Love - a Basic Communication Style?

Marshall Rosenberg PhD, founder of "nonviolent communication" (NVC), said that the only thing anyone really means to say is 'please don't hurt me.' This is a potent statement!

NVC "focuses on 3 aspects of communication:

• self-empathy (deep & compassionate awareness of one's own inner experience),

• empathy (an understanding of the heart in which we see the beauty in the other person), and • honest self-expression (expressing oneself authentically in a way that is likely to inspire compassion in others)." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonviolent_Communication

The ego and speech are "left-brain" functions. The fearful, self-centered ego function on its own simply does not see clearly AND this is reflected in how we communicate while in left-brain mode - which for most of us is, most of the time. Tennessee Williams: “Nobody sees anybody truly but all through the flaws of their own egos." Accurate awareness of, and empathy for self & others are "right brain" functions (which include the "heart", body, and the rest of humanity & cosmos): http://jglovas.wixsite.com/awarenessnow/single-post/2017/03/23/Mindfulness---Clarity-and-Love

NVC joins Taoism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and the mystics & saints of all major spiritual traditions in trying to "reunite" (more accurately, help us experience the fact that such boundaries don't exist) the "two sides of the same coin" - the individual & the whole - in a healthy, balanced, harmonious relationship.

“Midlife is the time to let go of an overdominant ego and to contemplate the deeper significance of human existence.” C.G. Jung

Body-based meditations are potent correctives for overdominant, noisy egos (left brains).

“The body itself, the cells of our body, are always and forever in a meditative state, meaning the awareness of the cells is unconditionally open and receiving information from the ends of the universe. Everything that can ever be known by us is already known by our cells - these pools of awareness, these trillions of worlds that are like receptors. Meditation can only be practiced by our cells – by the totality of our Soma. Our job as meditators is simply to tune in to the meditative state – the infinite open meditative state – that is the basic truth and reality of our Soma. For the first time with Whole Body Breathing we see truly what it means to meditate in an embodied way.” Reginald A. Ray. "Practice Five: Whole Body Breathing and Rooting." http://www.shambhala.com/theawakeningbody

“Forget the self and you will fear nothing, in whatever level or awareness you find yourself to be.” Carlos Castaneda