Daily 5 minute NVC Practice

Transcript in case you’d like to easily look up something:

If you read a book about NVC and you have trouble to put it into practice.. or maybe you’ve done a course in NVC but already a while ago and you notice you fall back into old habits? This video is for you! We’re going to create a daily NVC practice. Because NVC is in a way just like any new habit: sports or meditation.. if you stop doing it, you lose the muscle, you lose the habit. So I’m going to help you to have this daily practice.

It’s going to be a five minute guided self-empathy. You are going to practice expressing honesty and listening empathically, but to yourself.. because that’s the most easy thing to do every day. But then, for the rest of the day it’s much easier to put it into practice with other people. And also, it’s going to work like an emotional hygiene. Because every day you are going to do this, and it will prevent things from piling up and exploding later.

If, in this moment, you are very upset or have very strong emotions, I would recommend a different video. I will put the link up here. And, other than that, if that’s not the case.. let’s get started! Grab a pen and a piece of paper or something else you can write on. And make sure you have kind of a comfortable seat. Then we can start.

So our first step is our feeling in this moment. So maybe you would like to close your eyes for a second and just check your body, especially your core.. And maybe also your shoulders, and your throat.. your chest.. what do you feel? And then, open your eyes and check the feeling list. Just check if the feeling is on the list, because sometimes we have something that sounds like a feeling but it’s actually a thought. For example, I feel ignored, that’s not a feeling – it’s a pseudo-feeling, it’s actually a thought. So check your feeling on the list and write it down. And after you wrote it down, maybe you have several feelings, so write them all down.. you are just going to close your eyes again and just feel it again, just for two breaths.

Okay, then we’re going to move to step two. Which is your thoughts. So as you may know, feelings are created by your thoughts. So now we are going to see which thoughts created your feelings. So for each feeling there is a thought. So my tip for this one is to be really uncensored. We’ve learned to be nice, but maybe your thought is like “my boyfriend is such an ashole, he’s an egoist” or “he likes that girl more than me” or “my boss is manipulative” or “my mom is wining so much”. You know, anything. This is the moment to be really free. To really give space to any thought. We’re not going to put them away, it’s not healthy in my belief. So, write them down, each of them, and connect them with the right feeling. So write the thought next to the feeling that belongs to it.

So step three. Any thought you have is linked to an event in real life. So maybe you know this already, this is called the observation: the writing down of what happened. We’re going to do this without any judgement. It’s going to be completely neutral. If you don’t know how to do this, if you haven’t done this before, I would recommend watching a more in-depth video, I will have a link again about this. And, if you just want to try it right now, that’s fine as well. Just try to write down: what is it that – mostly someone else – said or did that triggered this thought in you? Write it down as short as you can, and also make sure that each thought is again linked to one event.

Now we’re going to move to step four.. and this is really the most essential and the most joyful step I would say. We’re going to see if we can find your needs. So behind each thought that you wrote down, there is a need. So check the card that I’m going to show you, and try to find your need. Anything that really speaks to you? And if you’re short in time, just pick one thought and find one need. Now once you find your need and you wrote it down, then I want you to close your eyes again.. and connect with this need. Do you really see the beauty of this need? This is really the step of seeing yourself as beautiful.. as human. Any thought you have, any feeling, it is a super human thing..

So our last step, step five – and this is an optional step – this is finding your request. So if you have a certain need that is not met, you just discovered it, it might be that you want to take a step to fulfil this need. My tip would be to make it very concrete. So if you tell yourself “Okay, I am going to stand up more for myself with my brother.” That’s not concrete and specific enough. So what would be specific is: “Next time my brother asks me to do something and I don’t feel like doing it, I am going to say no and I will explain why.” That would be a concrete and specific way to make a request for yourself. And obviously, you can also make a request to someone else. So if you would like to make a request, look at your need and try to come up with a request.

So now you completed the five steps.. close your eyes one more time, and just check how you feel. Maybe it’s exactly the same as when you started. That’s okay. Maybe something shifted? And then check if there’s any gratitude towards yourself taking this time for you. Open your eyes again. And now you fully completed your five minutes a day practice. I’m happy for you. Do this every day, then you’re really going to grow in your NVC, I’m sure.

So last but not least, if you don’t have this feeling and needs sheet that you saw, go to my website and leave your email address and I will send it to you for free. So you can print it out, take it with you, do this exercise anywhere. And last but not least, subscribe to the YouTube channel if you enjoy these videos, you will get updates when there is a new one. If you have any questions or comments, put them down below. I’m very curious how you find this practice and I’d love to see you again next time. Ciao!