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What participants have said

I have a celebration... I was listening to a discussion between my daughter (17) and her mamma, my ex-wife. My daughter was starting to stare down at the floor and then stood up and walked out of the room. I could hear her crying in the other room... When she came back in I decided to lend them my ears, and started an informal mediation...

This was a big deal for me.

As you can imagine - mediating between my teenage daughter and my ex-wife was a bit scary. Her mamma has not enjoyed some of the interactions she had with me when I was a baby giraffe, practicing my new found classical NVC language... She was often quite triggered by my communication in the past two years.

But in this moment I just cared more about their connection than anyone's view of me, so I just ...INTERRUPTED... started empathizing with my daughter and asked her mamma to repeat the needs...

Really wasn't too hard!

After a couple of rounds, they were both willing to repeat - only needed to pull one or two ears. I saw the connection growing - and I'm sure they did, too! After a while I would just ask "What did you hear?" to the one, and then ask "Was that how you wanted to be heard?"
to the other and they would self-correct, add missing details, share more, or just express gratitude at being heard.

Then there came a moment when my daughter revealed something really scary for her... and then she looked at her mamma and said: "...and I'd really like a hug now...", and they both stood up and hugged one another!! They shared more and the connection sometimes started to drop a bit, and I would step in to lend my ears again - but mostly I stayed out of it after the hug...

I really celebrate the moment I heard my ex-wife say: "I think you're being a drama queen...", and I immediately interrupted with something like: "... so when you say drama queen, is it that you're really needing some genuine connection?"... and she looked over at me, kinda confused, and then nodded her head and said "... yeah!"

They both celebrated me after it was over and we all hugged.

Thank you Liv and John and Ike and Kay - you saved at least two lives today. Now there's no stopping me...

Love, jas...)  (Participant in mediation training)