The alchemists of the Middle Ages sought the Philosopher’s Stone because they believed that such stone had the magical power to turn everything it touched into gold. In this same sense, the Philosopher’s Stone of the nonviolent language is empathy; it is the magic wand that makes it possible for the four components to work and for people to live together in compassionate giving, harmony and understanding.
Nonviolent Communication works like a four-cylinder car engine; the four pistons inside each cylinder are the four components of NVC: Observations – Feelings – Needs – Requests. The continuous movement up and down of the pistons activated by the explosion of the fuel is what keeps the engine going and the car moving. The fuel for the combustion and explosion is gratuity or giving from the heart; for the engine to keep going indefinitely the pistons need to be enveloped or soaked in lubricant that facilitates their smooth movement and operation. This lubricant in NVC is called empathy; it is what makes NVC possible and what facilitates the whole process.
What is empathy?
When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Matthew 9:36
In the nonviolent language, empathy or unconditional positive regard, terms used by Rosenberg and Carl Rogers, respectively, means fundamentally the same. It involves going out of oneself, seeing reality as others see it, feeling with and making the suffering of others our own. It is to accept and support a person independently of what he has said or done. To be empathic is to be sensitive to one’s own suffering and to the suffering of others.
Expressing our own observations, feelings, needs and requests to others is one part of NVC. The second part is empathy: the process of connecting with others to find out their feelings and needs. Empathic connection can sometimes happen silently, but in times of conflict by communicating to the other person that we understand his feelings and that his needs matter to us can be a powerful turning point in problem situations. Demonstrating that we have such understanding is not the same as complying to requests that might conflict with our own needs.
Connecting empathically with another person is a way to meet our own needs – for understanding, connection, contribution, or others. At the same time, we hope that the empathy would meet the other person’s needs as well, and would aid both of us in finding strategies that would meet each of our needs.
The language of nonviolence often helps us relate with others, but the heart of empathy is in our ability to compassionately connect with our and others’ humanity. Offering our empathic presence, in this sense, is one strategy (or request) through which we can meet our own needs. It is a gift to another person and to ourselves of our full presence.
When we use NVC to connect empathically, we use the same four components in the form of a question, since we can never know for sure what is going on inside of other people. They will always be the ultimate authority on what is going on in them. Our empathy may meet other people’s needs for understanding, or it may spark their own self-discovery. We may ask something like:
When you see, hear … Are you feeling … Because you need …. Would you like …?
Empathy and self-empathy
Charity begins at home – It is difficult to have empathy or benevolence towards others if I don’t have it for myself. If I don’t love myself unconditionally, I will never be able to love others unconditionally either. Both the expression of our own feelings and needs, and the empathic guesses of the other person’s feelings and needs are grounded in a particular consciousness which is at the heart of NVC. This consciousness is nurtured by the practice of self-empathy.
In self-empathy we give the same compassionate attention to ourselves that we give to others when listening to them using NVC. This means listening past any assessments and judgments we are making to find out what we are feeling and needing. This inner awareness and clarity support us in choosing our next step: expressing ourselves to others, or receiving them with empathy. This next step is our request to ourselves on where we want to focus our attention. The practice of NVC entails an intention to connect compassionately with ourselves and with others, and an ability to keep our attention in the present moment – which includes being aware that sometimes in this present moment we are recalling the past, or imagining a future possibility.
Oftentimes self-empathy comes easy, as we access our sensations, emotions and needs to attune to how we are. However, in moments of conflict or reactivity to others, we may find ourselves reluctant to access an intention to connect compassionately, and we may falter in our capacity to attend to the present moment. Self-empathy at times like this has the power to transform our disconnected state of being and return us to our compassionate intention and present-oriented attention. With practice, many people find that self-empathy alone sometimes resolves inner conflicts and conflicts with others as it transforms our experience of life.
