Nonviolent Communication by Marshall B. Rosenburg

Title: Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life
Author: Marshall B. Rosenburg
Type:  Non-fiction
Genre: Non-fiction
Series: No
Pages: 220
Copyright: 2003
Publisher: PuddleDancer Press
Rating: 4.5 out of 5


Summary: from Good Reads.

Do you hunger for skills to improve the quality of your relationships, to deepen your sense of personal empowerment or to simply communicate more effectively? Unfortunately, for centuries our culture has taught us to think and speak in ways that can actually perpetuate conflict, internal pain and even violence. Nonviolent Communication partners practical skills with a powerful consciousness and vocabulary to help you get what you want peacefully.

In this internationally acclaimed text, Marshall Rosenberg offers insightful stories, anecdotes, practical exercises and role-plays that will dramatically change your approach to communication for the better. Discover how the language you use can strengthen your relationships, build trust, prevent conflicts and heal pain. Revolutionary, yet simple, NVC offers you the most effective tools to reduce violence and create peace in your life—one interaction at a time.

Over 150,000 copies sold and now available in 20 languages around the world. More than 250,000 people each year from all walks of life are learning these life-changing skills.

Feelings:
This is a valuable book that helped me to look at the language I use in a new way. I have to admit for a book that is talking about language and how we can better use it to communicate what we really mean and to reduce conflicts I found the language at times flowery and a bit annoying. That being said I realized the language being used has a different meaning for me than it might for someone else. Thus when I was able to look beyond my frustration and see the message, yes that is more NVC talk than me, I found that they book did have a lot of helpful information.

In forward is written by Arun Gandhi a granddaughter of M.K. Gandhi.

One of the many things I learned from Grandfather is to understand the depth and breadth of nonviolence and to acknowledge that one is violent and that one needs to bring about a qualitative change in one's attitude. We often don't acknowledge our violence because we are ignorant about it; we assume we are not violent because our vision of violence is one of fighting, killing, beating, and wars--the types of things that average individuals don't do. (page xiii)

In the book we learn about the components of nonviolent communication.

"NVC Process

The concrete actions we
observe that affect our well-being

How we feel in relation
to what we observe

The  needs, values, desires, ect.
that create our feelings

The concrete actions we request
in order to enrich or lives"
(page 7).

This process is the basis of NVC and is referred back to through out the book. We might use it in different ways to help us understand someone other than our self and what they are needing but it is mostly being able to understand and implement this in daily life. Rosenburg also talks about the importance of expressing feelings and how this can help us to connect with others even though it may be hard for us to express what we feel because of a culture that labels those that express feelings as weak. The skills in here are extremely valuable and I hope that I am able to use them in my own life.