Non-violent Communication: Communicating Compassionately

So far we’ve been focusing more on the individual experience of the inner world, e.g. compassion for the self in Lecture 4. You might be wondering how we can extend our compassion to others. While we may often associate self-sacrifice with kindness to others, doing so and communicating without knowing your own and others’ real needs can pave the way towards misunderstandings, conflict, and ultimately destruction of relationships, especially intimate ones. A key to effective communication that addresses the needs of the people involved is non-violent communication (NVC), which we will cover in Lecture 5.