Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella believes in the book Nonviolent Communication so strongly that when he was named CEO, among his first actions was to hand it out to every one of the company’s executives.
I first read it in 2021 when my friend / therapist / fairy godmother Iris First recommended it. She is an Enneagram expert and brilliant at communication and conflict resolution: check out Iris’s podcast, “Really, is that the way you see me?”.
Simply put, since reading Rosenberg’s NVC and actively applying his verbal patterns to my daily interactions, my relationships have been more harmonious. If you can take a 15-minute walk during an amygdala hijack and return dropping NVC phrasing, you will absolutely disarm the other person.
“Emily, you are the best communicator I’ve ever met. You are so clear, and no drama.”
-Actual review from ex-boyfriend who enjoyed me for a year after I read Nonviolent Communication
Mastering even a couple of the below tweaks to sentence structure will benefit you personally and professionally – I promise.
Play my five-minute podcast about nonviolent communication to hear specific before-and-after phrase examples.
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Our observations are often clouded by Judgments.
The author, psychologist Marshall B. Rosenberg, PhD, says that good communicators are able to separate their observations of a situation from their evaluations or judgments of it.
Feeling or evaluation?
“I feel like you don’t care” is not a true feeling, it’s a critical evaluation that puts someone on the defensive.
Nonviolent Communication is all about how to communicate with empathy and uses four key actions (verbs):
Four essential components of NONVIOLENT communication:
1) Observing what is happening in a situation (such as someone saying or doing something you don’t like).
2) Stating how you feel when you observe the action.
3) Expressing how your needs are connected to the feelings you identified.
4) Addressing what you want by requesting a concrete action.
Four key concepts to help you practice nonviolent communication:
- We want to meet others’ needs, but only when we feel we do so with autonomy. (Santa Claus attitude = we want to make each other happy.)
- Make requests, not demands.
- Express what is alive in you and what you are really feeling: stop confusing strategies and judgments for feelings. E.g. “I feel like you don’t care” is not a true feeling, it’s a critical evaluation that puts the listener on the defensive.
- Request concrete actions. Figure out what you really need and request it clearly but give the option to say no without punishment.
Pop psychology advice to use “I” statements misses the mark.
Stop saying ‘I feel like’ when you are trying to make a point!#communication #debates #debating pic.twitter.com/Sv0DLuDFnQ
— Emily Binder (@emilybinder) March 1, 2024
Examples of common speech transformed into nonviolent communication:
Common, actually violent language (unhelpful:)
“I feel like you don’t value my opinion.”
- This is not a feeling, it’s an evaluation.
- “I feel like” is a veiled or seemingly safe way to actually make an accusation and judgment.
- Feelings are adjectives like judged, scared, discarded, or ashamed. It literally doesn’t make sense to say you feel like [someone did something].
- Puts recipient on the defensive and makes them wrong.
NVC phrasing (helpful):
1. Observe a fact or event (“just the facts” style):
- Okay (includes “you”):
“You left me out of the decision.” - Better (includes “I”, no “you”):
✅”I was not included in the decision making process at Monday’s meeting.”
2. Restate the fact with “when” and share the resulting feeling:
- Responsible for your own feelings.
- Blames the event or situation, not the person. Even if the person caused this event or situation, they will be less defensive when hearing this phrasing.
Another nonviolent rephrase from the Monday meeting example:
- An accusation or critical evaluation hides behind the incorrect use of “I feel”.
- It’s unhelpful for being truly understood and creating a win-win conversation outcome.
- The feeling is not “you think my opinion doesn’t matter” as in A above; it’s that you felt inconsequential, undervalued, unimportant, or forgotten.
- Sharing the real feeling is more vulnerable but THIS is what unlocks true communication and resolution.
- You can only know and be responsible for what’s alive in you, so focus on accurately and honestly labeling your emotion — not on what others do or think (that is an evaluation).
Pick up the book on Amazon: Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships by Dr. Marshall Rosenberg.
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Published December 29, 2021; updated March 1, 2024.
