David Weinstock • NVC Empowerment
SURF Practices (to-watch)https://youtu.be/aOkV6UrsdVU
Shape Shifting Practice
https://youtu.be/mMPvDxtTztY\
The Hollow Bone
https://youtu.be/42Oo8vPEC50
Choosing Decisively
https://youtu.be/mft3JAJBkko
Mary Mackenzie Self-Empathy: Three Simple Processes that Offer Profound Results
1) I love it when…(insert need)2) Dipping Into the Needs (adapted from NLP process)
Name first need that comes up…
If that need was met, what need would that meet?
If that need was met, what need would that meet?
Continue until you experience an internal shift.
Go with the first need that comes to mind – whether it makes sense to you or not
Don’t over-think the process – your connection to needs will guide the process
3) What do I want…and why do I want it?
I want Bob to stop snapping his gum…because I want peace.
I want Sally to be a better listener…because I want to be heard.
I want the kids to simmer down…because I want rest.
Roxy Manning Closing Privilege Gaps
Power = ability to mobilize resources to meet needs
Structural power = have sufficient external resources within a system that carry social, cultural, legal power or legitimacy, usu. by assignation of role/ job title, or by membership in a group/ caste (some members better able to meet needs, e.g. as parents'/ teachers I have legal & social power)
Structural privilege = access to resources that result from level/ social norms, without any action, inaction or awareness of the disparity in access or its benefits and costs (e.g. as a teacher, PhD I get respect)
Rank = the "sum of a person's privileges;“... a "conscious or unconscious, social or personal ability or power arising from culture, community support, personal psychology or spiritual power.”
Whether or not I ask for it, whether or not I was a part of making that resource, I have more access, resources.
Where do you have privilege?
In what areas of your life, if any, do you have rank?
What privileges do you receive due to your rank? Rank = what society ascribes to us
- Education (bachelor), English language, smart, can read, use computer, studied abroad,
- Able-bodied, pretty, tall, heterosexual, have a house with internet, live in city, supportive family, friends
- Experienced many things, no criminal record
Where do you lack privilege?
- No PhD, not long experience, no high job title
- Woman, young in this family, Vietnamese/ Asian
- Little experience in legal/ real estate, the money/ underground world
I can fully be with you. Your pain is not a judgment of who I am.
Double-edged: For each privilaged we have, what are the benefits and costs
Challenges connecting across rank/ privielge:
- Limited perspective
- constrained observation
- constrained understanding of everyone's needs
- Restricted access to resources
- limited feedback (go down privilege spectrum)
- insufficient entrustment
- withholding of opportunity
Exercise: give each group a bag of papers, glue, those with privilege said we don't try hard enough, those without say we don't have resources. With privilege
Exercise: 10 closest people: race, gender, education --> similar to you
Caste by Isabel Wilkerson
My Grandmother’s Hands by Resmaa Menakem
How to Be An Antiracist by Ibram X Kendi
What are some ways NVC can be used that perpetuates power imbalances?
- Observation: what we see is constrained. Folks with money - I had a great connection time. Folks without - so much food wasted. If we only talk about camera observation, how can we talk about racism? One and one example, the intersection is racism.
- Feelings: who gets to have what feelings. Black angry is less welcomed. Not able to express emotions is looked down in NVC circles.
- Needs: whose needs get voiced, attended to, whose needs are questioned. Safety for one white man overrode my need for expression.
- Requests: I demand that we go back and back to meet that needs. I will not give up on that need being neglected. I'm not attached to strategy.
- Empathy: If you are in power, be willing to show your emotion, not just ask me. Or if you're in power and need empathy, don't ask the person in pain to put their pain down to listen to you.
Where have you used NVC in ways that centered or attended to the needs of those with more rank, over those with less?
- I asked my kids to put down their annoyance and listen empathetically to their parents.
Where have you experienced NVC centering the needs of those with more rank than others?
- Prioritizing those with better language abilities
What do we do?
- Maintain compassionate stance
- Join affinity groups (talk about it with people who're similar to me, less burden on others)
- Ask/ be curious - Acknowledge I don't know. Be mindful, do your own research.
- Solicit feedback
- Be vulnerable
- Compost shame
- Resource with empathy
- Educate yourself (systemic/ historical)
- Increase somatic awareness
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