What is Compassionate or Nonviolent Communication (NVC)?
NVC is both a spiritual practice that helps us see our common humanity, and a concrete set of skills which help us to live more peacefully. These skills apply to thought, language, and using our power in a way that honors everyone's needs.
Flagship book by NVC's founderNVC is a learnable process for creating emotional freedom, self-acceptance, inner peace, and fulfilling relationships. It involves expressing ourselves honestly, listening with empathy, and developing a more compassionate inner relationship.
People around the world are using NVC skills to transform conflict, create harmony in their relationships, and build a world where everyone's needs are honored through compassionate giving, and without the use of coercion or violence.
NVC helps people to:
- speak in a way that inspires compassion and understanding
- initiate difficult conversations with more ease and confidence
- remain centered and peaceful while hearing difficult messages
- express anger fully, safely and respectfully - yet powerfully
- shift patterns of thinking that lead to depression, guilt, shame
- enliven yourself by expressing and receiving gratitude
- translate criticism, judgments and blame into life-serving messages
- resolve long-standing conflicts and heal painful relationships
- inspire others to change their behavior willingly
The Global NVC Movement
The Center for Nonviolent Communication (CNVC) is a global organization whose vision is a world where all people are getting their needs met and resolving their conflicts peacefully. In this vision, people are using Nonviolent Communication (NVC) to create and participate in networks of worldwide life-serving systems in economics, education, justice, healthcare, and peace-keeping.
The aim of CNVC is to provide ideas, experience, and support for the living of Nonviolent Communication in community. This is accomplished by providing Nonviolent Communication training, materials, organizational consulting, and projects that develop harmonious and effective relationships.
In addition to groups across the U.S., CNVC now has regional teams of trainers and organizers in Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Western Europe, Russia, Indonesia, Malaysia, India, Sri Lanka, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Burundi, and several countries in Latin America. By 1998 the CNVC team in the former Yugoslavia alone, had trained over 600 hundred teachers who taught over 12,000 students and parents, and now has developed curriculum materials for use with children from kindergarten through high school.
There are more than 200 CNVC-certified trainers throughout the world and estimate that, in each of the past two years, over 250,000 people have received training in NVC in a multitude of countries, cultures, and languages. Many thousands more people have informally shared what they have learned, thus enhancing the lives of their families, workplaces, and communities.
Marshall Rosenberg – founder of Nonviolent Communication
Dr. Marshall B. Rosenberg is founder and director of educational services for the Center for Nonviolent Communication, an international, non-profit organization.
In 1961 Dr. Rosenberg received his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of Wisconsin and in 1966 was awarded diplomate status in clinical psychology from the American Board of Examiners in Professional Psychology.
Dr. Marshall Rosenberg
Nonviolent Communication training evolved from Dr. Rosenberg’s quest to find a way of rapidly disseminating much needed peacemaking skills. The Center for Nonviolent Communication emerged out of work he was doing with civil rights activists in the early 1960s. During this period he provided mediation and communication skills training to communities working to peacefully desegregate schools and other public institutions.
Since the inception of the Center, the response to Nonviolent Communication training has been extremely positive. It is seen as a powerful tool for peacefully resolving differences at personal, professional, and political levels. Dr. Rosenberg provides Nonviolent Communication training in Sweden, Switzerland, Italy, Germany, Denmark, Belgium, Austria, Malaysia, India, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Austria, France, and Canada, as well as in the United States. He works with such groups as educators, managers, mental health and health care providers, lawyers, military officers, prisoners, police and prison officials, clergy, government officials, and individual families. He is also active in war-torn areas and economically disadvantaged countries, offering Nonviolent Communication training to promote reconciliation and peaceful resolution of differences. Israel, Palestine, Ireland, Russia, Rwanda, Burundi, Nigeria, Serbia, and Croatia are examples of countries where Nonviolent Communication is being utilized by teams of peace activists.
Worldwide reactions have been inspiring. Evaluations indicate that this training vastly strengthens the ability to connect compassionately with oneself and others, as well as to resolve differences peacefully. Reports also indicate that the benefit of the training is not only stable over time, but actually increases.
Dr. Rosenberg has been able to teach individuals to give the training in their own community, work, educational, and political environments, and in their own languages, with the same positive effects.