Nonviolent Communication Quotes

“Quanto mais as pessoas que fazem parte de nossa vida tiverem sido acusadas, punidas ou forçadas a sentirem-se culpadas por não fazerem o que os outros pediram, mais provavelmente elas levarão essa bagagem a todo relacionamento posterior e ouvirão em cada solicitação uma exigência.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Comunicação não-violenta: Técnicas para aprimorar relacionamentos pessoais e profissionais

“allowing others the opportunity to fully express themselves before turning our attention to solutions or requests for relief.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“A student of Nonviolent Communication volunteering at a food bank was shocked when an elderly co-worker burst out from behind a newspaper, “What we need to do in this country is bring back the stigma of illegitimacy!”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“If we wish for a compassionate response from others, it is self-defeating to express our needs by interpreting or diagnosing their behavior. Instead, the more directly we can connect our feelings to our own needs, the easier it is for others to respond to us compassionately.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“While the effects of negative labels such as “lazy” and “stupid” may be more obvious, even a positive or an apparently neutral label such as “cook” limits our perception of the totality of another person’s being.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“When we focus on clarifying what is being observed, felt, and needed rather than on diagnosing and judging, we discover the depth of our own compassion”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“if my partner wants more affection than I’m giving her, she is “needy and dependent.” But if I want more affection than she is giving me, then she is “aloof and insensitive.” If my colleague is more concerned about details than I am, he is “picky and compulsive.” On the other hand, if I am more concerned about details than he is, he is “sloppy and disorganized.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“It’s not what you do that counts, it’s the quality of your attention.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“Most of us grew up speaking a language that encourages us to label, compare, demand, and pronounce judgments rather than to be aware of what we are feeling and needing.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“the dangers of a language that implies absence of choice,”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“I had a major conflict with what went on in his head, but I’ve learned that I enjoy human beings more if I don’t hear what they think.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“The Sufi poet RUmi once wrote, "Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and right-doing, there is a field. I'll meet you there.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life

“Resistance, defensiveness, and violent reactions are minimized.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life

“Instead of habitual, automatic reactions, our words become conscious responses based firmly on awareness of what we are perceiving, feeling, and wanting.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life

“Empathy, on the other hand, requires us to focus full attention on the other person’s message.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“observe what is actually happening in a situation: what are we observing others saying or doing that is either enriching or not enriching our life? The trick is to be able to articulate this observation without introducing any judgment or evaluation—to simply say what people are doing that we either like or don’t like. Next, we state how we feel when we observe this action: are we hurt, scared, joyful, amused, irritated? And thirdly, we say what needs of ours are connected to the feelings we have identified.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“If we become skilled at giving ourselves empathy, we often experience in just a few seconds a natural release of energy that then enables us to be present with the other person.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“In the play A Thousand Clowns by Herb Gardner, the protagonist refuses to release his twelve-year-old nephew to child-welfare authorities, declaring, “I want him to get to know exactly the special thing he is or else he won’t notice it when it starts to go. I want him to stay awake … I want to be sure he sees all the wild possibilities. I want him to know it’s worth all the trouble just to give the world a little goosing when you get the chance. And I want him to know the subtle, sneaky, important reason why he was born a human being and not a chair.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“Essa característica da compaixão, que denomino “entregar-se de coração”, se expressa na letra da canção “Given to”, composta por minha amiga Ruth Bebermeyer em 1978: Nunca me sinto mais presenteada Do que quando você recebe algo de mim – Quando você compreende a alegria que sinto ao lhe dar algo. E você sabe que estou dando aquilo não para fazer você ficar me devendo, Mas porque quero viver o amor que sinto por você. Receber algo com boa vontade pode ser a maior entrega. Eu nunca conseguiria separar as duas coisas. Quando você me dá algo, Eu lhe dou meu receber. Quando você recebe algo de mim, Eu me sinto tão presenteada.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Comunicação não-violenta: Técnicas para aprimorar relacionamentos pessoais e profissionais

