Would you like . . .
- Less chance you’ll end up arguing with someone
- A way out of reactivity and blame
- More feelings of closeness or connection
- To make more effective requests
- To experience a greater sense of freedom and aliveness
- To talk to yourself with more kindness and acceptance
- More choice, creativity and collaboration
- Greater joy in wholehearted giving
Nonviolent Communication, or Compassionate Communication, as it is sometimes called is useful in homes, schools, businesses, prisons, and community organizations, and is taught in dozens of countries around the world.
Our foundation courses have been attended by singles, parents, couples, grandparents, business owners, and coaches, to name a few. It has been used as professional development for staff members in a variety of businesses, and we have been contracted by a community group to provide training for its volunteers.
Origins of NVC
NVC was developed by Marshall Rosenberg who grew up in Detroit. He was Jewish and experienced hate and violence because of this. He went to university and became a professional psychologist but became frustrated that treating just the patient and not the society in which they lived made treatment less effective. Another frustration was the advice to keep a professional barrier between himself and his clients. In addition he really disliked the paperwork demanded by his profession.
In the 1960’s he developed the basic framework of NVC while working with schools facing compulsory integration (black students being moved to white schools and vice versa) and also while working with universities and rioting students. He said himself that there is nothing new in NVC, but he found a way to package the principles which was simple and useful. The principles of NVC can be applied at a national level solving conflicts between countries, just as well as they can be applied in families, or at schools, or in businesses. In 1984 he founded an organization called the Centre for Non-Violent Communication and this is the organization that oversees training and certification of NVC trainers around the world. Marshall Rosenberg taught NVC in 60 countries – including Palestine, Israel, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Burundi and Rwanda. He worked with street gangs (and the police) in cities in the USA. He helped to found primary and secondary schools that are run using NVC principles and there are trainers in many countries teaching NVC and working in areas such as conflict mediation, marriage guidance and personal growth.