Self-esteem – It is to be able to dismantle self-criticism, judgment and feelings of guilt, and to identify and connect myself with my needs, values and what is important to me. As Rosenberg says, self-criticism, judgment and guilt are dramatic expressions of unmet needs. If I am able to discover and identify these needs or values, then I can reformulate my negative feelings and start to feel good about myself by virtue of having succeeded in connecting with the real and true ‘I’.
Empathy for others – In order to better feel and express empathy for others, it is advisable to follow the sign posted at any railroad crossing: Stop – Listen – Look. Others may turn to us in a manner of judgment or criticism, looking to accuse us for something that is happening to them. But if we have our ears tuned to hear only the nonviolent language then other than criticism, what we hear mostly is the dramatic expression of an unmet need. So all we need to do is to look beyond the form of the violent expression - the criticism – and turn it into the content of that expression, that is, the unmet need.
The violent language of the speaker must be translated into the nonviolent one, that is, we must not take the accusations personally and accept them as if directed to us. On the contrary, we are to look past the way they are expressed, and regard them psychoanalytically and realise that they are simply frustrations and dramatic expressions of unfulfilled needs.
To identify these very needs takes time, it requires that we stop to think, take a deep breath, and have the time to translate and identify these needs that are between the lines of an outburst, an accusation, or an insult.
In order not to keep the other person waiting for the final results of our mental process, we can think out loud and try to guess, tentatively asking the other person what are his feelings, needs, and what is most important to him. Certainly the person we are speaking to will either agree with the interpretation and understanding we make out of his speech, or he will help us to clarify them. This tentative attempt from both of us to understand what is happening to him will calm the person down and help him connect with his own needs, and slowly to let go of his negative feelings and violent words.
At the heart of empathy is our ability to connect to our own humanity and the humanity of others, with what is most real and alive in us and in others without criticism, judgment, feelings of guilt, pretensions or deceptions.
Nonviolent language helps us to connect with one another and with ourselves in a way that brings out our natural empathy. It is this empathy that inspires, forms, informs and guides our observation, feeling, needs and request that we make of ourselves and of others. Empathy is the general theory of the nonviolent language and is also, at the same time, the means to achieve harmony and understanding between people. It is like the oil in a car, which wraps the engine’s moving parts to prevent overheating, friction, and premature wear.
Through empathy we observe without evaluating, blaming, or labelling; we feel and make ourselves responsible for our own feelings without accusing, and we urge others to also take responsibility for theirs. We express our needs or values, what is most important to us without deception and we create the conditions or the environment for others to do the same. Then we make requests without pretensions, demands, obligations, or blackmail and similarly help others to do the same.
The triune brain
Charles Darwin’s theory of the evolution of species tells us that life on this planet evolved from a common trunk, so that all life forms are intertwined along the many millions of years since life first appeared in the sea. The earlier states of evolution have not been lost, and are still evident in us. Applying this principle to the formation of our brain, neuroscience tells us that we have three brains: the reptilian, the mammalian and the cerebral or neocortex. These are organized in the same way as a Russian matryoshka doll -- the cerebral contains the mammalian which in turn contains the reptilian.
The reptilian brain – Located at the end of the medulla, it is the most primitive and occupies the innermost and central part of our brain. It has remained unchanged by evolution, so that we share it with all animals with backbone or the vertebrates. It is responsible for functions related to survival, from heartbeat, digestion, basic movement to sexual behaviour. It functions according to stimulus principle – automatic response such as fight -- flight -- immobilization.
Synonyms of these basic reactions in our day to day are: desire – aversion – ignorance; love – hatred – indifference; hope – fear – disinterest. Being highly territorial, it acquires and defends its territory by fighting. The motor of this brain is the “Might is right”, meaning power is right and justified.
The mammalian brain – It corresponds to the telencephalon, the part of the forebrain where hippocampus and amygdala are found, and provides mammals with greater awareness of themselves and their environment, their friends and their enemies. As mammals take more time to care for their young, from instincts emotions are formed not only in relation to the offspring, but also to members of the same species, thus giving rise to life in groups.
