Don't make a whole to-do about it. Don't get down on yourself be- cause you're not an expert rower; don't start reading too many books in order to do it right.

Sometimes you come to a fall and sometimes you come to white water. Your rowing has to adapt to the situation. You can't do the same stroke coming down a small stream as you would coming down Niagara Falls. Even if you're only rowing down a stream, different things happen: maybe the wind changes, maybe the current, and suddenly everything's different. So gently is really important. Don't power yourself or blast through; rock with the way things are.

The extraordinary language of Nonviolent Communication is changing how parents relate to children, teachers to students, and how we all related to each other and even to ourselves. It is precise, disciplined, and enormously compassionate. Most important, once we study NVC we can't ignore the potential for transformation that lies in any difficult relationship - if we only bother to communicate with skill and empathy.

Our work may be important, but we don't take it too seriously. Otherwise, we get attached to one relatively small thing and ignore the rest of life.

whatever judgment we make is a subjective one we're making now, and that it could change.

When you care about perfection, you care about an expectation. But there is also caring for where I am right now, for what's happening right now. When I spend time with students, they tell me that they've read something in a book or heard something from a teacher that they don't think they're living up to. And I tell them, “Take care of yourself right now. Befriend what's happening, not just who you're supposed to be or what the world should be like. This is where you are now. So how do you care for yourself this minute?

Don't make a whole to-do about it. Don't get down on yourself be- cause you're not an expert rower; don't start reading too many books in order to do it right.