Be very slow to go into looking for solutions.
When I am angry I have a judgment and an unmet need.
We’re not taught to think in terms of needs. We don’t make nice dead people when we’re in touch with needs. Domination structures cannot maintain themselves when citizens are educated to be alive.
We give empathy to others for our own benefit.
We are compassionate with ourselves when we are able to embrace all parts of ourselves and recognize the needs and values expressed by each part.
Analyses of others are actually expressions of our own needs and values.
This language is from the head. It is a way of mentally classifying people into varying shades of good and bad, right and wrong. Ultimately, it provokes defensiveness, resistance, and counterattack. It is a language of demands.
I never have to worry about another person’s response, only how I react to what they say.
When I recognize I’ve got anger, then I realize it’s because I have a need that’s not being met.
When you are in a jackal environment, never give them the power to submit or rebel. We want to teach this to children very early: Never lose track that you are always free to choose. Don’t allow institutions to determine what you do.
If people just asked: “Here are the needs of both sides, here are the resources. What can be done to meet these needs?” the conflict would be easy to resolve.
What bores the listener bores the speaker too.
Thinking based on who deserves what blocks compassionate communication.
As radical as it may seem, it is possible to do things only out of play. I believe that to the degree that we engage moment by moment in the playfulness of enriching life- motivated solely by the desire for its enrichment- to that degree are we being compassionate with ourselves.
You don’t have to be brilliant. It’s enough to become progressively less stupid.
With every choice you make, be conscious of what need it serves.
Not getting our needs fulfilled is painful – but it’s a sweet pain, not suffering, which is what comes from life-alienated thinking and interpretation.
An important aspect of self-compassion is to be able to empathically hold both parts of ourselves-the self that regrets a past action and the self that took the action in the first place.
I find that my cultural conditioning leads me to focus attention on places where I am unlikely to get what I want. I developed NVC as a way to train my attention-to shine the light of consciousness-on places that have the potential to yield what I am seeking.
Empathy: Emptying our mind and listening with our whole being.