Requesting that Which Enriches Life – NVC Week 6
Six chapters in – hooray!
If you’re following along or just joining us, we’re working through Marshall Rosenberg’s book, Nonviolent Communication, and Lucy Leu’s companion Workbook . We’re doing this as part of our homeschool curriculum and we welcome your thoughts and companionship on our journey.
We’ve been taking it slow; well technically, I’ve just been lax about posting out updates. We’re doing week 7 and have been for a couple of weeks – I’m just now getting around to posting about week 6. In any case, I haven’t forgotten about this project and am quite pleased with myself for following through with it (even if it is taking longer than originally planned).
In any case, week 6 is all about asking for what you need. In NVC, that means identifying what it is that you feel first and then being able to ask for it. As we’re going along, I am noticing a tendency among certain members fo our family to sound rather condescending when making requests. It’s very hard to have a sarcastic personality *and* sound sincere a lot of the time. This has always been a problem between Loverly Husband and myself; compliments that are utterly sincere sometimes have to have a ‘note of sincerity’ attached to them in order to be taken seriously. Adding NVC to this mix has been… interesting.
I’m also a pretty demanding person in general – as a friend, as a wife, as a mother – I expect certain things from my friends and family and I expect that those expectations will be met. I’m working on it and again, trying to work on not being a demanding shrew AND factoring in NVC without feeling like I am lowering my standards is difficult.
I will say that being in the same place with my kids as far as being new to and learning this method of communication; being able to say to them, “I am trying to use NVC and am having a hard time with expressing myself’ is a tremendous help. It’s almost like being able to call a time-out in the middle of a conversation. It helps them realize that I’m not perfect, that I am struggling just as much as they sometimes are. Saying something like that automatically puts us on the same, inexperienced team and reminds us all, in that moment, that we’re working towards the same goal. If we take nothing else away from this experiment, that one thing is worth its weight in gold.
That said, this week’s lesson and focus on asking for what you need has been interesting and somewhat easier than the previous couple of weeks. Asking for something first requires that you know what it is that you need to begin with. These concepts are building on one another and being more familiar with one concept makes the next one easier. Being able to identify what you’re feeling (week 4) and then taking responsibility for them (week 5) and now asking for something to meet the need all works hand-in-hand.
If you’re following along, some of the discussion questions from Chapter 6 are:
What constitutes ‘request’ in NVC? How can we test whether it is a request or a demand?
How do expressing requests via vague/abstract language vs. expressing feelings gain different results?
Why do we sometimes hear a demand when someone makes a request?
What is reflecting? How does reflecting help?
Practice:
How can we strengthen our consciousness of what we want back when we talk to others?
If you’re reading along with us, I’d love to hear from you!
Have a great weekend!
Warmly,
~h
(Disclaimer: This is not a certified or ‘official’ NVC anything. This is my personal journey through Marshall Rosenberg’s book, Nonviolent Communication, and Lucy Leu’s NVC Companion Workbook. I am NOT an expert, nor am I particularly skilled in this process. Please use/follow/apply with those things in mind. When in doubt, please disregard my commentary and refer to the book or workbook. I make no money off of this exercise, nor is any copyright infringement meant by posting a sampling of the questions from the workbook. For best results, I strongly recommend that you purchase the book and workbook for yourself and go through them in their entirety at your leisure.)
Taking Responsibility for Our Feelings – NVC Week 5
It’s been a few weeks since I’ve updated this section, but we’re still plugging along. I have said it before, and it still holds true; learning this stuff (though totally worth it) is hard if it hasn’t been your normal pattern of communication. I do have one slight mama-brag for today though; today wasn’t one of our greatest, but we made it through and are enjoying a relatively peaceful evening.
At one point, PeaGreen was struggling to find the right way to phrase something and finally said that he was trying to say it in NVC and couldn’t – so I at least know that they’re thinking about it even when we’re not sitting there with the book open! That makes me happy, and it’s this kind of slow, but steady progress that keeps me thinking that this is working; that studying and practicing NVC is worth spending our time on.