The cerebral, rational brain or neocortex – The last step in evolution of the brain occurred about a hundred million years ago, with the emergence of the cerebral cortex. The cerebral cortex or the rational brain is not present only in humans. Intelligent animals like dolphins, whales and monkeys also underwent this last stage of brain evolution.
However, man has the most developed rational brain from which emotions like bodily sensations, common with other mammals, when mediated by a greater and more rational understanding, turn into feelings such as love, compassion and empathy.
How we lose our temper
When we are calm we work with the neocortex, we think critically, solve problems, and are creative and empathic with others. On the other hand, when we are stressed or perceive a less positive behaviour on the part of someone, we lose connection with the neocortex and no longer feel empathy as we automatically attach ourselves to the most primitive reptilian brain and are left with only three options: fight, flight or hide.
Stress activates the age-old reaction conceived by nature to help us cope with danger, which is the function of the reptilian brain. We cannot feel empathy for a lion running towards us, that is, to see things from its perspective; on the contrary, we either fight, run away, or hide. However, a 5-year old child may be disguised as a lion, who angrily stamps his feet and shouts that he does not want to brush his teeth. We immediately fail to see the child and see the lion instead, and react towards him as if he were indeed a lion. Just like Dom Quixote who threw his spear at the windmills, thinking that they were his enemies.
If at times like this we can remember that all behaviour is an attempt to satisfy needs, we can disconnect from the reptilian brain and stay connected to the cortex. Coming from our reptilian brain much of our behaviour is reactive, we speak or act first, only later do we take the time to think; it is as if our behaviours were on the autopilot mode.
How we best function
Against negative emotions such as criticizing and judging others, stress, fear, worry, self-centredness, resentment, frustration, or unhealed emotional pain, we must increase our self-observation and self-awareness, and take better care of ourselves, our physical, emotional and spiritual health; fight stress by improving our life and allocating time for sports, meeting friends, meditation and praying.
Psychologist Paul Gilbert distinguishes three groups of emotions: those that have to do with threat and self-preservation, those that have to do with our activity, achievements and successes, which he calls our comparative mind, and finally those that have to do with contentment, feeling safe, calm, relaxed, joyful and happy.
According to Gilbert, the first and second group of emotions are more motivating so they are more likely to get our attention. But this only happens if we allow it to happen. Our competitive mind makes us not to care if we lose a person as long as we win the argument. Similarly, negative news are usually the more blatant and are always on the front page of newspapers in large prints; the positive ones, on the other hand, are frequently lost in the middle of a newspaper because few are interested in them. Giving the priority to our reptilian brain only magnifies our misery, it does not make us happier.
It is true that empathy does not dwell in the center of our brain; the center, as we know, is occupied by the reptilian brain. However, as Gilbert notes, it is more than proven that our immune, hormonal, cardiovascular and other vital systems function best when we think, feel and act from our cortex or rational brain; loving and feeling loved, not hating or feeling hated, and supporting and helping others, not belittling or ignoring them make us happier. The thrill that our reptilian brain may give us is short-lived and can get us into more trouble.
If human beings were truly violent by nature, as Hobbes in his "Homo homini lupus" theory believes, and most people being, consciously or unconsciously, followers of the Babylonian creation myth, Man would be happier in a violent milieu where his bodily functions and organs would work better. The truth, however, as stated by Gilbert, is precisely the opposite. In addition to warning and helping us in case of danger, the reptilian brain does aggravate communal interactions. In fact, reptiles do not establish relations with anything or anyone, because everything and everyone is hostile to them; this being the case, our reptilian brain cannot be of much help and can become a great obstacle because human beings are in essence relational beings.
According to a legend of the North American Indians, there are two wolves fighting in our hearts and minds disputing between themselves for our interest and attention; one is angry, vindictive, envious, resentful and deceitful and the other is loving, compassionate, generous and peaceful. Which of these two will get our interest and attention? The one that is better fed. Practice empathy, even without feeling them, and you feel empathy towards yourself and others.
