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PREPARATION, SELF-DEVELOPMENT AND SELF-RESPONSIBILITY

What we ask Candidates to take responsibility for

You may ask yourself the following questions in order to assess the depth of your understanding of Nonviolent Communication concepts:

KNOWING Nonviolent Communication - THEORY, CONCEPTS AND PROCESSES

The purpose of this paragraph is to gain a deep understanding of the Nonviolent Communication concepts and process and familiarity with, understanding and recall of Nonviolent Communication concepts. Do I understand the purpose of Nonviolent Communication, its philosophical assumptions, concepts of life- alienated and life-connected communication, the quality of empathy and the elements of the "Giraffe dance"? The following is a review of basic Nonviolent Communication concepts and processes and some questions which often arise at Nonviolent Communication trainings

NVC Model: Parts and Components

  1. The Nonviolent Communication Model: expressing honestly and receiving empathically, the four components (purpose and characteristics of each), the Giraffe Dance
  2. The four ears (four choices we have when hearing a difficult-to-receive message)
  3. Three kinds of Giraffe requests

NVC Processes

  1. Hearing another's anger (blame, criticism)
  2. Expressing "no"
  3. Hearing "no"
  4. Self-empathy when (a) stimulus is external and (b) stimulus is internal
  5. Mourning and learning from our regrets
  6. Screaming in Giraffe
  7. Interrupting
  8. Expressing gratitude
  9. Receiving gratitude
  10. Making conscious choices with awareness of needs
  11. Expressing an "apology"
  12. Resolving an inner conflict through Nonviolent Communication dialogue.

Key Differentiations

  1. "Being Giraffe" vs. "doing Giraffe"
  2. Giraffe honesty vs. jackal honesty
  3. Empathy vs. sympathy and other forms of response (fixing, reassuring, storytelling, etc.)
  4. Protective vs. punitive use of force
  5. Power with vs. power over
  6. Appreciation vs. approval, compliments or praise
  7. Choice vs. submission or rebellion
  8. Observation vs. observation mixed with evaluation
  9. Feeling vs. feeling mixed with thoughts
  10. Need vs. request
  11. Request vs. demand
  12. Stimulus vs. cause
  13. Value judgment vs. moralistic judgment
  14. Natural vs. habitual
  15. Interdependence vs. dependence or independence
  16. Life-connected vs. life-alienated
  17. Shift vs. compromise
  18. Persisting vs. demanding
  19. Self-discipline vs. obedience
  20. Respect for authority vs. fear of authority
  21. Vulnerability vs. weakness
  22. Love as an action vs. love as a need and a feeling
  23. Self-empathy vs. acting out, repressing, or wallowing in feelings
  24. Idiomatic vs. classical (formal) Giraffe
  25. Empathic sensing vs. intellectual guessing

Frequently Asked Questions in Trainings

  1. Why is it important to stay focused on feelings and needs?
  2. How do you think Nonviolent Communication can change the way conflict is handled?
  3. How do you define empathy? Could you talk more about the difference between empathy and sympathy?
  4. I understand you promote a unique form of appreciation; how is it different from telling someone how great they are?
  5. I've heard you say that my presence is the most precious gift I can give to someone’s pain. Can you explain what you mean by that?
  6. I've heard Marshall talk about "enjoying someone's pain." What does that mean?
  7. When we empathize, why do we guess rather than simply ask what the speaker is feeling?
  8. You're saying we are not responsible for how other people feel. Can you tell me what we are responsible for then?
LIVING Nonviolent Communication - INTENTION TO LIVE IN NVC CONSCIOUSNESS

The purpose of this paragraph is to highlight the intention to embody Nonviolent Communication consciousness in our lives in each moment. This intention is supported by becoming a part of an Nonviolent Communication community or creating one of your own choosing -- if not a regional community, then a virtual community for a special interest group, such as parenting, education, business, or social change. To collaborate actively with others in your community by promoting each other’s events, consulting over dates and keeping each other informed about your activities. We want to create communities that operate in a spirit of cooperation, without competition or hierarchy. This will ensure ongoing learning and sharing, and will support the development of cooperative Nonviolent Communication communities worldwide.