If you’re following along or just joining us, we’re working through Marshall Rosenberg’s book, Nonviolent Communication, and Lucy Leu’s companion Workbook . We’re doing this as part of our homeschool curriculum and we welcome your thoughts and companionship on our journey.
I’ll be honest; I am not happy with this weeks’ lesson. I say ‘week’; I mean ‘few weeks’ – a month, nearly. We’ve taken a while to go through this chapter. That’s a lot of self-awareness to handle at one time – a lot of thinking and really connecting with the ‘how’ and ‘why’ of your emotions and responses. When that’s not your normal thought-process, it’s really difficult and time-consuming. One can assume that this gets easier with time and practice, but WOW to the first few months of really understanding and attempting to put into practice this type of self-aware communication.
To their credit, the kids seem to catch on faster than I do. Our phrase of the week is, “I feel…. because I need….” That sounds simple, right? But it’s not. Being able to out your own needs into works – even identifying them sometimes is challenging. We’re moving on to the next chapter, but I can confidently and unabashedly say that we have not mastered this concept. I do think that this is part of the process, and that with practice will come mastery (or at least competency). We’ve been stuck on a concept before, so I am sure this will work into the framework of the whole as we go along (and of course, we’re a long way from speaking Giraffe fluently).
Like I said above, I am seeing progress, but it is slow going. Right when I start thinking that this is not working, a situation will arise or a child will say something where I can clearly see the wheels of NVC turning. Oh, they still bicker, and I still get irritated and frustrated with them; that’s normal, I think. But overall, I think that communication is improving. This is a marathon, not a sprint.
I did appreciate the section on page 54 of the book where the lists the needs we all share; autonomy, integrity, celebration, interdependence, spiritual communion, physical nurturance & play. Having the list is helpful when I don’t know exactly which need of mine is not being met; having an example of the language to use is immensely helpful to me.
The summary states:
What others say and do may be the stimulus, but never the cause of, our feelings. When someone communicates negatively, we have four options as to how we receive the message: (1) blame ourselves, (2) blame others, (2) sense our own feelings and needs, (4) sense the feelings and needs hidden in the other person’s negative message.
I’m still not exactly clear on what, or if there even is, a ‘right’ option would be. It seems that differing responses would be appropriate in different situations, and/or a combination of responses. In any case, we’re working on it.
If you’re following along, some of the discussion questions from Chapter 5 in the workbook are:
What ’causes’ a particular feeling in us?
What are four options for hearing a difficult message?
How might we speak in ways that acknowledge responsibility for our feelings?
Guilt-tripping – discuss.
How do we often communicate instead of asking for what want? Response?
Explain the difference between ‘taking responsibility’ for someone else’s feelings and ‘caring compassionately’ about them.
We’ve already begun chapter 6, so keep an eye out for that in the next week or so. Hope your week is off to a good start!
Warmly,
~h
(Disclaimer: This is not a certified or ‘official’ NVC anything. This is my personal journey through Marshall Rosenberg’s book, Nonviolent Communication, and Lucy Leu’s NVC Companion Workbook. I am NOT an expert, nor am I particularly skilled in this process. Please use/follow/apply with those things in mind. When in doubt, please disregard my commentary and refer to the book or workbook. I make no money off of this exercise, nor is any copyright infringement meant by posting a sampling of the questions from the workbook. For best results, I strongly recommend that you purchase the book and workbook for yourself and go through them in their entirety at your leisure.)
Identifying and Expressing Feelings – NVC Week 4
If you’re following along or just joining us, we’re working through Marshall Rosenberg’s book, Nonviolent Communication, and Lucy Leu’s companion Workbook . We’re doing this as part of our homeschool curriculum and we welcome your thoughts and companionship on our journey.
