Communicate with Confidence

The Communicate with Confidence and Compassion course, based on the concept of Non-Violent Communication (NVC) was so good for anyone who finds conventional learning hard and needs a more multi-sensory approach to gaining information and skills. 

 

So many times people come to the Centre and say, “I want to improve my communication skills” and when you delve deeper, it is not just the communication with people you don’t know well that is tricky, it is often our communication with close friends and family that bothers us. We expect so much from our relationships and feel we are putting in our best efforts but things still seem to go wrong, we are still misunderstood or misunderstand. 

 

We have just completed an 8 week course on Communication skills at the Centre lead by Bridget Belgrave. This however, was not just an ordinary course – confidence is necessary for good communication but, so that it is not just one sided, we need to have compassion, to be able to see things from the other person’s point of view; to be able to recognise not just our own needs but also those of the person we are trying to communicate with. Our facilitator Bridget led us through a number of exercises and the penny slowly dropped, that needs are at the heart of our communication. 

 

Once we start to understand why we and the other person feel a certain way and what each of our needs are, compassion kicks in and communication improves. 

We had great feedback about the course 

 

• I am now much less afraid of expressing my feelings towards others. I can express myself in a more genuine, compassionate way. 

• It has given me greater understanding regarding how I ‘come over’ to others and how not to get caught up and be dominated by others in a conversation. 

• I feel much calmer, more at peace, more able to talk. 

• It has equipped me with skills on how to cope in certain situations. 

 

If you would like to find out more about NVC and Bridget’s work look at www.liferesources.org.uk or www.nvc-uk.com.