We might ask ourselves, "What am I doing to …

  1. ground myself in the consciousness of feelings and needs -- to live more fully from the heart?"
  2. deepen my capacity to empathize with myself”
  3. develop my ability to be present moment by moment”
  4. deepen my capacity to receive the world empathically?"
  5. develop awareness of my own intentions when speaking or acting?"
  6. bring clarity to my communication -- to express myself in a way that is readily understood by others?"
  7. create fulfilling relationships and to live in harmony with those around me?"
  8. deepen my sense of interconnection with others and all of life?"
  9. increase my capacity to give from the heart?"
  10. appreciate myself and other people more?"
  11. be able to live more often in the place of gratitude and abundance?"
  12. take more joy in the joy of others?"
  13. cultivate compassion in my life?"
  14. deepen awareness of what I am wanting back from others when I speak or act?"
  15. deepen awareness of when my 'Giraffe ears have fallen off' (i.e. when I have forgotten that I have choices in how I hear a message)? And what do I do when I then become aware that I had forgotten?"
  16. feel more alive?"
  17. be more aware of when I am in my head and disconnected from the heart?" experience more freedom in my life?"
  18. be able to 'express anger fully'?"
  19. experience greater clarity in my life?"
  20. experience more peace in my life?"
TEACHING Nonviolent Communication - IN HARMONY WITH NVC PRINCIPLES

The purpose of this paragraph is to clarify clear intentions, effective presentation and openness to feedback. This involves an ability to convey our understanding of Nonviolent Communication -- both to present concepts and to facilitate practice in ways that effectively support others in their learning needs. Clear intentions include the ability to understand and live the spiritual nature of Nonviolent Communication and to demonstrate the inclusion of this spirituality into your training in a way that is comfortable and authentic for you. Also, to be able to demonstrate the distinction between the vision the Nonviolent Communication process serves and the four steps of the model.

Clear intentions also include the ability to demonstrate the inclusion of a social change component or consciousness in your Nonviolent Communication teaching and Nonviolent Communication activities, from the understanding that social and political transformation is the basic philosophy that underlies the teaching of Nonviolent Communication.

The following are questions for reflection:

Clarity of intention in becoming a Certified Trainer:
  1. What are the intentions behind my desire to become a Certified Trainer?
  2. What are the intentions behind my desire to teach Nonviolent Communication?
  3. What am I wanting to get out of (or learn from) doing this?
  4. Do I see myself teaching the truth? Is it possible for others to have a different truth? How important is it that others agree with my teachings on Nonviolent Communication?
  5. What is my commitment to an Nonviolent Communication regional team or to CNVC? How does my presence enrich the Nonviolent Communication community? How do I contribute to the cohesiveness, harmony or growth of the community? What motivates me to participate in a vision to create a Giraffe world?
Presenting and demonstrating Nonviolent Communication theory and concepts: How do I...
  1. Develop my ability to communicate to others what I understand of Nonviolent Communication concepts?
  2. Develop my ability to understand and answer others' questions about Nonviolent Communication?
  3. Deepen my confidence in leading a practice group or presenting a piece of the teaching?
  4. Develop my ability to inspire others to approach me with their learning needs?
Ability to present the teaching effectively:
  1. What do I consider to be the most important information to present?
  2. How do I organize this material?
  3. What kinds of teaching aids, curricula, activities, examples, etc. do I use?
  4. How do I engage the participants' interest?
  5. How do I increase such qualities as clarity, comprehensiveness, compellingness, etc.?
  6. How do I develop my skills and fluency in demonstrating the model through role-play or other illustrations during training situations?
Receiving and offering feedback:
  1. How do I solicit feedback and strengthen my ability to give and receive honest feedback as a resource for my own and other people's growth? How do I offer feedback to others in a way that is likely to meet both our needs?
  2. How do I cultivate the capacity to offer my knowledge – including "correcting" people's errors – in a way that they welcome hearing?
  3. How do I increase my facility to receive negative feedback (especially when directed at myself or those with whom I am identified) without hearing criticism or perceiving hostility? How do I become more receptive to the possibility of benefiting from such feedback?
  4. When I organize or teach at Nonviolent Communication events, what kinds of interactions with others are most likely to trigger me? How would I like to be responding?
Group Skills -- "How might I…
  1. expand my capacity to contribute in the context of a group?"
  2. contribute more to each person's sense of their own power?"
  3. contribute more to a group's sense of purpose and community?"
  4. contribute to depth, authenticity and honesty in a group?"
  5. contribute to harmony, the resolution of tension and conflict, mutual understanding and cohesiveness?"
  6. contribute more to inspiration, joy and lightness in a group?"
  7. contribute more to focus, efficiency and order?"
  8. develop more awareness of the feelings and needs of other people in a group?"
  9. more fully balance my needs and those of others in a group?"
  10. become more vulnerable in a group?"
    • What are the intentions behind my desire to become a Certified Trainer?
    • What are the intentions behind my desire to teach Nonviolent Communication?
    • What am I wanting to get out of (or learn from) doing this?
    • Do I see myself teaching the truth? Is it possible for others to have a different truth? How important is it that others agree with my teachings on Nonviolent Communication?
    • What is my commitment to an Nonviolent Communication regional team or to CNVC? How does my presence enrich the Nonviolent Communication community? How do I contribute to the cohesiveness, harmony or growth of the community? What motivates me to participate in a vision to create a Giraffe world?
Presenting and demonstrating Nonviolent Communication theory and concepts: How do I...
  1. Develop my ability to communicate to others what I understand of Nonviolent Communication concepts?
  2. Develop my ability to understand and answer others' questions about Nonviolent Communication?
  3. Deepen my confidence in leading a practice group or presenting a piece of the teaching?
  4. Develop my ability to inspire others to approach me with their learning needs?
Ability to present the teaching effectively:
  1. What do I consider to be the most important information to present?
  2. How do I organize this material?
  3. What kinds of teaching aids, curricula, activities, examples, etc. do I use?
  4. How do I engage the participants' interest?
  5. How do I increase such qualities as clarity, comprehensiveness, compellingness, etc.?
  6. How do I develop my skills and fluency in demonstrating the model through role-play or other illustrations during training situations?
SOME THINGS I MIGHT DO

