One for the Books: A Celebration!

This is an excerpt from the weekly News-Loveletter. If you would like it sent to your inbox directly (with all the other juicy bits, including a mini joy practice), you can add yourself to my mailing list here.

Four years ago, my long-time friend and former empathy buddy, Stephanie Bachmann Mattei, invited me to join her in writing a book about Marshall Rosenberg’s key distinctions. Rosenberg started Nonviolent Communication (NVC) in the 1960’s and noted that learning often hinged on making keener and keener distinctions between topics. What happens when we think of love as a feeling rather than love as a need, for example? Is the latter less fleeting?

The Heart of Nonviolent Communication: 25 Keys to Shift from Separation to Connection explores 25 key distinctions that reveal the consciousness embedded in Nonviolent Communication. Drawing on brain science with awareness of systemic conditioning, each chapter presents examples from around the world alongside practices aimed to move one toward the spirit of true connection. Available for pre-order now, our book will be released by Puddledancer Press on April 1st.

The writing here is not as spare and down-to-earth as my usual. You can read a sample chapter here and pre-order here if it's a fit. Stephanie brought to this project a boat-load of science along with years of experience as an assessor of certified trainers with Center for Nonviolent Communication. I brought my experience from teaching workshops and in schools as well as my history as a writer. I learned a lot from both the project and the process.

The Heart of Nonviolent Communication is chock-full of ideas we hope will spur the reader’s further exploration. I myself find the practices and life stories most accessible. Many brought tears to my eyes.

What projects have you completed with old friends and what did you learn in the process?