Principles for a good life

Most of us define violence as a harmful activity that harms another person, society, animals, plants or an object. It can be physical, verbal, social, sexual or otherwise. Violence is known to have a physical, mental, and achievement effect over the years.

 

When I was exposed to the non-violent communication, the violence took on a much broader definition. I connected to it right away. It explained so many difficult feelings I felt over many years, in my childhood and after.

Violence in its broadest sense includes anything that makes us uncomfortable, and in particular that causes feelings of fear, guilt or shame. It also includes self-violence, meaning that every time I blame myself for something I act violently towards myself. Actions such as insult, shouting, accusation, contempt, humiliation, condescension, punishment - all these are violent acts.

 

Violence, even the mildest, leaves scars, harms the psyche and takes a long time to recover from. We learn at a very young age to develop mechanisms that help us defend against violence, and these mechanisms have heavy costs, such as decreased self-esteem, mental harm, impaired self-esteem, and more.

 

Fear is a survival mechanism. It helps us to identify danger very quickly, and activates physical mechanisms in the body that help to stay away from danger - puts the body under stress, injects adrenaline, and prepares us for a fight or flight state. In this state the body acts out of instincts and less out of considered thought. We would act to protect ourselves from the danger and would not be free to live a normal life. So when someone else launches a scary action on us, we move into a state of survival. Our body cannot be in this state for long, it is eroding. So fear is harmful to us both physically and mentally. Anxiety is already a chronic state of fear, with severe effects over time.

 

Guilt and shame are emotions that often connect to the conflict we have between our actions and the values ​​we believe in (also known as conscience). This is an emotion that comes to keep us from doing immoral acts. This emotion also has long-term psychological consequences, they cause discomfort in the body that does not pass until the conflict is resolved. This emotion activates the stress hormones (cortisol) so that the person who feels guilty will be tense, blush, sweat excessively and the pulse will accelerate. This condition is also unhealthy for us, and causes long-term effects. So when someone makes us feel guilty or ashamed, we would be uncomfortable, and our body would go into stress.

​

Physical violence, for example, can activate the fear mechanism in us, verbal violence can activate the mechanism of guilt or shame. It is clear that we would not agree to be in these situations for a long time. But even in situations where someone, for example, would belittle you in front of other people and cause you a strong feeling of shame - we can identify as a violent situation and choose how to react to it.

​

Non-violent communication provides tools for dealing with violent situations, by avoiding the use of violence ourselves. The observation that avoids interpretation, blame and judgment, clarifies feelings and needs without exerting guilt feelings on the other side, a request that does not exert any pressure - all the basic components of non-violent communication are actually motivated by non-violence.

​

We wouldn't chose the non-violent communication approach against all kinds of violence, because it is not always appropriate. For example in a life-threatening situation we will instinctively choose to perhaps run away or stay and fight, and that would be the right thing to do. But when we are in the company of the people closest to us, and they treat us with such violence that causes us fear, guilt or shame, there is a very powerful tool here that helps maintain a relationship, while maintaining ourselves, our resilience, and our psyche.

 

 

 

​