So start with these four steps, but be willing to move beyond them as you feel more at home with the process. Step 1: Make observations. To make an observation is to report on what we commonly call the facts. The Yoga Sutra calls this pramana pada I, v. Because John may not believe that he is late, and if Mary tells him he is late, he might deny it and argue the contrary.
Such an argument probably will not get to the heart of how 17 what we say matters John and Mary would like to be together. Instead of enjoying each other, they might spend their time together at odds with each other.
Imagine the following. Please clean it up by tomorrow morning because company is coming. A more desirable connection is likely to result if the interchange begins with observation language. More on the teenage bedroom drama to come.
Observation used in this way is an expression of what we call spiritual speech. It is learning to leave out our judgments and beliefs about what is observed and just describe it as a camera would record it.
Later in this chapter, we offer practice exercises to help you to refine your awareness of observations versus judgments. We are not proposing a new set of rights and wrongs. It is not wrong to use judgments. We just want you to be aware of using them, so you can learn what ensues from using judgments and what ensues from using observations instead. Then the choice is yours. The judgments at issue here are moralistic opinions about someone or something being right or wrong.
We will never be able to do away with evaluating whether 19 what we say matters our needs are being met or not. That is a form of judgment. But in making that evaluation, we are not condemning anyone for their motives. Step 2: Name your feelings. Feelings are emotions and are connected to bodily sensations.
Feelings are constantly changing and constantly arising. They tell us simply whether our needs have been met or unmet in that moment. For example, we might feel happy, content, at ease, connected to self and others, or full of energy. These feelings tell us that we are perceiving that our needs are being met in that moment. Or we might feel sad, lonely, afraid, irritated, or confused.
These feelings tell us that we are interpreting and therefore believing that our needs are not being met in the moment. All human beings have feelings, and they are constantly arising and changing. Feelings are signals shooting from the depths of the unconscious mind, alerting us that we need to pay attention. In that way, feelings are like a yoga pose. The sensation is telling us to pay attention to the hamstrings and how they need some release. This act of paying attention is 20 nonviolent communication the practice.
Spiritual practice is not the asana but the act of noticing during the practice of the asana. Part of the benefit of a regular asana practice is to remind us to pay attention.
Feelings serve the same purpose. If we learn the habit of paying attention to feelings as they arise, we are immediately brought into the present moment. And this is the hallmark of spiritual practice.
You cannot simultaneously be paying attention to your feelings and be lost in thoughts about the situation. Being lost in thoughts is our suffering. One important thing to remember is that, according to the NVC model, feelings arise separately from what other people say and do.
Others might stimulate my feelings, but my feelings are mine and are unique to how I experience the world. One person might feel sad from hearing something on the news, while another might feel happy upon hearing the same thing. The difference lies in the individual, not in the news.
The news does not create feelings, although it may very well stimulate feelings. There is a difference. The observation is that we both saw a movie. The stimulus was the same for both of us. We reacted differently, based upon our unique makeup. Our makeup comes with us from the womb and is shaped by our life experiences, particularly the patterns formed in early childhood. This use of language brings the speaker back to her own truth.
It is what occurs when we observe thoughts arising in meditation. We predict that you will enjoy the responses you receive when you do not mix the expression of feelings with analysis or opinion. It takes another person to abandon me. Try saying these two sentences out loud. Upon hearing that sentence, the other person may feel that he is being judged.
In that sense, they are real 22 nonviolent communication to you. Step 3: Express your needs. We all have needs to survive air, water, food, shelter and needs to thrive touch, play, intimacy, sexual expression, creativity. We all have a need for respect and a need for our autonomy to be recognized.
We also have spiritual needs, such as for peace, or wholeness, or connection with Deity. Dozens of human needs have been identified.
Needs are simply life expressing itself, and they are held by all human beings. When we are in touch with our needs, we are in touch with life itself as it arises in us. Maybe that is why we find babies so fascinating and dear. Babies are always in touch with their needs.
When they are hungry, wet, or bored, they let us know immediately. And babies do not resent their needs or perceive them to be a burden on their parents. Learning to identify our needs and how to get them met is a fundamental life skill that is part of what it means to practice spiritual speech. Sometimes Marshall Rosenberg, in his public workshops, draws upon the work of economist Manfred Max-Neef, who presents a list of nine universal human needs: affection, creation, freedom, identity, participation, protection, recreation, subsistence, and understanding.
You may find that using just these nine needs is an excellent place to start your practice of NVC; identify these needs when they arise in you. In a few words, he summed up the basis of our consumer culture.
