By Nathan Schechter, Listening Hour host
“Like any art or craft, NVC is something you can get benefit and enjoyment from in the beginning. But it also takes practice to get a high level of skill.
As you and your partners are learning to hear feelings and needs, you may want to consider what level of depth and complexity of sharing both you and the others in your group can metabolize.
While NVC principles suggest people are not the cause of other people’s emotions – and that we can endeavour to speak authentically – it’s important to realise that as with any skill people are at different places in different moments.
The ability to gauge what level of sharing can be heard and held by an individual or group is one piece of navigating NVC successfully.
While NVC practices ask us to understand in a thoughtful way our own reactions and those of others, it also encourages us to do this in a compassionate way.
Here are three things you can do to navigate what to share and how:
- One strategy is to share less or on easier topics until you are more familiar with the capacities of the people you are sharing with.
- Another strategy is to exit a situation if it exceeds your capacity and to be kind to yourself and others involved if this happens.
- And another strategy is to check if listeners have willingness to hear a deeper sharing or a sharing on a particular topic, “I want to talk about a very painful, complex and old situation with my mother, are you OK to hear this?” (although be aware that some people will automatically say yes to one of these requests, and you may want to request a more experienced practitioner who will give an authentic and considered response.)
The art of NVC is balancing in real time, feelings, needs and reactions. And this is a lifetime practice and it’s tricky because there is no algorithm or rule that will be right for every person or every situation.
That is why NVC is an art and a practice”
Nathan Schechter https://www.thenewmindbodyliteracy.com/
About the LIstening Hour
The Listening Hour began in November 2020 as a response to isolation and separation in the pandemic. It has evolved and strengthened in the almost 3 years that it has been running. We welcome Participants and Hosts from anywhere in the world.
This particular post was written by Nathan in response to a lively discussion amongst the Hosts to diversify the ways we can support people new to the Listening Hour and to NVC and to increase resilience in the Listening Partnerships that we are inviting people into.
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