By Marshall Rosenberg *
RESPONDING TO A "NO"
Responding to a refusal is a four-part process rooted in empathy:
1. Describe the situation
2. Guess the other person's feelings.
3. Guess the reason for that feeling, together with the unmet need;
then let the person verify whether you have correctly understood.
4. Clarify the unmet need.
When people say no in a nasty way, what they invariably want is to protect their autonomy. They have heard a request as a demand and are saying, in effect, "I want to do it when I choose to do it, and not because I am forced to do it." Sighing, sulking, or screaming can likewise reflect a desire to protect one's freedom of choice, one's need to act from a position of willingness. If people scream at us, we do not scream back. We listen beneath the words and hear what they are really saying-that they have a need and want to get their need met.
If a mother has asked her daughter to please do her chores and she has refused, the Giraffe dance may go something like this:
Parent: Are you feeling annoyed right now because you want to do your chores at your own pace rather than being forced to do them?
Child: Yeah, I'm sick and tired of being a slave. (Note the defensive mode, indicating a need to be listened to.)
Parent: So, you really want to do things when it feels good to do them, and you're not just avoiding them altogether?
Child: You order me around! (The child still needs to be listened to. The parent must keep guessing what the child is saying about feelings and wants.)
Parent: So, it's frustrating when I seem to be ordering you around and you have no choice about when to do your chores.
Child: I don't want to do chores! They're stupid. If you want them done, you do them.
Parent: You really hate doing chores and you would like me to do all of them?
Child: Yeah.. no.. I don't know. I just don't feel like being bossed around. (The child is becoming vulnerable and starting to open up because she's feeling heard without judgment.)
If we have been Jackalish and demanding in the past, the people close to us may need a lot of empathy at first. So we listen and listen, reflecting back with guesses about what they are feeling and wanting, until they feel heard and shift out of being defensive. We don't take anything personally, for we know that upset, attacking, defensive statements are tragic expressions of unmet needs. At some point, the person's voice and body language will indicate that a shift has occurred.
At a meeting I attended at a mosque in a refugee camp near Jerusalem, a man suddenly stood up and cried, "Murderer!" As a Giraffe, all I heard was "Please!"-that is, I heard the pain, the need that wasn't being met. That is where I focused my attention. After about 40 minutes of speaking, he did what most of us do when we sense we have been accurately heard and listened to: he changed. The situation was immediately defused of all tension.
In international disputes, as well as in relationship, business, classroom, and parent-child conflicts, we can learn to hear the human being behind the message, regardless of how the message is framed. We can learn to hear the other person's unmet needs and requests. Ultimately, listening empathetically does not imply doing what the person wants; rather, it implies showing respectful acknowledgment of the individual's inner world. As we do that, we move from the coercive language we have been taught to the language of the heart.
Speaking from the heart is a gesture of love, giving other people an opportunity to contribute to our well-being and to exercise generosity. Empathetically receiving what is going on in others is a reciprocal gesture. Giraffes experience love as openness and sensitivity, with no demands, criticism, or requirements to fulfill requests at either end of the dispute. And the outcome of any dialogue ruled by love is harmony.
In the end, Jackals are simply illiterate Giraffes. Once you've learned to hear the heart behind any message, you discover that there's nothing to fear in anything another person says. With that discovery, you are well on your way to compassionate communication. This form of dialogue, although offering no guarantees of agreement between disputing parties, sets the stage for negotiation, compromise, and most importantly, mutual understanding and respect.
*Dr. Marshall Rosenberg, founder of the international nonprofit Center for Nonviolent Communication,