The purpose of this section is to make suggestions to prepare for becoming a Certified Trainer. Not all these suggestions will work well for everyone. They are offered as a guide to support your learning process and as a way of monitoring your own progress and readiness.

  1. I would dedicate a notebook to my Nonviolent Communication practice--one central place to record my learning and insights and to come back for review.
  2. I would regularly journal about moments of “stuckness” or conflict in my life and replay them in writing, using Nonviolent Communication. For example, in recalling an interaction where I felt disconnected from another person, I would journal about what I was observing, feeling and needing at various points of the interaction. What could I have said or done differently? What prevented me from doing so at that moment? What might the other person have been observing, feeling, needing and requesting?

Suppose I was frustrated with what I heard on the news: I might use my journal to draft a Giraffe letter to the media commentator. If someone praises me and I notice discomfort, I could try putting their words in my journal and translating them into Nonviolent Communication; do I then hear their message differently? I might celebrate a moment when I used Nonviolent Communication as I would have liked. Or journal about an episode of anger -- "enjoying watching the Jackal show" as I scribble down all my angry thoughts. In re-reading what I wrote, I would look for "should thoughts." Do I hear the needs hidden behind those thoughts?

I would often ask myself, "What am I learning here?" I could also use the (B) questions under "Certification Readiness ABC's" to focus some of my journal entries. Perhaps I would create imaginary scenarios and alternative ways of unfolding them through Jackal or Giraffe. I would journal about places of pain inside, connecting with my own needs, translating inner Jackal dialogues, and exploring requests I might make of myself.

  1. I could use this journal outline:
  • Feeling ..........
  • Need ...............
  • Empathic Statement (all four steps)
    1. Describe a conversation or a situation that was difficult.
    2. Then express the jackal show. Were you judging yourself? The other person?
    3. Can you restate those judgments and with each judgment identify a feeling, a need and an empathic self-statement?
    4. What did you say in response to the other person?
    5. Could you offer empathy to the other person? Did it work? If you could not offer empathy, what stopped you?
    6. What did you learn about this exchange that will support you in doing it differently in the future? What specific steps will increase your skill?

(For example: " I realize that I needed to give myself empathy before I could care enough to offer him empathy. So for the next two weeks I will do a daily 5- minute self-empathy practice to deepen my skills." OR: " I will spend time this coming week staying with my feelings and deepest needs (in reflection or writing) until I feel a shift, before trying another conversation with this person.")

