I had a draft of a blog post from mid October that started, “It has been A WEEK!” I don’t think that post got saved, and when I refreshed the browser it disappeared, which is just as well, because, little did I know, I was in for EVEN MORE the next week. Hahahaha waaaaahh….
It has been A MONTH. And by that I mean a challenging month. And, as seems to be the case with most challenging times, it felt like it came out of nowhere and I was not prepared for it. Rehashing the details doesn’t serve anybody, but I can probably summarize by saying that there was something that happened that hit a few of my big triggers simultaneously and I spiraled into a place of fear and shame and self-judgment and blame. And it involved more people than just David and I, which made it feel all the bigger and stickier and scarier. Whew. To be completely honest, I’m still unpacking some of the things that came up for me during that time. Yesterday I realized how unsorted I still feel. Like I’ve had lots of realizations about myself and epiphanies about things that get in my way of living the life I want, but it’s not like epiphanies automatically transform into new habits, or that wanting to change something or exist differently in the world magically helps me find the skills I need to develop.
But there is one very useful skill framework that did come out of the whole situation, and we owe our discovery of it to a member of our book club who mentioned it in passing. During one discussion she mentioned how something used to be an issue for her but really wasn’t since she learned nonviolent communication. I made a note of that phrase in my phone, and it also sparked something in David. Later (during a heated discussion during the two weeks of emotional upset) it came to him again, because he had the sense that the words I was using felt very much to him like he was being hit. They felt violent. Suddenly he felt like, yes, if there is violent communication, there must be nonviolent communication. And shortly after we got to a small bit of resolution with that discussion, he went and started googling. What he found has been transformative. Or at least it has planted seeds of transformation. It is fascinating to be exposed to a framework and immediately see its beauty and power, but know that you are going to have quite the journey ahead of you to be able to put it into practice in your life and reap the benefits.
For those unfamiliar with Nonviolent Communication (NVC), a brief overview:
People have needs.
People have feelings that come up as a result of having those needs met or having them not met.
Most people are not aware of their own needs, and therefore feel like their feelings come as a result of the actions or inactions of others.
The way people handle and voice these feelings usually comes across in a way that is unlikely to help others want to meet those needs.
This is sad, because honestly, most people want to Help Make Life Wonderful for others.
If people can see their own needs and the needs of others, communication can help find ways to meet everybody’s needs.
The first thing to be clear on is what is defined as a need. This page does a great overview http://www.compassionateinteractions.com/needs.php
But the larger categories are Connection, Physical Well-Being, Honesty, Play, Peace, Autonomy, and Meaning.
NVC really has so much depth to it that it’s hard to give it an adequate treatment in this blog post, but I will link a few resources at the end of the post for you to check out.
A key point in Nonviolent Communication is that two types of violent communication that we are trained in from our earliest days are Moralistic Judgment and Comparison. Marshall Rosenberg, the father of NVC, makes the point that NVC doesn’t really accept the verb “to be,” because no one IS anything. All statements of the sort, such as “I am stupid,” “He is a jerk,” “You are selfish,” imply moralistic judgment which is unhelpful and useless because all such judgments would require a position of omniscience which none of us have. Instead it is a judgment made by a person who has a limited reference point about someone else, or themselves. This is a violent mode of communication, and a violent mode of thinking. Comparisons are the other one, because just as we don’t have the omniscience to know what all the factors are at play behind a person’s behaviors, we don’t have some sort of spectrum of Ultimate Human with which to effectively compare two or more humans. To quote one of my favorite lines from The Courage to Be Disliked, “There is no such thing as a 100 percent human.” Rather than comparing people against others, or judging ourselves against some idealized human in our minds, we instead should strive to see the uniqueness of each individual person. Our culture of comparison is violent because it posits that it is meaningful in some way to compare people across different gradients. It absolutely is not. But we’ve collectively bought into the lie that it is.
One idea that really jumped out to me was how often we use violent communication with ourselves, in our own thoughts. When we have a challenging feeling come up, how quickly do we judge ourselves for that feeling, rather than seeing it as a clue as to what might be going on with us. Looking for the unmet need that sparked the feeling is such a compassionate approach. It so often results in a feeling of, “Of course you would feel that way,” instead of “What’s wrong with you?”
Rosenberg points out that a society of people who are in touch with their needs is a tough one to exploit, because fear is not an effective tactic with them. He makes the case that our history of Judeo-Christian religion combined with authoritarian governments (kings and emperors) shaped so much of our language and worldview that we don’t even recognize the violence we inflict upon ourselves. One has to look completely outside of Western society to find alternative strategies of communication and thought frameworks. We are instead raised to do our duty, respect authority, and that “needs” such as those outlined are meaningless or weak. He encourages everyone to tune in to themselves and frequently ask “What is alive in me at this moment?” And then to see what we need.
Listening to him talk about this in one of the workshops I watched, I couldn’t help but think of the pretty recent practice I’ve tried to do, which is to ask myself what would feel good to do now. Last year I realized how much of my life I spent beating myself with the stick of “should.” “I should get the laundry done today. I should clean this room. I should spend more time doing X. I should go to the gym today.” Blech. A good friend mentioned that we are better served when we replace should with could. It reminds us that we always have a choice. As I started to practice this, I was honestly amazed at what a shift it was. “I could get the laundry done today,” has so much more kindness and room for possibility and my own mood than “I should get the laundry done today.” And if I choose to do the laundry, whoo hoo. And if I don’t, I don’t have to feel that bad, because it was just one option out of many. I don’t know if this will resonate with others as much, but for me it has been a game changer. Out of this practice grew another practice of asking myself what I wanted, based on how I was feeling. I pause to check in. Huh, how do I feel? Hm, it seems like I feel a little low energy. Maybe a walk or reading a bit from an uplifting book or maybe reaching out to a friend would help. Oh, am I feeling a little sleepy? Do I think caffeine or a short nap or moving my body would help? I think I’m hungry. Does my body want something nutritious or does it want something that just tastes good? Connecting with my body and my emotions in this way has been so nourishing. I think it will be really helpful to me as I continue to learn more about and practice NVC. We really don’t have to live cut off from ourselves. It’s okay to have needs. And desires. Those things are part of What Can Make Life Beautiful.
RESOURCES
https://youtu.be/l7TONauJGfc?si=NjhJQgJFkdtFJSOX 3 hour workshop by Marshall Rosenberg. Really good information.
https://youtu.be/jCbxAMgfkkM?si=ls47-vLC1GRXFbs2 TED Talk about some key NVC ideas.
Language of Life - Nonviolent Communication Podcast with Nate Guadagni
https://www.cnvc.org/about/cnvc/purpose-of-nvc Overview of NVC from the Center for Nonviolent Communication
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