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For many, spending time with relatives over the holidays may be challenging. In addition to the love and care we may feel, family gatherings can bring up old hurts or expose painful differences. How many family meals have been marred by tense silence or devolved into harsh argument?

Trainer Tip: Mindfulness, focusing on what's happening now, is the foundation of Compassionate Communication. The more present we are, the greater the chance we will be aware of our needs and meet them, thus the greater opportunity for joy. Connect to your feelings and needs at least four times today. Notice how differently you conduct your day when you are mindful.

Ask the Trainer: An NVC Academy member from Bosnia asks: "Is the NVC process truly effective in places where so much violence has occurred and people's pain is very deep?"

Along with it’s potential for helping others calm their emotions and feel deeply understood, the Nonviolent Communication process of empathetic listening can help someone increase their capacity for finding their own truth.

Listen to Jim and Jori Manske share their understanding of discernment to gain clarity, insight, and wisdom for making life-serving distinctions and choices.

Miki speaks to peace activists about connecting with the life vision in those who stimulate pain in them.

For each reactive pattern there is a perceived threat to a tender need. Knowing these tender needs helps us figure out how to interrupt these patterns and creating new ways of perceiving and relating to life. In addition to knowing the need, knowing the healing response and the primary reactive behavior helps with transformation.

How do you know when you’re projecting disowned parts or replaying old relationship dynamics? It’s hard to know for sure, but if you find yourself upset or shutting down and unable to have a dialogue in which you can speak clearly about your feelings and needs and empathize with the other’s feelings and needs, there is likely a projection. The stronger your reaction, the more likely you are projecting.

Ask the Trainer: "I have the understanding that the unconscious is vast compared to conscious mind. When I state 'needs' how well can I depend on there being something beneath my awareness that is actually the motivation?"

There are many polarizing issues we can resist and fight over. The word "resistance" can mean fighting against what we don’t agree with in counterproductive ways. It can also be the illusion and futility of mentally fighting against reality of 'what is'. But acceptance, non-resistance, of what is doesn’t mean powerless resignation. Another way to resist is to accept and love whole-heartedly, with empathy and care for the people doing the things we are resisting.