The RULER Approach

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RULER empowers people of all ages to use emotions intelligently so that they are happy, healthy, compassionate, and productive.

We do not talk about this enough. When a student walks in already falling apart, the adults around them are often managi...
09/19/2026

We do not talk about this enough. When a student walks in already falling apart, the adults around them are often managing their own fear about what that distress means, for the student’s future, for the relationship, for themselves.

And that fear enters the room before the student’s story does.

Most adults are already three catastrophes ahead before the student finishes their first sentence. The student feels that. And they learn to filter what they share, soften the truth, and protect the adult from the full weight of what they are carrying. The students who need us most are the ones who have gotten the best at doing this.

Marc Brackett and Dr. Jenny Wang (Dr. Jenny Tzu-Mei Wang) on what it actually takes to show up for a student who is falling apart. From the vault on Dealing With Feeling. Link in bio/stories

Most educators have probably said some version of “you’ll get over it” to a student who was struggling, and meant it as ...
09/08/2026

Most educators have probably said some version of “you’ll get over it” to a student who was struggling, and meant it as reassurance. But what matters is not only what we intend. It is also what the student hears.

Because sometimes what they hear is not reassurance at all. They hear that they should be over it already, that the feeling is too much, or that “I’m fine” is easier than trying to explain what is actually happening.

And that is where a coping strategy can become a dismissal without us realizing it.

Temporal distancing can work. But it works differently when the student is helped to generate that perspective themselves rather than having it imposed on them. Sometimes the difference is a question instead of an answer.

Marc Brackett and Ethan Kross | Psychology & Emotions on Dealing With Feeling. From the vault. Link in bio.

We ask students every day to recognize their emotions, manage them, and make thoughtful choices. But that work has to in...
08/30/2026

We ask students every day to recognize their emotions, manage them, and make thoughtful choices. But that work has to include the adults in the building too.

More than 60 educators from Mannheim School District 83 spent two days this summer digging into the research, reflecting on their own experiences, practicing the skills, and thinking about how they want to show up for one another and for their students this fall.

Amy and Mariam Korangy from YCEI led the training, and we’re grateful to Michael Courington and Mannheim School District 83 for having us.

If you’re interested in bringing RULER to your school or district, learn more at the link in our bio.

We have spent decades asking why children are struggling, while the research has continued pointing to something we stil...
08/22/2026

We have spent decades asking why children are struggling, while the research has continued pointing to something we still do not take seriously enough.

It is not that children are weak or that something is fundamentally wrong with them. It is that we have built entire systems around their academic development while leaving far too much of their emotional development to chance. And then we wonder why the behavior is so hard to manage, the relationships feel so fragile, and the kids who seem fine on paper are falling apart at home.

Emotional intelligence is not a personality trait and it is not something children either have or do not have. It is a set of five learnable skills, and decades of work across thousands of schools show what can happen when those skills are given the same attention as academic ones.

And it is the lifelong practice that can take a child further than any grade, any test score, or any college acceptance letter ever will.

More from our director, Marc Brackett, in his conversation with Mel Robbins on The Mel Robbins Podcast

08/16/2026

“I am anxiety” sounds honest. It can feel true. But it can also make a feeling feel more permanent than it actually is.

That does not mean anxiety is any less real. It does not mean trauma disappears because we choose different words. The words we use can help us remember that feelings change, or make it harder to recognize when they do.

Our founding director, Marc Brackett, talks about this on Mighty Pursuit and why learning to name what we feel can also remind us that we are more than what we feel.

We say students have permission to feel, but in school that permission can get conditional fast.If the feeling takes too...
08/11/2026

We say students have permission to feel, but in school that permission can get conditional fast.

If the feeling takes too much time, pulls the lesson off track, or makes the adult uncomfortable, it often has to become perspective, gratitude, resilience, or something we can fix before the bell rings.

But that comes with a cost. And then we wonder why the response is “I’m fine,” when we may have taught students that the safest feeling is the one that asks the least of us.

The hopeful part is not that adults should stop reassuring students. It is that there is a moment before the bright side where a student can be met instead of moved along.

Marc Brackett and whitney goodman lmft talk about that moment on Dealing with Feeling, and how to notice when comfort is helping, and when it is asking the feeling to disappear.

If people have to wait for your best mood before they tell you the truth, that is not just a communication problem.As a ...
08/08/2026

If people have to wait for your best mood before they tell you the truth, that is not just a communication problem.

As a new school year begins, a lot of people are already deciding whether to call silence “fine,” delay the real concern until later, or carry it somewhere safer because another tense room feels like too much to take on.

That is where emotionally intelligent leadership gets very real, because the beginning of the year does not only reveal how people are doing. It begins to shape what they will feel safe enough to say.

This is part of the deeper work behind RULER.

We have made creativity feel like a trait students either have or do not have, when so much of what we call creative is ...
08/04/2026

We have made creativity feel like a trait students either have or do not have, when so much of what we call creative is really the ability to survive the ugly middle of making something.

The first version is messy, the feedback stings, the doubt gets louder, and suddenly “I’m not creative” becomes the safest story to tell.

RULER Institute Online helps educators build the emotion skills students need for that exact moment, when persistence matters more than the spark that started the idea. (Link in bio/stories to sign up)

As educators prepare for the year ahead, the question is not how to demand more creativity from students. It is how to build classrooms where frustration, uncertainty, and imperfect first attempts do not make good ideas disappear too early.

Research spotlight: Zorana Ivcevic Pringle | Author, The Creativity Choice

“Work is the school of adulthood.”  That’s how Dr. Heidi Brooks closed her keynote at TISEI’s Annual Congress this week,...
07/31/2026

“Work is the school of adulthood.” 

That’s how Dr. Heidi Brooks closed her keynote at TISEI’s Annual Congress this week, and it resonated. 

A few sessions later, we heard it echoed from the next generation. Students from The High School of Fashion Industries and incoming college freshmen took the stage to talk about emotional intelligence—not as an abstract concept but as a set of skills they’re actively building and teaching others for future resilience. 

Two moments, one throughline: emotional intelligence isn’t something we arrive at. It’s something we practice as students, professionals, and people. The students on that stage aren’t waiting for adulthood to start learning these skills; they’re already enrolled.

         TISEI2026

You can be fully engaged at work but at the end of the day have nothing left for the people you love.When Jochen Menges ...
07/30/2026

You can be fully engaged at work but at the end of the day have nothing left for the people you love.

When Jochen Menges raised this today at the 10th annual TISEI Congress at Yale, it exposed how quickly we treat engagement as proof of success. But someone can show up, perform, give their best energy all day, and still go home completely drained.

The next era of emotional intelligence must make room for emotional diversity. Not everyone wants to feel joyful or upbeat at work, and even pleasant emotions can become exhausting when they are expected instead of chosen.

A workplace cannot keep calling that engagement and pretend there is no cost.

Who gets the best of us, and who gets what’s left?

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