If you have an image of someone cutting off a relationship, it's the cutting off that will lead to your suffering. If you see the action as their need being expressed, then the message is within them, not you. Any interpretation you put onto another person's message (such as passive-aggressive, withholding, etc.), you will pay for because of how you took it.

The most important use of NVC may be in developing self-compassion.

Our goal is to create a quality of empathic connection that allows everyone's needs to be met.

We want to take action out of the desire to contribute to life rather than out of fear, guilt, shame, or obligation.

It's never what people do that makes us angry; it's what we tell ourselves about what they did.

Punishment also includes judgmental labeling and the withholding of privileges.

All violence is the result of people tricking themselves into believing that their pain derives from other people and that consequently those people deserve to be punished.