Miki Kashtan

CNVC Certified Trainer, author and co-founder of Bay Area Nonviolent Communication (BayNVC) and the North America NVC Leadership Program, from Oakland, California, USA

Miki Kashtan is a co-founder of Bay Area Nonviolent Communication (BayNVC) and Lead Collaboration Consultant at the Center for Efficient Collaboration. Miki aims to support visionary leadership and shape a livable future using collaborative tools based on the principles of Nonviolent Communication. She shares these tools through meeting facilitation, mediation, consulting, coaching, and training for organizations and committed individuals. Her latest book, Reweaving Our Human Fabric: Working together to Create a Nonviolent Future (2015) explores the practices and systems needed for a collaborative society. She is also the author of Spinning Threads of Radical Aliveness: Transcending the Legacy of Separation in Our Individual Lives, and The Little Book of Courageous Living. Miki blogs at The Fearless Heart and her articles have appeared in the New York Times ("Want Teamwork? Encourage Free Speech"), Tikkun, Waging Nonviolence, Shareable, Peace and Conflict, and elsewhere. She holds a Ph.D. in Sociology from UC Berkeley.

“Miki, I really admire the way you are able to be so present in the moment and are able to respond so well to what you see and sense. Just watching you in action makes this course worthwhile to me."
—S.G., Litchfield, Connecticut, USA

”Miki's workshop was exceptional in giving an overview of the work, while calmly meeting the emotional challenges everyone brought to the table.”
—Class participant

Website: BayNVC

Upcoming Live NVC Courses with Miki Kashtan

Making NVC Relevant to a World in Crisis: Integrating Systemic Awareness and Nonviolence into Our Teaching

with Miki Kashtan

Learn how to transform NVC into a tool for systemic awareness and healing
Examine the influence of difference, and uncover pathways that strengthen its capacity
Learn to receive and offer feedback on impact in situations fraught with power differences
Explore specific ways in which NVC systemically supports the full flowering of humanity
Delve into the dynamics of cultural differences, and discover how NVC can systemically contribute to a liberation perspective

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Responding to the Call of Our Times: A Leadership Coaching Program (2020)

with Miki Kashtan

Enjoy powerful, personalized coaching and support
Bring nonviolence more fully into your personal leadership style
Step into your power, and learn how to use it creatively and collaboratively
Engage productively with others in moving toward a shared purpose
Bridge the gap between your vision and the reality of life
Transform the legacy of separation, powerlessness, and scarcity into a livable future for all

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Latest NVC Library Resources with Miki Kashtan

Intention and Effect

with Miki Kashtan

When someone expresses upset about our actions, and we focus on our intention being seen and understood (e.g. "I didn’t mean to hurt you”) it doesn't support the speaker in being heard more deeply with care. Here we'll explore this dynamic in a way that supports more clarity and the possibility of greater personal liberation. Read on for more.

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Responding to Opportunity in Extreme Times. (From the "Apart and Together" series)

with Miki Kashtan

This pandemic is an immense opportunity, and a dire catastrophe in the making. It's a crisis within many planetary crisis's -- during which, our habits as individuals, and as a collective, are challenged because they don't work. And we are pushed to respond freshly and join forces in ways that seemed impossible before. Read on for more about this first in a series of articles.

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Mourning Our Way to Acceptance

with Miki Kashtan

When something happens that we don't like no amount of resentment nor magical thinking will make it disappear. Instead, we can mourn to dissolve our own resistance, resentment, and numbness of resignation. Mourning can allow us to feel pain with acceptance, and without needing to be okay with what happened. Acceptance can bring us to a place where even all the anguish in the world is fully, part of life.

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Abusive Relationships and Nonviolence

with Miki Kashtan

In order to bring in more nonviolence into the world, we need to take our own needs seriously and recognize that no amount of seeing someone’s innocence would mean putting up with more of their harmful behavior. We need to disentangle compassion towards another from the willingness to tolerate more harmful actions. At times this means finding enough self-love, support, or clarity, to take decisive action. Read on for more.

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Can the Social Order Be Transformed through Personal Practice? - Part 2

with Miki Kashtan

We can't alone (nor with lone communities) transform the hidden structures of violence and domination. Dialogue alone isn't disruptive enough. We can easily be in dialogue with Trump supporters while the planet burns up, millions are still hungry, and we go extinct. NVC seriously risks reinforcing vast inequities and abuses if we're not radically engaging systemic constraints, and impacts of our choices that go beyond our immediate circle. Read on for ways to leverage NVC practices to expand true social change.

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