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In this brief video, CNVC Certified Trainer and Inner Relationship Focusing Guide and teacher, Gina Cenciose, teaches that our inner relationship is the basis for both Focusing and NVC work.

Bask in this telecourse recording with Kathleen Macferran and explore ways to nurture and maintain greater depths of joy by focusing on gratitude.  The reward?  To increase your ability to live fully present to the joy in life, even in the midst of pain.

Listen to the Universe is a fun group exercise to explore how we focus our attention and interpret what we experience.

I want to hear others through the lens of the meaning their actions have for them rather than through the effect their actions have on me. The very root of empathy resides in this fundamental shift. Whenever someone’s actions are at odds with our own needs, most of us, most of the time, do the latter. In that way, we keep our attention on ourselves rather than on the other person. We cannot be in empathy when we are focused on how things affect us. Miki Kashtan poignantly shares about the challenges of empathizing with another when we really don't understand their actions.

Trainer Tip: The question is not what other people think of you, but what you think of yourself. Who are you, really? Take a moment to consider what you value.

Who does not want to be understood? In Tip #6, Eric shows you how to deepen connection and trust by checking your understanding with the person you are conversing with.

For many, the word “need” is associated with lack, neediness, and scarcity. These associations are the opposite of the meaning of needs in Nonviolent Communication (NVC). In NVC, needs are the motivational energy of our innate wholeness and desire to grow, like the energy of a plant pushing it up through the soil and toward the sun.

The focus on patriarchy emerges from the understanding that patriarchy plays a foundational role in everything. Yes, I mean it: everything. Patriarchy is not the same as sexism; patriarchy is to sexism very much what structural racism is to (interpersonal) racism: it's a system that runs independently of any one person's attitudes or behaviors. Join Miki for her first in a series of discussions on patriarchy.

Eric offers some tips for nurturing and affirming ourselves as a daily practice.

Trainer Tip: One of the basic philosophies of Nonviolent Communication is valuing everyone’s needs equally. That means that you consider your needs to be equal to another person’s needs. If someone asks you for empathy, and you choose to empathize at you own expense, you're not living in a Nonviolent Communication consciousness. Be aware of your own needs today when someone asks you to be their emotional support.