Search the NVC Library

Miki Kashtan helps a mother restore connection with her daughter after a painful conflict.

Learn how Nonviolent Communication (NVC) can improve the quality of your personal and professional relationships, one interaction at a time.

How we choose to communicate can either open or shut down connection. We express ourselves through our bodies, so no matter how ‘nicely’ we offer words, if they are not aligned with our energy, they won’t be congruent. This session will offer simple yet powerful tools to connect to your needs and others' needs, allowing more authentic words that are imbued with care.

How do we live each and every day from the “living energy of needs” – with the unimpeded fullness of life’s energies flowing through us, regardless of the conflicts or life circumstances we may be experiencing? Through developing deep self-compassion. How can we experience our inner world from a place of utter and total compassion? When we practice compassionate self-care, we create an inner spaciousness that allows our life’s energies to flow. In that spaciousness both healing and inner transformation occurs. Robert’s work explores the interweaving of two co-intentions—to live life from the fullness of the “beauty of needs” and to approach every experience with deep compassion.

Trainer tip: Notice how the exact same actions can stimulate different feelings depending on if your needs are met or unmet. So while what people say or do is the stimulus, the actual cause of our feelings comes from our met or unmet needs. Read on for more on this.

Trainer tip: Empathy can offer profound learning opportunities to children, expand their feelings and needs vocabulary, and teach them the positive results of valuing everyone’s needs. Read on for a story that illustrates this.

Trainer Tip: Even when it's tempting to coerce or match might with might, we can strive to meet our needs without negatively affecting others. Instead of convincing anyone to do it our way or to value the same things we value, we can focus on what we value: compassion among people and valuing everyone’s needs. By doing this we are actually more likely to meet our own needs and we are better able to live peacefully.

Eric explains how we can often avoid regret by getting empathy before making important decisions.

Trainer Tip: If you are feeling anger, you are experiencing an unmet need. When you recognize it as a warning signal, it can be a life-serving tool.

Trainer Tip: Commit to doing one thing right now that will bring you closer to meeting a need today. Do it today. Don’t put it off. This is your life.

Have you ever said 'I'm Sorry' to someone, only for it to leave you feeling disappointed and lacking connection? In some cultures, saying 'I'm sorry' has become too easy and is used for all sorts of situations. Whether it's just to excuse yourself as you pass in front of someone taking a photo, or if you've truly hurt a close friend. So when we really need to communicate regret, how can we do so in a way that acknowledges the situation and the connection?

With this exercise you'll choose an experience you had with someone where your needs were not met. You'll work with the related feelings, judgements, values, and feeling the fullness of the need even though it was not met, plus any sadness that may arise.

Here's a four step exercise applying a needs-based approach to effective goals, habits and New Year's Resolutions.

How can you remember to use the skills and consciousness of NVC in the heat of the moment? 

Jim and Jori Manske will show you how in these recordings from their 2018 course!

They teach that when and how you address the conflicts that emerge in your everyday life matters! By slowing down and considering the state of your resources before engaging in a conflict, you increase the likelihood of discovering a solution that dissolves separateness and enhances the connection and compassion you long for.

We all love to contribute to others’ lives. We love to offer support because it meets our own needs for contribution, love, caring, and making a difference. For today, admit that you love to support other people, and that you would like support yourself. Let at least one person contribute to your life today. Read on for a related story.

Trainer Tip: When considering your "deal breakers" consider what you want from a relationship rather than how it will look. For instance, maybe my need for abundance can be met by someone who is independently wealthy, so he doesn’t have to “have a good job”. When you shift your focus from strategies to needs, you may be pleasantly surprised what the universe brings. Read on for more.

Trainer tip: When you tell yourself that you have to do something, you're more likely to disconnect yourself from the needs you’re trying to meet, and also diminish the joy in your life. Instead, experiment with translating your “shoulds” and “have tos” into the need you are trying to meet.

Trainer Tip: In a Compassionate Communication process, we believe there are enough resources in the Universe to meet all of our needs. Most people are stumped because they can only see one strategy for meeting a need. Identify one need that you would like to experience more of and make a list of at least five strategies for meeting it today.

Our world trains us to think in terms of providing for everyone’s needs because they deserve it, earned it, or they possess the resources -- it's fair, socially just, supports equality or because people have rights. Instead, can we step outside this worldview to look at providing for everyone’s needs because those needs exist -- can we hold this basic reverence for life? Are we able to have a needs-based dialogue when such a reframe could alienate those who live in the worldview of earn/deserve?