Then, how about describing another exchange with the same person, 3-6 months down the road. What is different this time? In other words, demonstrate your Nonviolent Communication progress in real life situations. [Assessor Notes C-III]

  1. I would find a buddy, a mentor, an Nonviolent Communication practice group or team. We would help each other develop goals and a clear structure for practice and use the materials in this packet. We would support each other in our intention to follow through with our goals and in making Nonviolent Communication practice a priority in our lives.
  2. I would study "Certification Readiness ABC's" and evaluate my current strengths and weaknesses. I would take one or two of the questions and concentrate on them over a defined period of time before taking another to work with. ("Work" might include contemplation, journaling, requesting feedback or doing specific practices.)
  3. I would cultivate awareness of intention when opening my mouth -- especially when I'm angry or when I have an urge to "say it anyway." ("Say it anyway" or "do it anyway" even though I'm aware that it's likely to contribute to alienation rather than to connection.) When I do act out of anger or the urge to "say it anyway," I would try to overcome the tendency to defend myself and instead acknowledge my limitations with compassion. The important piece for me is not that I fail to walk my talk, but that I acknowledge when it happens.
  4. I would practice answering the question, "What is Nonviolent Communication?" in 15 seconds. Then change it to one minute, five minutes and 15 minutes. I would stage a mock presentation introducing Nonviolent Communication in 30 minutes.
  5. I would lead practice groups and offer Nonviolent Communication introductory presentations to small groups. From there I would organize more extended trainings (workshops), first informally, then more formally. I would video record my own presentations and study the recordings. I would ask for feedback from others for all aspects of these events. (See Feedback Form for Participant in packet of materials.)
  6. I would practice using Nonviolent Communication in my life, especially where I have enemy images that trigger reactivity. Possible triggers might be political leaders, media commentators and letters to the editor. I would acknowledge this reaction and strive to free myself of it through self-empathy and requesting empathy from others.
  7. I would make it a priority to attend Nonviolent Communication trainings available to me, especially by different trainers to expose myself to a range of styles and possibilities.
  8. I would read recommended books that would help to deepen my conceptual understanding of Nonviolent Communication framework or assumptions. I would explore how these concepts apply to me (e.g. A book says our dominator system teaches us to value domination and submission. How have I internalized such values?).
  9. I would go through CNVC materials (audios, videos, printed material), especially the resources recommended in this packet, that would support my skills as a potential trainer.
  10. I would encourage in myself a conscious practice that involves taking time each day to notice what I appreciate in life, and to deepen my compassion and self- awareness.
SELF-QUESTIONNAIRE FOR CERTIFICATION CANDIDATES

The purpose of this section is to support the mutual exploration between Certification Candidate and Assessor of the following topics: self-awareness, self-responsibility, the importance of the value of community, and the political and spiritual philosophy (demonstrated by living in Nonviolent Communication consciousness) which is at the heart of Nonviolent Communication.

Please note that in the triad of "knowing, teaching, and living Nonviolent Communication," this questionnaire is focused on living in Nonviolent Communication consciousness, which Assessors consider the most important and often the most difficult for Certification Candidates to demonstrate.

  1. Am I fully aware of what time and energy this preparation for certification involves, and do I see how it fits into my work and my life?
  2. Am I familiar with and comfortable with all the policies and procedures leading up to certification, including the guidelines for teaching Nonviolent Communication as one who is not certified, details of the certification preparation document, the latest trainer agreement, my relationship with my Assessor, how I evaluate my own progress, the importance of living in Nonviolent Communication consciousness. If you are uncomfortable with any procedure, please do not wait until pre-assessment to work it out with your Assessor.
  3. Do I notice when I get caught reacting from the domination paradigm, and am I developing the skills to shift my consciousness?
  4. Do I have the resources for empathy that I need to support the creation of a "sacred space" (Robert Gonzales' term) for my interactions with my Assessor, and with others in my life?
  5. Do I understand that after certification, I will be joining CNVC in support of its mission, and also working with an Nonviolent Communication community as an active member so that I can continue to practice living in Nonviolent Communication consciousness?
  6. What learning edges have emerged for me by responding to this questionnaire? Where am I in my journey to become a Certified Trainer? What support might I want to request, and from whom?
  7. Am I willing to explore the concept that each Nonviolent Communication Key Distinction is a reflection of the difference between the domination paradigm and the partnership paradigm that Nonviolent Communication offers to the world?
  8. Am I willing to explore the concept of needs/values in terms of what values are important for me to live by ("do I walk my talk") rather than focusing on needs as either met or not met, or that the goal of Nonviolent Communication is to get one's needs met?