feelings over judgments
To communicate nonviolently, we need to clearly communicate our feelings, rather than our judgments. Maturity means differentiating our feelings and experiences into as many parts and distinctions as a well-trained orchestral listener. “I feel that” or “I feel when” is expressing an opinion, rather than a feeling. Even “I feel inadequate” would be better expressed as “I feel disappointed with my performance…” “I feel good about …” is not specific enough.
We always want to connect the emotion we feel to a universal need, as well as a request. We need to take responsibility for our feelings, despite any connection to a cause. “I’m feeling _____ because I…” is how we should express our feelings and connect them to a need. Diagnoses and moralistic judgments are alienated expressions of our needs, and often lead to self-fulfilling prophecies. When someone says “You’re working late too often. You love your work more than me,” that means they need more time with you, and they’re attempting to communicate that.
needs over strategies
Needs contain no reference to specific people taking specific actions. Needs are universal. Here are some universal needs:
- sustenance
- safety
- empathy (human understanding)
- honesty, clarity, trust
- play
- rest
- love
- community
- autonomy
- meaning and purpose (he calls this the need to contribute to life)
Women are taught that they need to sacrifice their needs, and men are taught that they should have no needs. We should have a Santa Claus attitude about our needs: see them as a gift to the other person, an opportunity to help you.
Rosenberg discusses three stages of emotional liberation:
- emotional slavery: we feel responsible for others’ feelings, at the expense of our own.
- When we become aware of our right to share our needs, we reach an obnoxious stage where we become too willing to express our own needs and we leave the responsibility for others’ needs to them. We think emotional liberation means trumping our needs above those of others.
- In real emotional liberation, we respond to the needs of others out of compassion, not our of fear, guilt or shame, without suppressing our own needs. It becomes fulfilling to do what others want, and we express our own needs with the Santa Claus attitude.
“I am sad you came home late because I was hoping to spend the evening together” does not express a need, but a strategy. “I need connection and intimacy.”
requests over demands
Demands threaten autonomy, while requests are opportunities to serve life. It’s important to frame requests in the positive: we say what we do want, rather than what we don’t want. It’s a good idea to confirm with the person that they understood what you said, and when they’re wrong say “thanks, I think I didn’t say it clearly enough.”
Meetings can often be a waste of time because it’s hard to get clear about what someone’s goal is with a discussion. It can be useful to ask “What response were you hoping to get from the group on this?” That invites people to become clearer with their requests.