It surprises me sometimes how the things that pop on Facebook are relevant to what’s going on in my life. I mean, not really, because it used to happen all the time when I was religious-y, and I would attribute it to a ‘blessing’ or divine direction or whatever. These days, I’m more inclined to believe that this happens because our brains are hard-wired to find patterns in our lives, and when we have something on our minds unconsciously (and especially when it’s consciously part of our thinking), we’re more apt to notice these little ‘coincidences’, but that doesn’t lessen my amazement and delighted surprise when they occur.
In any case, this week’s NVC chapter is on identifying and expressing emotions, and on my wall this morning was an article posted by Spin-Doctor Parenting, You Don’t Really Feel That Way, Part I. It was talking about how we parents often, without realizing it, teach our children to distrust their feelings or relegate them to the backseat. And then we wonder why we have such a hard time communicating how we feel about something…
I think I’ve mentioned it before, but I like communication help sites that offer a script. I generally get the concept, but lack the vocabulary, or recall to make up my own words in tense situations. Having a script helps get the words I want to use at the ready – at least until I’ve internalized it enough to have the language I want to use at the ready. Books like ‘How to Talk so Kids Will Listen and How to Listen so Kids Will Talk‘ by Faber & Mazlish is great – there’s even a school version. With tools like these on hand, it’s easy to keep your cool all the time and remember to ‘use your words’, right? RIGHT?!?
No, of course not. But it does help. Immensely, especially when your own connection to your feelings is masked by years of being told that the only appropriate outward display of emotion is calm – or at least a reasonable facsimile of calm (which has the unintended side effect of molding a really good actor).
It’s not just being in touch with negative emotions that is important. Masking or limiting emotional intelligence also has a negative effect on being able to process positive emotions as well. I find it both interesting and odd that I am less embarrassed by allowing negative emotions to show, and more embarrassed by allowing positive emotions to show. Last night I had dinner and discussion with some very good friends and some new people in my life. I was in a very, very good mood and a little dizzy with it. I chattered quite a bit and may have laughed too loud once or twice. I am unused to letting my emotions have any kind of starring role in my actions, and so anytime I get carried away, I end up extremely embarrassed by something I said or did. Keep in mind that intellectually, I know that I didn’t say or do anything untoward or inappropriate in any way. I was just happy and excited and a little nervous. But I lack the emotional management tools to properly assess those feelings and assign them to their proper place. I felt ‘out of control’ and that’s unpleasant for me. Nonetheless, this is progress for me – even being able to identify and express what’s ‘really’ going on in my own head.
A sampling of Chapter 4′s review/discussion questions:
According to Rosenberg, why do people in certain professions have more trouble than the rest of us in identifying and expressing feelings?
What problems might a woman encounter in ‘expressing her feelings’ by saying to her husband, “I feel like I’m living with a wall’?
What are the advantages of expressing our feelings?
What is the advantage over identifying specific emotions rather than general ones (I feel good/bad.)
And a few of the workbook’s exercises:
How do you know what you are feeling at any given moment? Where do you go to look?
Under the subheading ‘Feelings vs. Non-Feelings”, there are examples of words that tend to describe:
- what we think we are (I feel inadequate)
- how we think others are evaluating us (I feel unimportant)
- how we think others are behaving towards or around us (I feel misunderstood/I feel ignored)
What other words would fall into this category?How do you feel in the presence of someone who does not express their feelings?Start your own personal inventory of feelings (exercise).
Now that we’ve been working on this for a month, I am really starting to see small changes in all of us that I think will accumulate as we continue. It’s definitely easier for my kids to grasp some of these concepts than it is for me; we read over and discuss the review questions at the end of each chapter the day we read over the chapter, and then again at the end of the week and try to think of specific instances where we each put the chapter’s topic into practice – in this case, where we expressed an evaluation with ‘I feel’ rather than a true emotion, and where we have used words to describe actual emotions. They’re usually in agreement with the author more often than I am, and/or are faster to respond – I still have to think about it much of the time. The changes are getting easier, more visible in daily interactions – small and just hints of them much of the time but they’re there.