“PALAVRAS SÃO JANELAS (OU SÃO PAREDES) Sinto-me tão condenada por suas palavras, Tão julgada e dispensada. Antes de ir, preciso saber: Foi isso que você quis dizer? Antes que eu me levante em minha defesa, Antes que eu fale com mágoa ou medo, Antes que eu erga aquela muralha de palavras, Responda: eu realmente ouvi isso? Palavras são janelas ou são paredes. Elas nos condenam ou nos libertam. Quando eu falar e quando eu ouvir, Que a luz do amor brilhe através de mim. Há coisas que preciso dizer, Coisas que significam muito para mim. Se minhas palavras não forem claras, Você me ajudará a me libertar? Se pareci menosprezar você, Se você sentiu que não me importei, Tente escutar por entre as minhas palavras Os sentimentos que compartilhamos.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Comunicação não-violenta: Técnicas para aprimorar relacionamentos pessoais e profissionais

“O mundo em que vivemos é aquilo que fazemos dele. Se hoje é impiedoso, foi porque nossas atitudes o tornaram assim. Se mudarmos a nós mesmos, poderemos mudar o mundo, e essa mudança começará por nossa linguagem e nossos métodos de comunicação.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Comunicação não-violenta: Técnicas para aprimorar relacionamentos pessoais e profissionais

“A não-violência significa permitirmos que venha à tona aquilo que existe de positivo em nós e que sejamos dominados pelo amor, respeito, compreensão, gratidão, compaixão e preocupação com os outros, em vez de o sermos pelas atitudes egocêntricas, egoístas, gananciosas, odientas, preconceituosas, suspeitosas e agressivas que costumam dominar nosso pensamento.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Comunicação não-violenta: Técnicas para aprimorar relacionamentos pessoais e profissionais

“A menos que “nos tornemos a mudança que desejamos ver acontecer no mundo” (como diria meu avô), nenhuma mudança jamais acontecerá. Infelizmente, estamos todos esperando que os outros mudem primeiro.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Comunicação não-violenta: Técnicas para aprimorar relacionamentos pessoais e profissionais

“violência passiva que alimenta a fornalha da violência física.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Comunicação não-violenta: Técnicas para aprimorar relacionamentos pessoais e profissionais

“When we use language which denies choice (for example, words such as should, have to, ought, must, can’t, supposed to, etc.), our behaviors arise out of a vague sense of guilt, duty, or obligation.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“When we speak a language that denies choice, we forfeit the life in ourselves for a robotlike mentality that disconnects us from our own core.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“we grew up in homes where we were rewarded for being good little boys and girls, and were punished when our caretakers judged us to be otherwise. Thus, as adults, we easily trick ourselves into believing that life consists of doing things for reward; we are addicted to getting a smile, a pat on the back, and people’s verbal judgments that we are a “good person,” “good parent,” “good citizen,” “good worker,” “good friend,” and so forth. We do things to get people to like us and avoid things that may lead people to dislike or punish us.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“After having acknowledged that you choose to do a particular activity, get in touch with the intention behind your choice by completing the statement, I choose to … because I want ….”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“When I advise, “Don’t do anything that isn’t play!” some take me to be radical, even insane. I earnestly believe, however, that an important form of self-compassion is to make choices motivated purely by our desire to contribute to life rather than out of fear, guilt, shame, duty, or obligation. When we are conscious of the life-enriching purpose behind an action we take, when the sole energy that motivates us is simply to make life wonderful for others and ourselves, then even hard work has an element of play in it. Correspondingly, an otherwise joyful activity performed out of obligation, duty, fear, guilt, or shame will lose its joy and eventually engender resistance.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships

“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. The process of mourning and self-forgiveness frees us in the direction of learning and growing. In connecting moment by moment to our needs, we increase our creative capacity to act in harmony with them.”
― Marshall B. Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships