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Trainer Tip: Have you ever noticed how often we back up when we find ourselves in a conflict? Or how much we try to pull away when someone is angry or in emotional pain?

How to get past the sting of a painful comment? Get empathy from self or another. Then connect with the commenter's feelings and needs. The more you can do this the less personally you may take it. Then work together on specific, do-able, authentic agreement about doing something differently next time, the kind that will enable you both to shift out of reactivity. Three things need to be in place for that to work.

In listening to what our emotions tell us, and embracing what we do not know, we begin the path of courage. Even though our culture tells us not to, revealing our imperfections is where we can deeply connect. Living our lives more courageously honest, can shift us towards inspiring one another. Read on for how some people experienced this in coming together to transform one woman's heroine addiction.

Trainer Tip: When we feel resentment toward others, we are harming our own emotional health. Surprisingly, when we own up to our part of an uncomfortable situation, we can release the pain and resentment. Such honesty can provide healing. Read on for a related anecdote of how this can play out.

Listen as Mary Mackenzie shares an eight step path to create your own NVC learning activities, based on your own NVC learning experience. In this session, Mary uses the value of requests and observations as teaching examples.

We can ask for what we want but if we repeatedly don’t get it from one source, it's our responsibility to find a new way to get it. We don’t honor our relationships when we insist that people who are unavailable or unwilling to support us meet our needs. Read on for related a parable about a woman persistently asking to get milk from a hardware store.

Trainer Tip: When there's conflict if you set the intention to connect and build trust first, you're more likely to move towards resolution. This can be built through offering reflections that captures essence of what's important to each party. Once connection and trust is established, then begin the process of creating strategies and solutions.

In October 2016, CNVC Certified Trainer Gitta Zimmerman held her 5th international workshop for people working with street children in Ruhpolding, Germany. This time most of the participants were already experienced, and we were merging more and more into a family. The workshop focus was on “mediation” and “entrepreneurship.