Warmly,
~h
(Disclaimer: This is not a certified or ‘official’ NVC anything. This is my personal journey through Marshall Rosenberg’s book, Nonviolent Communication, and Lucy Leu’s NVC Companion Workbook. I am NOT an expert, nor am I particularly skilled in this process. Please use/follow/apply with those things in mind. When in doubt, please disregard my commentary and refer to the book or workbook. I make no money off of this exercise, nor is any copyright infringement meant by posting a sampling of the questions from the workbook. For best results, I strongly recommend that you purchase the book and workbook for yourself and go through them in their entirety at your leisure.)
Observing Without Evaluating – NVC Week 3
So, if you’re just tuning in, my kids and I are working through Marshall Rosenberg’s book, Nonviolent Communication, and Lucy Leu’s companion Workbook . We’re doing this as part of our homeschool curriculum and we welcome your thoughts and companionship on our journey.
We’re taking it week by week, and doing one chapter/workbook assignment per week. This is actually week 4 of our journey, because chapter three has been particularly challenging, so I decided to work through this chapter for another week. After nearly 2 weeks on it, I think I have a better understanding of the concepts and how to put them into practice.
If you’re not familiar with the book, chapter three deals with separating ’observation’ from ‘evaluation. There are a couple of poems in this chapter that have helped me, and especially the kids grasp the difference between the two. Working with kids, obviously, the text of this book is going to fly right over their heads (evaluation). I’ve had to read and then figure out how to ‘translate’ what I am reading into kid-speak. That’s been challenging, but good in a way because in order to explain it to them, I have to understand it. We’ve worked over the last couple of weeks to put this into practice, but also to have practice sessions where we’re role-playing and trying to illustrate and identify the difference between the two ideas (observation).
One of the parts in this chapter that I appreciated was in the NVC in Action dialogue on pages 32 & 33. Rosenberg says,
“… what keeps me in the struggle are the close connections to other people that happen when I do stay in touch with the process.”
It’s comforting to know that even the man with the vision struggles and sometimes even ‘loses touch’ with the ideals he promotes; I think that we all do that at times and it’s hard to admit. Gold star for honesty. I did the exercises on page 34 and was in agreement with the author 80% of the time. As I said, this chapter has been challenging for me for some reason, but I think I am seeing enough progress for myself to move on.
In the workbook, the exercises for Chapter Three begin on page 73. Some of the questions include:
Explain the difference between ‘static language’ and ‘process language’.
MBR prefers to avoid even positive or neutral labels of people (for example, ‘a responsible child’, ‘a cook’, ‘a pretty blonde’). Why?
What is the first component of NVC?
Practice exercises include:
Write down 3 observations about yourself. Write down 3 evaluations about yourself.
Next time you’re waiting in line or among people in a crowd, take five minutes to look at the people around you. What thoughts do you discover on your mind? Are they observations or evaluations? What’s the proportion of observations to evaluations?
I thought that these were interesting assignments. It really brought to the fore how much of my inner dialogue is judgemental – both positively and negatively. The quote on our chalkboard in the school room right now is from Gautama Buddha, “Mind is everything. We become what we think.” I am thinking that I need to work on my mind.
Overall, I am glad that we spent another week on this chapter. It was worth it to spend the extra time on it. We are, as always, a work in progress, but I think that we’re moving forward and that makes me happy.
Hope you have a great weekend!
Warmly,
~h
(Disclaimer: This is not a certified or ‘official’ NVC anything. This is my personal journey through Marshall Rosenberg’s book, Nonviolent Communication, and Lucy Leu’s NVC Companion Workbook. I am NOT an expert, nor am I particularly skilled in this process. Please use/follow/apply with those things in mind. When in doubt, please disregard my commentary and refer to the book or workbook. I make no money off of this exercise, nor is any copyright infringement meant by posting a sampling of the questions from the workbook. For best results, I strongly recommend that you purchase the book and workbook for yourself and go through them in their entirety at your leisure.)
