Trainer Tip: A request completes the communication by stating specifically what we would like from someone else to meet our need. Without this clarity, our communication can be confusing and can easily be seen as a demand. When people know what you want, you have a better chance of meeting your needs. Make clear, specific, doable requests of people, and see if this increases the chance of...

In this Life Hack, we're going deeper into self-empathy with a simple guided reflection that you can work through. This will be followed by a short exercise with a fill-in sheet led by Gesine and is something you can come back to as you wish.

Trainer Tip: We all want to be valued in our totality, to be loved even when we make mistakes. Wouldn’t we also like to offer this to ourselves? Compassion is about seeing the humanness in everyone, including ourselves. One way to express compassion is to remember your entire relationship and history of love with someone as a whole, rather than focusing on one disappointing incident.

Who are you not use to caring about? Is it those you classify as "other"? Those you disagree with? The lower class? People in power? Those who inflict harm? Yourself? To include everyone's needs fully, not instead of your needs, can transform the either/or paradigm. It can also help us to go beyond so-called "codependency". And it can support us all to live more sustainably on this planet.

Welcome to Part Two of our 3 part Embodied NVC Life Hack series. Last time we looked at rewiring your brain to navigate our primitive mind and sometimes default reactions such as fight, flight or freeze when faced with conflict. In this episode, we're going beyond self-empathy and looking at ways we can empathize with the other person.

Welcome to the final video in our 3 part Embodied NVC Life Hack series. So far we've learnt about rewiring our brain from a flight, fright or freeze reaction to the choice of self-empathy, allowing us to centre and check-in with ourselves. In part two, Empathy Skills, we went beyond self-empathy to look at ways we can empathise with the other person. In this final instalment, we create a bridge...

Trainer Tip: Even when you hit deep emotional bottoms, instead of deciding whether something is good or bad, get clear on how you feel about it and what needs it will or will not meet. Let the Universe do the rest. Then take action to resolve any situations that are not enjoyable to you.

With practice we can prevent reactivity from overtaking and harming: notice signs of reactivity, bring compassion to it, see reactivity as the misperception of threat and a distortion of what's happening, plus engage and pursue connection and the clarity to weaken reactive impulses. In taking responsibility like this overtime, you can live from your values and from care. And life can get easier...

Trainer Tip: In a Compassionate Communication process, we believe there are enough resources in the Universe to meet all of our needs. Most people are stumped because they can only see one strategy for meeting a need. Identify one need that you would like to experience more of and make a list of at least five strategies for meeting it today.

When we're faced with certain situations we tend to go into a fight, flight or freeze mode. While these can sometimes be helpful and even lifesaving, they can also be crippling when the situation may not be life-threatening. In this episode, we give you some tips on how to shift into a more intentional way of handling difficult situations.

With these practices make space before reacting to emotion or external stimulus. This can enable your capacity to respond from your self-connection to universally shared values. With practice you can create the capacity to temporarily put impulsiveness aside, in the service of connection with yourself and others, and in service of more informed and effective strategies.

Trainer Tip: Sometimes I wish others would make it easy for me to live my values. If other people would just do their part, I wouldn’t have to work so hard at doing mine. Can you relate? However, if I support peace in the world, this means I act peacefully because it’s important to me, not because it’s important to others. Identify your most important value today. Then live it. Notice how...

Integrating a full living involves grief/mourning and gratitude. Here we'll more deeply integrate inner and outer dimensions of gratitude and grief. In any experience there's the outer aspect, an event that occurs in life. And there's the inner response to the outer event. When we judge the outer positively or negatively we're in tension or resistance to our experience. Here we'll explore a...

How can we create a partnership and eye-level dialog with people who we perceive to have more power? In this session, we will create a practice of humanizing ourselves and others through empathy, practicing scary honesty, and making requests that serve both persons’ needs

When was the last time you were in a situation with an overwhelming feeling of shame or an unnerving fear of 'doing it wrong'? Sometimes we get sweaty palms or a dry mouth, maybe we freeze on the spot or start an unhelpful internal monologue that makes the situation feel even worse. In this months NVC Life Hack Gesine takes a closer look at her own experience with shame and the fear of doing it...

Trainer Tip: Overwhelmed with all that you want to do? If so, what are you working to change? Is it a behavior or a consciousness? Where were you with this issue when you first decided to create change? And now where are you? Celebrating your progress can encourage you to keep trying. You wouldn’t expect to jump on a treadmill and jog three miles the first time. Don't have the same expectations...

For this exercise choose a situation in which you have said a “yes” to someone‛s request but you didn't experience your “yes” as given freely or joyfully. Then explore judgements, feelings, needs, and alternate strategies that come up in relation to your “yes”, your “no”, and in relation to what the other person might be experiencing.

Judging or criticizing others indicates pain, unmet needs and a coping strategy. It distracts you from yourself and can give you the illusion of control. You may think you see more than they do, imagining criticism will bring change. But even a correct analysis won’t inspire change if they hear criticism. Instead, the moment you notice judgments or criticism turn towards yourself with...

Trainer Tip: When we feel resentment toward others, we are harming our own emotional health. Surprisingly, when we own up to our part of an uncomfortable situation, we can release the pain and resentment. Such honesty can provide healing. Read on for a related anecdote of how this can play out.

We all know what it’s like to be on the end of feedback that we receive as clumsy, unbalanced or even spiteful. We don’t have any control over the skill level of people who give us feedback, or their motivations. So how do we receive feedback without taking it personally, in a way that we can learn from it?