A Cooling Moment

To speak or not to speak? How to frame what to say? Is it good to speak anyway. Is now a good time? That’s a really important question. It necessarily builds in a life saving pause between thought/feeling and action. A cooling moment when the heat is rising and the compulsion to speak, or write, is almost overwhelming. Thankfully there isn’t anything really important or pressing I need to communicate right at this moment.

While going through my bookmarked pages, something I do when looking for blogging inspiration, I came across Marshall Rosenberg talking about the basics of Non Violent Communication. I’ve not always connected so well with NVC as it is commonly passed along. This site makes the whole thing more easily understandable and less, how do we say, verbally stultifying. I’ll return and take a longer look.

In the mean time there is nothing that can replace the simple act of sitting still. A moment to cool, whatever the weather!

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5 thoughts on “A Cooling Moment”

  1. Where I flounder with NVC is in identifying the underlying need in myself and then finding ways to meet that need. It seems somehow not quite to be in tune with our way of trying to live and I become confused. How to distinguish need from want? Do I just want things to be different? Can I console myself with impermanence and try to let the need and the associated feelings go? Is having a need at all something to work on and try to let go? And when it comes down to it in the end (basic food and shelter needs having been met) isn’t it all about wanting (needing?) love and recognition. To be heard and acknowledged? Oh dear, it makes me feel very inadequate – and there’s obviously a need underlying that feeling…

    1. I do appreciate what you say here Chris. Need is a loaded word and within the context of our practice and the language we use it does not fit, not well anyway. There maybe another word to use or an understanding of ‘need’ which sits better within our context. I’ll have to think about that.
      I understand that the Buddha taught that peoples basic needs are important and I believe that would have been more than simply food and shelter. Distinguishing between need and want is tricky and it doesn’t mean that we should not have what we want either. I feel it is when want turns into MUST HAVE that things go pear shaped, or can.
      Anyway, thanks for leaving the comment Chris. Now I think about it this need business is where I have tripped up on NVC. All the same I do think/feel there are very useful aspects. What comes to mind is the distinguishing between observation and expectation.

  2. Hm-m-m, some really good considerations here. Chris’s comment describes a lot of what I’ve gone through when looking at NVC. At the same time I’ve heard some very helpful communication from folks who can make it real with NVC.

    I appreciate the distinction between observation and expectation, Rev. Mugo. Seems to be that’s where I try to rest, neither comfortable nor uncomfortable, but willing to sincerely bumble along. I say good on all of us for making the effort!

    I look forward to more of your thoughts about this, Chris and Rev. Mugo. Thank you both.

  3. I like the idea that it is the ‘must have’ or seemingly imperative nature of wants that is the challenge. When I look at my needs, they are really very few indeed, but of course my wants run into the hundreds, or so it seems. Perhaps one of our tasks is to sit with the wanting and to try to let it pass through. It seems that when I can identify a want and then look at it with kindness, it is less likely to give me quite such a hard time; and if I can do my absolute best to be kind both to the want and to myself, then perhaps it will become less imperative. Of course sitting with wanting a piece of chocolate is somewhat less challenging than sitting with wanting to be appreciated and supported. But I console myself, when the going gets tough, that perhaps letting go of that Cadbury’s fruit and nut will somehow make it easier to gently loosen the hold of the wanting to be appreciated and acknowledged.

    With bows

  4. There is an unobstructed awareness within each and everyone. It underlies and flows through our whole being, with an immediacy that’s beyond time and place. It is the most intimate, absolute communicating, beyond words, with every aspect of our being, that I know of. ‘It’ can’t possibly get stuck in words, feeling, notions and perceptions as our mind does. It pierces right through it. It is worth living ánd dying for.

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