What empathy is NOT
In his book, Rosenberg quotes his friend Holley Humphrey when he points out some common behaviours or temptations that many of us often fall into in trying to help others, but in truth far from helping, these behaviours only make things worse and certainly prove our inaptitude at being candidly present with the other.
• Advising: “I think you should…”, “How come you didn’t…?”
• Analyzing: “How did it start?”, “When was the last time you felt this way?”
• Outdoing: “That’s nothing; wait till you hear what happened to me.”
• Educating: “This could turn into a very positive experience for you if you just…”
• Consoling: “It wasn’t your fault; you did the best you could.”
• Story-telling: “That reminds me of the time…”
• Dropping the subject: “Cheer up. Don’t feel so bad.”
• Sympathizing: “Oh, you poor thing…”
• Questioning: “When did this begin?”
• Explaining: “I would have called but…”
• Correcting: “That’s not how it happened.”
How does empathy work
Empathy is getting in touch with what is alive in the other person, that is, what is going on in him, it is to be in his shoes. It is to see reality from the point of view of the other person or to see it as the other sees it. Very often when the other person realizes that we are not managing to connect empathically with him, he will say in exasperation, “Put yourself in my place.” Thinking that I was doing a good job advising and consoling my father during the final days of his life, one day he suddenly interrupted me and said, “How easy it looks to the healthy, the condition of the sick.”
Hearing these words, I realized with pain that I was unable to be empathic with my father. He was not in need of a quick fix as he knew there wasn’t any, he was only in need of empathy and I was unable to provide it. We believe that quick fixes, advice, consolations would make others feel better but the reality is that far from making them feel better, they only add to the pain of those suffering.
If it is already difficult to be empathic with our loved ones, imagine how difficult it must be with those we feel nothing for or may even have negative feelings towards. True empathy in NVC, however, is for all; no matter what the person is, says or does we need to see the beauty in his personhood. True empathy is composed of three components:
Presence – The philosopher Martin Buber says that presence is the most powerful gift one person can give to another. It is a major component in healing; in fact, some psychotherapists go as far as to say that active presence accounts for 90% of the healing process. But it is not easy to stay actively present for another person as it requires that we bring nothing from the past into the present.
If we start to think about what the other person is saying, or begin to analyze and think of some advice to give, or that we need to fix something or feel the urge to help or to correct, we lose the quality of the presence because intellectual understanding is not empathy. The moment we go up to our head trying to understand and conceptualize what we are hearing, we have stopped listening and being with the other person to be with ourselves instead.
People might be fixating their emotions on something that is false; what we have to do is to connect with those emotions first and to correct after. For example, “How stupid the Americans were in invading Iraq thinking that Gadhafi had weapons of mass destruction!” We might want to step in and say that the president of Iraq at the time was Saddam Hussein not Gadhafi, but this urge to correct would ruin our empathy. Empathic connection is more important than correction.
Sympathy, however, is not empathy. If I show sympathy by saying, “I am sad because of what happened to you”, this would be okay if I have shown empathy beforehand. If not, then I would be taking attention away from the other person’s feelings to focus on my own feeling of sadness. It would also not be empathy if I were to say, “I understand how you feel”, as this would be too presumptuous on my part. In NVC we don’t say that we understand, we simply demonstrate the understanding.
Focus on the now – If people tell me things that have happened to them in the past that are still causing them great pain now, I place my focus on what is alive in them now. If I follow them into the past also, I might be tempted to analyse or understand intellectually and lose the presence in the here and now. So to remain in the present, all I need to do is to stay in touch with the feelings and needs of the person now.
