Non-Violent Communication

Table of Contents

Nonviolent Communication (abbreviated NVC, also called Compassionate Communication or Collaborative Communication) is an approach to nonviolent living developed by Marshall Rosenberg beginning in the 1960s.

At its heart it is a belief that all human beings have capacity for compassion and empathy and that we only resort to violence or behavior harmful to others when we do not recognize more effective strategies for meeting needs.

Habits of thinking and speaking leading to use of violence (social, psychological and physical) are learned through culture.

NVC theory supposes all human behavior stems from attempts to meet universal human needs.

The needs are never in conflict.

Rather, conflict arises when strategies for meeting needs clash.

NVC proposes people identify shared needs, revealed by the thoughts and feelings surrounding these needs, and collaborate to develop strategies and make requests of each other to meet each other's needs.

The result is interpersonal harmony and learning for future cooperation.

NVC supports change on three interconnected levels: within self, between others, and within groups and social systems.

NVC greatest impact has been in personal development, relationships, and social change.

NVC is ostensibly taught as a process of interpersonal communication designed to improve compassionate connection to others.

Bullet Summary

  • Leverage compassion both in interpersonal and internal communication
  • Express how you feel with “I” statements instead of “you”
  • Voice your needs and requests both non-offensively but clearly
  • Look for win-win and full satisfaction instead of compromise

Full Summary

Communication is a major part of everyday life and of our relationship. If we want to function well with people, we need to learn to communicate effectively.

Avoid These Violent Communication:

  • Moral judgement (insult, criticism, labels)
  • Judgmental words
  • Demands (you must)
  • Comparisons (violent)
  • Accusatory words

The words we use impact the way we behave. O.J. Harvey studies the world literature looking for how often word depicting people as “good” or “bad” would come up. He found out that countries with a larger usage of bad words also had more incidents.

My Note: This doesn’t say much however. Correlation is not causation and it might as well be that more violence leads to more negative words and not the opposite.

Labels for example impair our observation skills because they imply a judgment (ie.: “liberal” or “conservative”).

Nonviolent Communication

The goal of nonviolent communication, or NVC, is to help us communicate our feelings clearly by observing objectively, identify feelings and communicate with compassion.

  • Observations
  • Feelings
  • Need
  • Request

Imagine as an example that you son left his toys all across the floor. You would not start yelling at him right away. Instead, first you observe the situation; then you ask yourself how it makes you feel (angry, frustrated, worried for the family’s safety?); next you identify what need you have (clean house, safe environment?); finally you ponder for a second what’s the best way to voice your request in a way that influence them without hurting them.

For example:

Son, when I see your toys spread across the kitchen’s floor I feel frustrated because I need our house to be clean and safe.
Do you think you can pick up your toys and take them to your room when you are done playing?

Starting with “I” instead of “you” is a staple of communication manuals.

Observation Without Evaluation

Observing without evaluating is one of the keys of nonviolent communication and one of the most difficult steps to master.

For example the phrase: “Mark always comes late at work” already implies an evaluation. Rephrasing it in a way that is object would say: “Mark does not arrive before 9am”.

Another example even more relevant for relationships would be:

You never to listen when I speak to you

Instead it’s better to be specific:

The last two times I tried to talk to you about it you left the room

What to You Want

The author talks about creators and victims, which is basically the internal vs external locus of control.

You go from victim to creator by asking what do you want

Take Responsibility

Taking responsibility means that you don’t blame anyone else for your own feelings.

What someone does is a stimulus but it’s never the cause of our response. Our response is up to us, and our overall emotional well being is up to us.

Also read:

  • Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
  • The Obstacle is The Way

Example

Imagine that someone tells you:

You are the most selfish person I met

Sounds harsh, right?

There are a few ways people normally react to strong accusations:

Change self-narrative, blame themselves and feel depressed
Get angry or defensive, lash out and blames back

A better reaction though would be to walk through you own feelings and verbalize them. For example:

I feel offended and dejected when you say that because I have really been trying to take your needs into account

This response will clarify your own feelings and get you more easily down the road of resolution.

The last and best option of them all would be to put your ego aside and ask for clarification:

OK. What makes you say that. Do you think I’m selfish for something specific that I have done?

And later you can add:

How do you think I could show more consideration for you and your needs

When you use this type of communication you will often find out that people will self-soothe and calm down because they feel heard and understood.

Communicating Needs

Marshall Rosenberg says that many of us are not skilled at communicating our own emotions and needs.

That leads people to passive aggression and grow anger and resentment.

The best you can do, both for yourself and the people around you, is to communicate as directly as possible. Voicing the Request

Similar to communicating our needs, voicing our request should be done as directly as possible.

The author says that a great way to be cause less defensiveness as possible in the listener is to communicate what you want them to do instead of what you want to stop doing.

Positive language also helps to make your needs clearer. For example if a wife tells his husband not to spend too much time at work, he might not be sure what she means. Does it means he is stressing himself too much or that she wants him to spend more time at home with her? Positive language avoids misunderstandings. Nonviolent Communication For Self Talk

Marshall Rosenberg says that can use nonviolent communication to talk to ourselves as well.

Way too often indeed we label ourselves negatively and we are way too harsh. Instead, the next time you are being judgmental towards yourself, focus on your unmet needs. Listening Well

To listen well Nonviolent Communication recommends the following:

  • Listen empathically (try to feel what they feel)
  • Don’t try to cheer them up
  • Don’t offer immediate solutions or advice
  • Ask question
  • Repeat their last words (it will lead them to expand and clarify)
  • Paraphrase what they said to make sure you understand

What is Nonviolent Communication™?

"Nonviolent Communication shows us a way of being very honest, without any criticism, insults, or put-downs, and without any intellectual diagnosis implying wrongness.”

