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A Newsletter Valuing Change
May/June 2001
Newsletter Archive
Tips for Change
On Being Caring:
- Care for yourself.
- Be tender, loving, affectionate, warm, kind, and gentle.
- Care for others.
- Listen closely to people.
- Help people when they need it.
- Be empathic.
*Getting What We Want
How can we expect someone to give us what we want, if we don't know what that is? Once we know what we want, we can make clear requests, and like magic, we may get what we want from others.
*When Someone Communicates Negatively
You can choose to:
- Blame yourself,
- Blame them,
- Notice your own feelings and needs, or
- Notice the feelings and needs hidden in the person's negative message.
Marshall Rosenberg points out in the following book that judgments and criticisms of others tend to lead us to waste energy in self-defense or counterattack. Rather listening for the message behind the apparent criticism would lead to resolving the problem with diplomacy and tact.
Books Supporting Change
Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Compassion by Marshall B. Rosenberg, Ph.D. is a book that will help you improve the quality of your personal and professional relationships. At the root of Rosenberg's message is we must take responsibility for our feelings.
He gives very simple instruction and exercises to help the reader learn how to observe and not evaluate, identify and express ones feelings, make requests rather than demands, to listen with empathy, and to distinguish between proactive and punitive force when communication fails to resolve a problem.
*The ideas in this newsletter are from this book.
Buy this book
*Epictetus: ""People are disturbed not by things, but by the view they take of them."
"
Personal Notes
I recently attended Marshall Rosenberg's lecture on nonviolent communication and was inspired by his message. I want to learn more about this style of negotiation and communication and include the topic in my writing and speaking to help professionals deal with the difficult people they come across in their business life.
So I'm inviting you to share your thoughts with me on how you handle angry, frustrated people that take their frustration out on the people they communicate, work, negotiate, or associate with.
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