A car is not a need but a strategy for getting a need met. What might be the need in this case? Perhaps it is for sustenance to support a family or for ease of movement when meeting commitments. The salient point is that those needs can be met by other cars, other means of transportation, other methods of getting around. We run into trouble when we confuse strategies with needs. Most of us do this all time.
We think the need is to get into a specific university or to get a certain job or to learn a certain yoga pose. But these are all strategies for getting our needs met. In the cases listed above, can you guess what the needs might be? Perhaps getting into a particular university might be a strategy for 24 nonviolent communication meeting a need for safety or identity.
Getting a certain job might be meeting a need for community or creativity or financial security. And mastering a certain yoga pose might meet a need for fun or meaning or physical well-being. Separating needs from strategies is critical in relationships.
When a couple argues, it is often over strategies. For example, a couple might be arguing over where to go on vacation. One wants the beach, and the other wants the mountains. It seems like they can come to no resolution.
From the point of view of NVC, this argument is about strategies. It is likely that each person has the same needs: rest and recreation. They have just chosen different strategies for meeting those needs. When the couple focuses on the needs first, the strategies often work themselves out in a mutually agreeable way.
Love is an interesting part of the needs inventory. Many people would call love a feeling, but NVC suggests that love is a need. If I have the strategy for getting love from a specific person and that person does not give it, I am stuck without getting my need for love met. But there are always many strategies for getting any particular need met, and so it is with love. I can get love from many other sources in my life.
Viewing love as a need frees me up to search for another strategy to get that need met. Instead, by discussing the situation in this manner, I am making it clear that what is stimulating my reaction of frustration is what is arising in me.
True, the state of the room is the stimulus for the feelings. But when I make an observation in this manner, it becomes clear that my needs are what is being discussed. Step 4: Make a request. When I make a request, I am trying to get my needs met in that moment.
Requests may seem like the easiest part of the model to understand, but actually they are more difficult to make clearly than you might think. Requests have the following characteristics: They are made about the present, and they are doable.
Requests in the NVC system are about a specific action to be done in the present. Showing love is not something a camera could take 26 nonviolent communication a picture of. Both people would know when the request had been met. Often the only way you know when you are making a demand instead of a request is by what you do or think of doing when the other person says no to your request.
The sweet tone and kind face you use when asking does not make it a request. The expectation of having your request met is not in the spirit of spiritual speech. To make a true request, we need to remain open to the outcome and open to allowing the other person to say no.
Later we discuss the next step you can take to get your needs met if your initial request is denied. Would you spend ten minutes with me now, making the bed and picking up the clothes off the floor and hanging them in the closet? The syntax you learn in NVC is designed to help you uncover your intention—for example, the intention of connection with the other person—and remembering it in the moment.
I Ike have found, for myself and in working with others, that using the basic sentence of NVC verbatim can be extremely valuable as you are learning this new language. Observations vs. Feelings vs. Needs universality vs. Strategies, concrete behavior diversity Life in action, universal qualities Action to meet needs Language that connects to life energy Specific to person, time, place Internal experience independent of externals Often cultural, habitual, conditioned 4.
Requests for action vs. Using the training wheels sentence over and over ingrains the basic distinctions that are so important to Nonviolent Communication: distinctions between observations and judgments, between feelings and evaluations masquerading as feelings, between needs and strategies, and between requests and demands.
These distinctions are embedded in the structure of the training wheels sentence, so using the sentence prompts awareness of them. Practicing the training wheels sentence is the only way I have found to establish these basic distinctions at a deep level.
The sentence encourages us to focus on each of the four parts of communication— formal observations, feelings, needs, and requests. Once these are fixed in your consciousness, then you can more easily use colloquial phrasing to create the connection between yourself and others that you are seeking. When you are firm in your intention of communicating based on getting your needs met, you might even use words that sound judgmental, yet you will be able to connect with others.
Perhaps it is because they are not yet clear in their intention. When you have the clear intention of connection, the words become the strategy to accomplish this. The particular words and their syntax become secondary. The central precept of Nonviolent Communication is to focus on connection between yourself and others, 30 nonviolent communication and out of that connection to fulfill your needs and the needs of others.
We often believe that if we can analyze a situation clearly, we will be able to get what we want. NVC suggests that it is only when we are connected to our own needs and the needs of others that we can cooperate to meet the needs of everyone.
The table on the following page identifies a number of basic feelings and needs, and might help you be more precise in expressing yourself. Now translate those judgments into observations. Write these down and share them with an empathy buddy: a friend who would be willing to give you empathy, and vice versa. You can be available to each other as needed, or you can speak regularly, either in person or by phone.