Therefore, the question is how you feel now as the result of what has happened to you in the past. For example, if someone were to tell me how his father used to hit him and how scared he was at the time, my attention is to focus on how he feels now. The feeling now might be of anger or rage, therefore my empathic connection will relate with this present feeling and not with the one in the past. Enquiring about the feelings in the here and now is what we also do when a person is using lots of words and jumping from one story to another; we simply interrupt and say, “Excuse me are you feeling…. because…”
Check it out by means of paraphrasing – We are not to assume that we have correctly connected with the feelings and needs of the other person, so we check it out by saying: “Are you feeling… as you do because of your need for…” Reflecting back our understanding is important for two reasons: first, if we have guessed wrong, the person can correct us; second, the person might need some confirmation that we are really with him and are following and understanding him correctly.
It is difficult to empathically connect with a person that says he is going to commit suicide and that the world is better off without him… We tend to analyse, ask questions, give advice… Or with a criticism as when somebody tells us, “The problem with you is…” We need to disregard the criticism as if it has not been made or directed at us and look for feelings and needs behind it. Checking it out with the person so as to give him the opportunity to correct us if we are wrong.
Empathy – Sympathy - Compassion
Empathy - is viscerally feeling what someone else feels. Researchers have called it the “mirror neurons” as empathy may arise automatically when we witness someone in pain. For example, if we see someone missing the nail while hammering and hit his finger instead, we would immediately have a sense of his pain. It is not always this easy, so when it does not come automatically, we need to rely on our imagination. Of course empathy is not just for unpleasant feelings, it is also for pleasant ones as oftentimes the smile of a person makes us smile back.
Sympathy - Most people confuse and mistake sympathy for empathy. Empathy is solidarity and being with the other while sympathy is fundamentally being with ourselves. Furthermore, empathy is more of an attitude, a way of being, and sympathy is more a feeling that comes to us from the understanding of the other person’s situation. If sympathy comes after empathy then it is good; however, if it comes before or instead of empathy then it is not good and does not help the other person or the situation.
Compassion - Compassion takes empathy and sympathy one step further. When we are compassionate, we feel the pain of another (i.e., empathy) or we recognize that the person is in pain (i.e., sympathy), and then we do our best to alleviate the person’s suffering.
Compassion is the end of the process that starts with being with the other person, just feeling his feelings as we need to be present for him first without attempting to understand or grasp the whole situation; second, with the understanding of the situation, we feel sympathy for his cause and in the end we do something with it.
We could look at the mystery of the incarnation of God in this light. God did not attempt to save us from above; instead, he took our human form and dressed in our human nature, from within it he felt sympathy to our condition, and out of compassion saved us.
Who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Philippians 2: 6-8
Summing up what has been said, empathy means that we feel what another person is feeling; sympathy is the feeling that we get out of the understanding we got from his feeling; compassion is what we do about his feeling, the willingness to relieve the suffering of another.
The power of empathy
Rosenberg mentions an experiment his teacher Carl Rogers did to prove that empathy alone may accomplish most of the emotional healing. In this experiment Rogers had two groups of patients, one group was treated by psychotherapists of different schools and the other by lay people with no formal psychotherapy training just using empathy. The outcome showed that the ones who used empathy well, regardless of being psychotherapists or lay people, were the ones who obtained better results.
From this experiment and from his own experience, Rosenberg concludes that empathy by itself is the best way to attain emotional healing as well as resolving conflicts and bringing reconciliation between individuals and between groups of people.
For this to happen, the only requirement is that each of the antagonistic individuals or groups of people must first through self-empathy discover what is alive in themselves at the level of feelings and needs and realize that unmet needs are at the heart of what divide them. Then second through empathy connect with what is alive in the others - their humanness, at the level of their feelings and needs. When this two-way empathic connection is established, conflicts dissolve, healing and reconciliation occur magically, simply because feelings and needs are universal.
Commonality between individuals and groups of people at the level of thoughts and ideas may occur from time to time. However, commonality at the level of feelings and needs can be taken for granted as it occurs always. It is precisely because of this that empathy is the most powerful tool for emotional healing, resolving conflicts and bringing about reconciliation between individuals and groups.
Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC
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