Tag: Q&A

Question: Explain to me why “intimidated” is not a proper feeling-word. Answer: “Intimidated” isn’t an emotion—the word includes an interpretation of the situation. The emotion on its own would probably be fear, maybe anxiety, maybe some other mix. When you say “intimidated”, you’re also bringing up a story about the other person’s behavior, and I’d…

Question: I’m still kind of confused about the NVC general sense of the term ‘need’. I’d before been thinking that NVC talks about ‘needs’ rather than ‘values’ or ‘wants’ because by thinking of them as needs, people would respect the desire once noticing and taking account of it, in themselves and/or others. So this was…

Question: How does “I need to…” relate to NVC needs, such as judgments being alienated expressions of unmet needs? Answer: “I need to” is classified as an internal demand, which is related to a judgment, but a bit different. “Demand” means that fear, guilt, or shame are part of the enforcement system.

Not quite a question, more of a prompt for discussion:  I find it very interesting to say “We don’t talk except to meet our needs.” At one level it’s trivially true because you don’t do anything without a reason. At another, it’s not as true. Often the need in question is ‘fill dead air’ or…