Write it down. Write them down. Remember, needs are universal, and they arise in us independently of others. It can be the same request or three different ones. Write down these requests, refine them according to the principles of NVC, and then ask them. See what happens. Without a technique such as Nonviolent Communication, these values and ideals can remain just that. While we may value dearly the ideas of satya and right speech, how can we live them in a way that brings us home to ourselves and creates the kind of world we want to live in?
Often when we are first learning NVC, we think it is about the literal language or specific words we use. Remember, first value connecting with yourself and then allow your internal shift.
Only then should you attempt to use NVC language. It is this internal shift of awareness and intention that allows speech to become a spiritual practice. When we struggle with NVC language, it may be a sign that we have not yet made this internal shift. Use the skills you have learned in your yoga or meditation practice, or just slow down and notice what is going on inside you.
Without this self-awareness, we forget that what we say is always about ourselves, especially about our feelings and needs, and is never about the other person, because whatever we say is coming out of our perception of what is. This is true even if the words we use sound like they are about or directed to the other person. Choice 1: Focus on Silent Self-Empathy Starting with yourself is important, especially when you are learning.
Most of us have been taught by culture and religion that focusing on ourselves is selfish and is always the worst choice.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Unless and until we are aware of what we are feeling and needing, we are unlikely to relate in a direct way with others. Unless we are clear in ourselves, our words create consequences karma for everyone that we will probably not enjoy.
Emotional DNA creates the patterns of thinking, believing, and acting that control our lives. By using the tool of self-empathy to become aware of what is arising in us, we can begin to be clear about the patterns of speech we have inherited. We then have the choice born of awareness, and we can begin to use language in a way that heals ourselves, our children, and the world.
To practice self-empathy, sit or lie comfortably in a quiet place, and recall something someone said to you today that caused a reaction in you. You may want to write down the interchange, to slow it down in your mind. Once you have the situation in mind, distill it down to one simple sentence that the other said to you.
Use observation language to start. Stay away from words such as messy, late, good, mean, and irritating; they are judgments because they imply evaluation. When you find the words that are true, you will know it. Confirmation that you have hit upon something that is alive in you is often experienced as a strong physical reaction.
It might be tears or a feeling of euphoria as you say the words to yourself. This energetic shift is the manifestation that you have connected with your deepest self. You have given yourself empathy for what is alive in you. Life is now serving life. There is something healing about naming what is going on inside you.
Finally, another way you will know that you have connected with yourself is that you will notice a curiosity about the other person, about what might have been going on with them when the communication happened, or what might be going on with them now.
Our advice is to persevere with silent self-empathy until this curiosity arises in you. It may take more than one session to arrive at this place of curiosity. This means that you state aloud to the other person what is going on with you. Do not fail to follow this self-expression with a clear, doable request. You will follow your self-expression with an immediate request, detailed below.
Here is where you make your request, which is detailed under the fourth communication choice. Make sure the whole interchange uses no more than thirty words. Using more words is likely to result in disconnection.
If so, give yourself self-empathy again and try once more. Remember, NVC is a practice like yoga and meditation and therefore requires lots of repetition. Your intention is not to get it right but to connect with yourself and with the person in front of you. It is this connection that holds the potential for changing the world. Choice 3: Focus on Giving Empathy The third choice, either to begin or to continue your communication process, is to focus on giving the other person empathy. This can either be silent empathy in your own heart or empathy spoken out loud.
Then I tried using silent empathy and was astounded by what happened. I learned that when I use silent empathy with the other person, a change happens.
But that change occurs in me. This is so because, in order to empathize silently with the other person, I have to empathize with myself first. In the beginning of my practice of Nonviolent Communication, silent selfempathy could take minutes, hours, or days. Now, with practice, I can sometimes feel the shift that comes 40 four communication choices with self-empathy in a matter of seconds, and then I can choose to give empathy to the other almost immediately.
I actually now experience self-empathy and empathy for the other as virtually the same process, like a continuum. Silent empathy for the other person also causes a change in my expression and body language that the other person picks up. This shift is sometimes palpable between us, and invariably when I shift, the other person senses it and shifts as well.
Ike and I are both continually amazed and pleased by how powerful it is to give the other person silent empathy. To give silent empathy is to intuit or guess what the other person might be feeling or needing in the moment.
Be sure to start with observation language. Rather, it is the process of considering the other person after having empathized with your own needs that fuels the shift. When you make this shift to compassion, you will have a greater potential to actually say what you want to say. The other empathic choice is to give empathy to the other person out loud. This intention reflects the spirit of satya, which is not just telling 41 what we say matters the truth but has inherent in it the desire to better the world.