Nonviolent Communication — also known as NVC and often called “compassionate communication” — helps you create the high quality of connection out of which people naturally enjoy contributing to one another’s well-being.

Dr. Marshall B. Rosenberg, Ph.D., travelled the world over for nearly 50 years teaching what Nonviolent Communication is by training people and mediating conflicts. He said that all over the world, in every culture, people are playing one of two games. One of those games was called "who is right and who is wrong?" The other game is called, "How can I make life more wonderful?"

When people experience a high quality of connection, they naturally want to play the latter of the two, and spontaneously feel motivated to create mutually beneficial outcomes.

When we feel connected we can enter into relationships of "power-with" rather than "power-over" — and we can use our Nonviolent Communication skills to facilitate the mutual understanding that can take us to win-win outcomes. Sometimes, the easiest way to understand what Nonviolent Communication is, is to take a look at what it isn’t….

What is Violent Communication?

Violent communication is what Dr. Rosenberg referred to as "life-disconnected, life-alienated thinking and language." It is precisely this way of thinking and speaking that takes us away from the quality of connection for which we are looking.

Violent communication can be seen as the opposite of what Nonviolent Communication is, because it is based on judgment, criticism, labeling and pigeon-holing others, avoiding responsibility and blaming, placing demands, threatening, and having rigid concepts of rightness and wrongness.

Violent communication uses static language — in other words, the verb "to be" — in order to know who is what and especially who is right and who is wrong, so that then we know who deserves to be rewarded and punished! Nonviolent Communication, on the other hand, is a process language which teaches you to be in the moment and connect with the deeper values and needs driving people's words and behavior rather than any intellectual diagnosis of "wrongness."

NVC teaches you how to speak your truth or share your perspective in a way that is most likely to lead to harmony than conflict. And it teaches you how to be in the face of uncomfortable statements — like blame, judgment, criticism, or a verbal attack — and listen for the values and needs behind the statement. As a result you are less defensive, are able to stand in a more compassionate place, and are much more likely to defuse any potential conflict.

Keep reading if you want to learn more about Nonviolent Communication (NVC), and how you can apply it in the important relationships in your life.

The Nonviolent Communication Model

The Nonviolent Communication model is the symbiotic integration of four main components:

  • Consciousness - A set of principles and perspectives that support living a life of compassion, collaboration, courage, and authenticity both within ourselves and in our interactions with family, friends, coworkers, or anyone else with whom we might interact;
  • Language - Understanding how our words, as well as the words of others contribute to either connection or distance, helping or hurting, compromise or conquest in an interaction or situation;
  • Communication - Knowing how to ask for what we want without threatening, demanding or coercing, how to hear others (even in the course of a disagreement) without absorbing self-criticism or blame, and how to move toward mutually beneficial and positive outcomes for all parties involved in an interaction or situation;
  • Means of Influence - Learning how to share our power with others instead of using our power over others, in order to facilitate an environment where all parties feel equally honored, valued, respected, and safe.

The Nonviolent Communication model can be effectively employed to enrich and nurture parenting & familial relations, friendships & relationships, workplace interactions, the educational process, and any other situation in which we interact with others. Using the Nonviolent Communication model in our everyday lives can help facilitate an empathic and supportive emotional environment for ourselves and those we value.

Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life by Marshall Rosenberg Ph.D.

"Human beings have enormous power to enrich life. We can use words to contribute to people’s enjoyment, their wisdom. We can use words that can make life miserable for people. So our words are very powerful. We can touch people in ways that give great pleasure, great nurturing, support. We are powerhouses, and there’s nothing we enjoy doing more than to use that power we have to enrich lives. So isn’t it wonderful that we have this power and the joy it brings when we use it? That’s to be celebrated. Wow! And the more we celebrate that, the less we will be willing to do anything else."

  • Marshall B. Rosenberg, Ph.D.

Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life by Marshall Rosenberg Ph.D. is the final literary offering from the visionary peacemaker who ushered in the compassionate communication movement worldwide. This bestselling book has sold over one million copies and has been translated into over 30 languages to date. Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life, is chock-full of engaging stories, tangible examples, and anecdotal information about the core components of the compassionate communication process and its effect on human consciousness. You can purchase a copy of Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life, by Marshall Rosenberg Ph.D., in our webstore as well as other works of literature that can help you construct the framework for healthy, happy, and safe communication in your life and the lives of others.

The Nonviolent Communication Process

Any communication model has at least two parts: speaking and listening, also known as giving and receiving. In NVC we call these "honesty" and "empathy."

The Nonviolent Communication process consists of four components. Each of these four falls under empathy (how I listen) as well as under honesty (authentic and genuine self-expression). Because communication involves your own as well as the other person's perception, worldview, and interpretations, we use honesty and empathy to create a "dance of connection" — in which we use our Nonviolent Communication skills to exchange the information necessary to both feel more connected and bring about outcomes that are mutually beneficial.

The four components of the Nonviolent Communication process are:

  • Observations - How your perceptual observations and the observations of others — the neutral facts — provide a foundation to know what are we talking about — and eliminate confusion about the particular stimulus in any given situation or interaction;
  • Feelings - The information our body and mind give us regarding whether our values and needs are fulfilled in a given interaction. They provide a powerful point of connection to help us understand another's experience, or communicate our own;
  • Needs - Universal Human Needs also known as core human motivators; when you distill any conflict to the level of Universal Human Needs, now people can see each others' humanity which begins the healing and reconciliation process and provides a solid foundation for win-win solutions;
  • Requests - Taking responsibility for what we actually want by expressing a request rather than a demand. Hearing another's request as such, and knowing that we still have choice.