Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships (Nonviolent Communication Guides)

by Marshall B. Rosenberg

It is helpful to recognize a number of common speech patterns that tend to mask accountability for our own feelings: Use of impersonal pronouns such as it and that: “It really infuriates me when spelling mistakes appear in our public brochures.” “That bugs me a lot.” The use of the expression “I feel (an emotion) because … ” followed by a person or personal pronoun other than I: “I feel hurt because you said you don’t love me.” “I feel angry because the supervisor broke her promise.” Statements that mention only the actions of others: “When you don’t call me on my birthday, I feel hurt.” “Mommy is disappointed when you don’t finish your food.” In each of these instances, we can deepen our awareness of our own responsibility by substituting the phrase, “I feel … because I … ” For example: “I feel really infuriated when spelling mistakes like that appear in our public brochures, because I want our company to project a professional image.”

relationship.” In such a case, my partner would do well to reject the notion that there is anything wrong with her needs. It would only make a bad situation worse to accept that blame. Instead, she could offer an empathic response to the pain of my emotional slavery: “So you find yourself in panic. It’s very hard for you to hold on to the deep caring and love we’ve had without turning it into a responsibility, duty, obligation…. You sense your freedom closing down because you think you constantly have to take care of me.” If, however, instead of an empathic response, she says, “Are you feeling tense because I have been making too many demands on you?” then both of us are likely to stay enmeshed in emotional slavery, making it that much more difficult for the relationship to survive.

trusted this would occur in time. Stage 3: At the third stage, emotional liberation, we respond to the needs of others out of compassion, never out of fear, guilt, or shame. Our actions are therefore fulfilling to us, as well as to those who receive our efforts. We accept full responsibility for our own intentions and actions, but not for the feelings of others. At this stage, we are aware that we can never meet our own needs at the expense of others.

Like this father, we often use vague and abstract language to indicate how we want other people to feel or be without naming a concrete action they could take to reach that state. For example, an employer makes a genuine effort to invite feedback, telling the employees, “I want you to feel free to express yourself around me.” The statement communicates the employer’s desire for the employees to “feel free,” but not what they could do in order to feel this way. Instead, the employer could use positive action language to make a request: “I’d like you to tell me what I might do to make it easier for you to feel free to express yourselves around me.”

Sustaining Empathy I recommend allowing others the opportunity to fully express themselves before turning our attention to solutions or requests for relief. When we proceed too quickly to what people might be requesting, we may not convey our genuine interest in their feelings and needs; instead, they may get the impression that we’re in a hurry to either be free of them or to fix their problem. Furthermore, an initial message is often like the tip of an iceberg; it may be followed by as yet unexpressed, but related—and often more powerful—feelings. By maintaining our attention on what’s going on within others, we offer them a chance to fully explore and express their interior selves. We would stem this flow if we were to shift attention too quickly either to their request or to our own desire to express ourselves.

In our language there is a word with enormous power to create shame and guilt. This violent word, which we commonly use to evaluate ourselves, is so deeply ingrained in our consciousness that many of us would have trouble imagining how to live without it. It is the word should, as in “I should have known better” or “I shouldn’t have done that.” Most of the time when we use this word with ourselves, we resist learning, because should implies that there is no choice. Human beings, when hearing any kind of demand, tend to resist because it threatens our autonomy—our strong need for choice. We have this reaction to tyranny even when it’s internal tyranny in the form of a should.