What is NVC?
“Peace requires something far more difficult than revenge or merely turning the other cheek; it requires empathizing with the fears and unmet needs that provide the impetus for people to attack each other. Being aware of these feelings and needs, people lose their desire to attack back because they can see the human ignorance leading to these attacks; instead, their goal becomes providing the empathic connection and education that will enable them to transcend their violence and engage in cooperative relationships.”
~ Marshall B. Rosenberg
Nonviolent Communication (or NVC) is a process that was developed by Marshall B. Rosenberg, Ph.D. in the 1960s. Across the world, NVC has been used to grow connection, compassion, and collaboration in homes, offices, hospitals, schools, and in communities coping with violence.
At the very core, NVC is grounded in the idea of universal human needs, and that everyone’s needs matter. For us at Living Bridges, this is how NVC connects naturally with social change, and we focus on supporting you to bring this idea into vision and action!
The NVC trainings and workshops offered by Living Bridges focus on clarifying the basics of the framework, deepening understanding, and growing into intensive work. Our NVC sessions are woven in with our social change modules, in order to bring in social awareness, to invite us to lead with empathy, vulnerability, kindness, and collaboration.
It is hard to separate meeting human needs from the needs of the environment: They are one and the same. Meeting the needs of all the phenomena on the planet... Life-enriching structures — the kind of structures that I would like to see us creating and participating in — are structures whose vision is to serve life.
What does NVC offer?
Awareness: NVC is oriented towards connection, and built on the foundation of principles that support compassion, collaboration, courage, and authenticity in different areas of one’s life
Repurposing Language: Our language shapes our consciousness. Our words can contribute to connection or disconnection. Through four simple steps, NVC shifts the focus on our words from diagnosis and “getting things done”, towards connection, and making life wonderful.
Communicating with Care: The four steps can be used in three movements towards greater connection: towards self connection, towards empathy, and towards expression of what we want. We can communicate with care and willingness to move toward solutions that work for everyone.
Shared Power: NVC helps us share power with overs, rather than power over them. This principle can be woven into systems, professionally, socially, and politically, to actively contribute to a world that works for everyone.
