Ganb8te 4 - Putting on my giraffe ears

[gan]

Hey Jim,

Yeah, I'm curious to know what made it occur to him to reply one week later, midway through a work day. WTFK. I didn't respond...but my mind fantasised about the amazing exchange we could have had. I'm clearly not detached enough as I was down all last week and with his response this week I am back on top.

Wobbly crow lasts about 3 seconds before I crumble or do a face plant. I'm cutting myself some slack though as a bunch of moooooses showed up at the end of my thread (in a nice kind of way - thank you) ;-)

So the giraffe image is actually pretty cool. I've been watching some of the NVC videos on youtube and the author uses puppets to explain his ideas. The giraffe (communicates "non-violently") is talking to a jackal (communicates "violently"). When he's talking about how to listen, he literately puts on a headband with giraffe or jackal ears on top! As someone who works in education, I appreciate the teaching approach. Definitely gets the point across and improves retention.

When we put our giraffe ears on all we hear are feelings and unmet needs. Not criticism or other things that put us on the defensive. With NVC the response is "Are you feeling [guess at their feeling] because you have a need to [guess at that need]?" The idea being that (1) you are showing empathy, (2) the person on the other end will try to explain their POV again if you've not quite got it, and (3) it fosters connection since you are seeking mutual understanding. All good in concept but I bet it takes a lot of practice. I think I mentioned that there are some NVC practice groups near me that I am looking into.