The best way to learn empathic guessing is to do it. Give yourself silent empathy all day long when judgments arise, and then try it with others. And watch the magic happen! See the exercises at the end of the chapter for practice in offering empathic guessing. One important distinction to keep in mind when you are choosing empathy is the difference between empathy and sympathy. Empathy is focused on the other, on their feelings and needs. As a practice, notice when you use sympathy instead of using an empathetic guess.
One experience of giving empathy particularly stands out for me Ike. Our travels in Pakistan took us northwest, toward the Afghan border, near the Khyber Pass. We had to gain access to the camps from the head of security for all refugee camps for the 1.
Abdula Hafeez. His shift from skepticism to willingness did not occur until we spent the next ten minutes guessing what he was feeling and needing. Then, in one of the fastest shifts I have ever seen, he leaned forward on his desk and wrote out a pass to the camp, complete with two security officers detailed to us, instructions to the camp administrator that he was to accompany us at all times, and a message to be sent ahead to the camp to invite all the elders to meet with us.
We offered the training session for the leaders of the various tribes represented in the camp, which held 1, families who had fled the many years of violence in Afghanistan.
We had planned to teach the principles of NVC from day one, but there was so much pain being expressed that we could not move past giving empathy for the first two days. They were no longer living in their country, their children did not have many of the things we take for granted, and their future was unsettled, to say the least.
Instead of spending our time teaching, as we had planned, we found ourselves responding to the immediate pain and anguish in front of us, which was directly stimulated by us being American. This anguish 43 what we say matters was created in part by what the United States had done in Afghanistan—by leaving as soon as the Soviets had withdrawn and not following through with promises of support.
All the pain and suffering of nearly twentyfive years of turmoil and war boiled over in our interaction with these men. With each cycle of empathy, we could see plainly the wonder of empathic connection. When our guesses about their feelings and needs turned out to be true for them, the speakers would fall silent, their eyes would lower, and the other twenty-five or so men sitting on the floor around the room would murmur together in assent.
This would be followed by ten or twenty seconds of reflective silence without eye contact. We felt the empathic connection as a palpable entity. We went through tens of these cycles in the first two days alone. We learned once again that needs are universal and are part of all human beings, even when those needs are translated from English to Urdu to Pastho and then at times into Uzbek, Tajik, Turkmen, or Parsi, via ad hoc translations.
On the surface, our seeming differences of dress, life experiences, culture, education, and resources separated us, and yet, with the sharing of our feelings and needs, I saw beyond the differences to how we are all truly the same. These were men, just like me, who wanted to contribute to the well-being 44 four communication choices of their families and others, and who were distressed because they needed order and stability.
They wanted education for their children. They wanted to trust that commitments when made would be kept. They were longing for hope, hope for a world where, as one man put it, doctors would work as doctors, and engineers as engineers, and shopkeepers as shopkeepers, referring to so many who were instead working at manual labor.
At the beginning of the last day, a Friday, the Islamic holy day, one of the men invited us to join him in prayer at the mosque that afternoon. Immediately another man objected, saying that we could not go to the mosque because we were not Muslim. I did have some concern that our role play was about something as real and sensitive as nonbelievers at Islamic prayer services, but we decided to go ahead, since this was actually what had arisen in the group.
The invitation to the mosque became our example of conflict. With some coaching, the needs were identified. Those who wanted us to join them in prayer at the mosque needed understanding, connection, and education.
Those who objected needed respect for that which helped them make sense out of their world— their religion. Each side reflected back those needs to the other side. Yes, of course, seemed to be the response, we see how we all share these needs, and we can respect them in ourselves and others. The brainstorming for an actual strategy to meet the needs took only moments. In retrospect, our solution seemed simple, as they often do when each person feels heard.
We all agreed that the Westerners in the room who had not been raised in Islam would receive a fifteen- or twenty-minute explanation of the ceremony, and that they would sit outside the doors of the mosque and observe from there. Finally, they would be welcomed into the mosque at the completion of Friday afternoon prayers. Now they've packaged the most effective tactics into a four-step daily framework that anyone can use to systematically design their days. Make Time is not a one-size-fits-all formula.
Instead, it offers a customizable menu of bite-size tips and strategies that can be tailored to individual habits and lifestyles. Make Time isn't about productivity, or checking off more to-dos. Nor does it propose unrealistic solutions like throwing out your smartphone or swearing off social media. Making time isn't about radically overhauling your lifestyle; it's about making small shifts in your environment to liberate yourself from constant busyness and distraction.
A must-read for anyone who has ever thought, If only there were more hours in the day Jess has been in love with her best friend, Kate, for seven years, but her feelings have never been returned.
