disheveled hair every day tells the world you’ve given up, while overdressing for every occasion and never missing your weekly haircut lets people know you are trying too hard.”

— Travis Bradberry

30. “When you’re stuck in a down mood, it’s not a good time to make important decisions. You’ll have to remain aware of the mood and understand it if you hope to keep it from leading you to make mistakes that will only pull you down further. Not only is it OK to reflect upon recent events that may have brought on the mood, but this is also a good idea – as long as you don’t dwell on them for too long – because often that’s all it takes to get the mood to pass.”

— Travis Bradberry

31. “Suspending judgment of emotions allows them to run their course and vanish.”

— Travis Bradberry

32. “Hard times of any kind – financial, familial, or job-related – create more intense and often prolonged negative emotions that ultimately result in stress. In addition to the physical costs of stress, such as weight gain and heart disease, stress also taxes our mental resources.”

— Travis Bradberry

33. “This sounds basic, almost too basic to mention, but listening is a strategy and a skill that is losing ground in society. Most people think they are good listeners, but if adults played “the Telephone Game” today, how accurate would the final message be? Listening requires focus, and focus isn’t easy because we’re stretched in several directions. Listening.”

— Travis Bradberry

34. “Butch’s thoughts didn’t make his feelings of fear and terror disappear, but they did keep his emotions from hijacking his behavior.”

— Travis Bradberry

35. “EQ is so critical to success that it accounts for 58 percent of performance in all types of jobs. It’s the single biggest predictor of performance in the workplace and the strongest driver of leadership and personal excellence.”

— Travis Bradberry

36. “Your brain has a difficult time distinguishing between what you see with your eyes and what you visualize in your mind.”

— Travis Bradberry

37. “In the beginning, doing other than yelling when you are angry will be extremely difficult. But each time you succeed, the new pathway is strengthened. Eventually the urge to yell is so small that it’s easy to ignore.”

— Travis Bradberry

38. “Your personality is a result of your preferences, such as your inclination to introversion or extroversion. However, like IQ, personality can’t be used to predict emotional intelligence.”

— Travis Bradberry

39. “Stay aware of your good moods and the foolish decisions these moods can lead to, and you’ll be able to enjoy feeling good without any regrets.”

— Travis Bradberry

40. “The excitement and energy you enjoy during a good mood paint a rosy picture of all you encounter. This leaves you far more likely to make impulsive decisions that ignore the potential consequences of your actions. Stay aware of your good moods and the foolish decisions these moods can lead to, and you’ll be able to enjoy feeling good without any regrets.”

— Travis Bradberry