Reader and Holistic Health Coach Cara Graver introduces Non-Violent Communication into the discussion of the cleansing process we’re going through pre-Ascension.
Nonviolence and Compassion
Cara Graver, October 23, 2018
As we all navigate these times of turbulence, confusion, change and imbalance, old wounds pop up, often triggered by events or encounters in daily life. Some call them vasanas; others just react to them as if the original trauma was happening again now and fall victim to repetition.
Marshall Rosenberg Phd., early in the 1970s, developed a process he called Nonviolent Communication (NVC) and now also referred to as Compassionate Communication. Using this process can turn our triggers into doorways of healing.
The practice is simple. It takes us on a direct path via our wiser self rather than our reptile responder, to understanding instead of drama looping.
There are 5 steps but the first three will bring significant results.
When triggered by something start by:
1. Observe what we saw or heard, not to be confused evaluating, blaming or judging the stimulus, which immediately puts us into story.
2. Notice the actual Feelings* that arise. Not the thoughts, that try to derail us into story. When we get connected with those feelings we know that they are the messengers, that point the way to our actual needs in the situation.
3. Find the unmet Needs* that triggered those feelings. Once we can identify our unmet needs (not the person or event) which stimulated those feelings we can develop a strategy for meeting those needs that serves our highest good.
*When beginning to learn NVC and even for long afterwards it is really helpful to consult lists of Feelings and Universal Needs. We haven’t been educated to have much fluency in those areas. Look on the internet for NVC lists of Feelings and Needs, they’re easy to find.
As you look at the lists and realize you get to have all those feelings and all those needs, check out the feeling that comes over you. Mostly our troublesome interactions assume we can’t get our needs met unless we use the old standbys, some form of blame, demand and manipulation.
No worries. These are just the cultural habits we’ve been educated with. And now we get to take the direct path through clear thinking rather than the old path through our fight or flight responses.
For example: When I come home from a day at my new job and I start to tell my boyfriend about it, I feel excited, I am able to share my experience. But as I’m talking I see my boyfriend take out his phone and start to do something with it.
I feel annoyed, sad, lonely and upset, so I start to tell myself the story that he obviously doesn’t care enough about me to listen and that makes me think of the “fact” that as a child I was always less important than the other kids in my family. So I huff off to take a shower. But while in the shower I reflect on what just happened and I think of the NVC approach to the event and realize that I went into story and judgment rather than observing what I heard/saw, felt and needed. So I set about to consider how I could better get those needs met and stay connected to my boyfriend.
After the shower I tell him that I was really excited to share the events of my first day on my new job and when I saw him take out his phone and start to do something with it I felt disappointed because I had a need for connection and sharing and I thought he didn’t care.
I ask what he experienced (for clarity). And (this is the real report from the real client) he said something to the effect of, “Oh I am so sorry I didn’t realize that might seem like I was not listening -You wanted to be sure you had my full attention and really wanted to share something important to you.”
The cornerstone of NVC is clear thinking as compared to giving our minds over to the reptile brain. The result of starting with an observation then going to the feelings and then the needs is that we stay out of the habit of blame, demand and manipulation.
Those strategies neither get us what we want nor give us the connection that we need with ourselves and others. Connecting with our feelings lets us know what unmet need triggered the feeling and when we know what we need we can think about how to get that need met.
The above example is only one type of outcome. Another is that that person or situation we’re in cannot meet our need, but we still get to figure out another strategy for meeting it.
The point of using these Universal Needs is to remind us that we are all, at all times, just trying to get our needs met and it is not our needs that are in conflict but the strategies we use for getting them met.
The very first benefit from following these steps is that simple realization that we get to have all these feelings and needs, they belong to us and they are there for our benefit, not at all like the convoluted contortions of blame, demand and manipulation that pit one of us against the other.
These days as humans in a world of turmoil and suffering we may have needs for security, safety, peace, ease, love, dignity, autonomy, effectiveness, etc… We may be looking to an individual or system that cannot meet those needs but we can be creative and think of how else we get those needs met and how to connect with those or new strategies instead.
My offering here is only a small taste of NVC. The internet is a source for a multitude of ways to learn more about this process, there are online courses, feelings and needs lists (because our vocabularies for those are pretty small), plus other resources, Youtube videos, of Marshall Rosenberg as well as many others he inspired, presenting a wide variety of supportive learning.
Information about the Author
Cara Graver is a Holistic Health Coach, potter and Cob Builder living in Pennsylvania.