One night they sleep together, and Jess finds out how much it is possible to be hurt by someone close. Jess and Kate struggle to redefine their friendship. They spend a week at Jess's family holiday house in a small seaside town, Awatangi, intending to make the time to talk things through, but the conversations never happen.
Kate makes vague promises, but begins to have second thoughts. Jess wants Kate, and nothing else, and is heartbroken that isn't enough. Jess decides — while everything is changing in her life — that she doesn't want to go on living in the city, that she wants to return to Awatangi.
Part of her hopes some physical distance between them may help things with Kate, and part of her — frustrated and upset — simply wants to leave Kate behind. In Awatangi, Jess meets Keri, a local lawyer who has also recently returned home. Like Jess, Keri surfs, and like Jess, she seems to feel some attachment to her family roots in Awatangi. Jess is drawn to Keri, but forces herself not to let anything happen. Despite everything, Kate is still Jess's closest friend, and she has loved Kate all her life.
She feels she has to give the situation with Kate as long as she can to work itself out. Awatangi is about coping with feelings for a close friend that are not returned, set in a small holiday township on the West Coast of the South Island of New Zealand.
It is an exploration of getting what you've always wanted and it not being enough, of being in love with one person and wanting another, and of finding out that life doesn't always turn out as expected. The New York Times Bestseller! Learn how to keep your cool and get the results you want when emotions flare. When stakes are high, opinions vary, and emotions run strong, you have three choices: Avoid a crucial conversation and suffer the consequences; handle the conversation badly and suffer the consequences; or read Crucial Conversations and discover how to communicate best when it matters most.
Crucial Conversations gives you the tools you need to step up to life's most difficult and important conversations, say what's on your mind, and achieve the positive resolutions you want. You'll learn how to: Prepare for high-impact situations with a six-minute mastery technique Make it safe to talk about almost anything Be persuasive, not abrasive Keep listening when others blow up or clam up Turn crucial conversations into the action and results you want Whether they take place at work or at home, with your neighbors or your spouse, crucial conversations can have a profound impact on your career, your happiness, and your future.
With the skills you learn in this book, you'll never have to worry about the outcome of a crucial conversation again. Skip to content. What We Say Matters. Say What You Mean. You re Not Listening. You re Not Listening Book Review:. Yoga Abs. Yoga Abs Book Review:. Dialogue in the Digital Age.
Dialogue in the Digital Age Book Review:. Chatter Book Review:. What You Say Matters. Author : Herlene L. Talk Matters. Author : Mary V. Talk Matters Book Review:. Measure What Matters. Whether you are a Christian or not, if you struggle with impatience and anger while driving, this book is for you. It not only will make you a better driver but also, more importantly, may lead you to a much-closer relationship with God.
Drawing upon over twenty years of experience teaching college composition and professional writing, David S. Hogsette combines relevant writing pedagogy and practical assignments with the basics of critical thinking to provide students with step-by-step guides for successful academic writing in a variety of rhetorical modes. The Strategies covers necessary actions that you need to take to become more influential in any environment to move yourself and your people to greater contributions.
The Personal relates to the concepts that you must develop and hone to increase your influence. The Environment reinforces how you can exercise the strategies and personal factors in this leadership model through assessing the situations in which you find yourself.
Reflection questions in each chapter emphasize the importance of the process being discussed as a strategy for growth and to facilitate active reading. LL Alert! LL Lineup summaries at the end of each chapter help you create an action plan related to the chapter topic. Practical approach features straightforward, concise content that addresses only the most relevant information on the subject of each chapter. The Environment reinforces how you can exercise the strategies and personal factors in this model through assessing the situations in which you find yourself.
Clean up on Aisle 4! This read will cause you to first, take a hold of your thoughts, and second, cause you to taste your words before you serve them to someone else.
There are many challenges she faced: loss of parents, crippling disease, and more. Through her writing, you can take a ride down the path and hear the experiences of the hills and valleys that could have caused many words to be released from her, but with the help of the Holy Spirit, she chose a different course of action. Take a read and set your heart, mind, and mouth My prayer for every reader is to have a moment where their brain and senses come alive to the knowledge of the fact that our words carry weight.
Pickles Ph. Pickles, Ph. Pickles enjoys giving back to the community, closing achievement gaps, swimming, traveling, reading and spending time with family and friends. Now that the author drives her own company and priorities, she finally found the time to speak out through her writing. Internet Archive's 25th Anniversary Logo. Search icon An illustration of a magnifying glass.
User icon An illustration of a person's head and chest. Sign up Log in. Web icon An illustration of a computer application window Wayback Machine Texts icon An illustration of an open book.
0コメント