Dynamics of Empathy - Session #4 - Nonviolent Communication Training - Marshall Rosenberg
I relate empathy to surfboard riding. Imagine yourself getting up on a surfboard, this requires getting in touch with a certain energy. If you don't get on exactly, you can get knocked off. To me, empathy is somewhat like that. Empathy is getting in touch with a life energy that's coming through another person. Now, as I have expressed in other sessions, the life energy that's coming through people at each moment, I have learned can best be described in words by referring to what that person is feeling and needing. The empathic connection that I am interested in sustaining is one in which I can stay connected to the life energy coming through another person. That's what makes it like surfboard riding.
It's a challenge because many people, they don't know how to directly express what's alive in them. So they use a rather choppy language, they often tell you what's alive in them with reference to what's wrong with you. When people need empathy the most, they're often expressing it in a pretty violent way. In that sense, it's very much like surfboard riding. How to get in touch with this energy and flow with it. The energy coming through people is, for me, a very beautiful divine energy. So when I can really stay connected with it, I feel like I'm riding in a very precious flow of energy.