I absolutely love it when someone puts words together so simply to describe something that can seem so complicated! Tammy Lenski’s description is so clear, so I stole it and put it here. Thanks Tammy! In court cases, settlement agreements reached through mediation signal the end of the litigation. But in conflict between people who… Continue Reading
Power Struggles
This photo reminds me of the legal system. Parties spend a lot of time and energy making their case – building their story of how they are better or more deserving or more right than the other. They pay an attorney to argue their case to a judge, then the judge gets to decide… Continue Reading
Anger
Anger is an honest human emotion. We use it to mobilize into constructive action and make great things happen. When anger acts to create good, it an awesome tool. (Ray Calabrese) For so many years, I thought “good girls don’t get angry.” I thought is so much that it became a core belief – those… Continue Reading
Compromise
If I give up on half of what I want to make someone else happy or to avoid negative consequences, the results are short-lived, and we each get to share 50% of the leftover resentment. A shift in needs is different. If I am giving to you because it makes me happy to contribute to… Continue Reading
NVC Mediation – Empathetic Presence
Nonviolent Communication, based in large part on the work of Carl Rogers, is the best model of mediation I have found to stay fully connected to my own humanity. Continue Reading
Just do one thing at a time
Wasted time or one thing, one moment, one day at a time. Continue Reading
Meatloaf and Lampshades
I received this email from a friend, and I am sharing it with you with her permission. Enjoy! This morning my husband and I were connecting at the breakfast table. During our conversation he said, ‘I don’t understand why you never make the same meatloaf twice. Once you perfect a dish why do you find… Continue Reading
BOUNDARIES
A boundary is something that indicates my limits. I may not even realize thI have a boundary, until it gets crossed. So I come at the understanding backwards. Continue Reading
“Taking the Dread Out of Saying No”
NVC Certified Trainer Faye Landey wrote a wonderful article called “Taking the Dread Out of Saying No.” Her statement that fear of saying no is “embedded in the domination system.” What is the domination system? It is a system where power over many lies in the hands of a few. In domination systems people are… Continue Reading
