When we hear the other person's feelings and needs, we recognize our common humanity.

The most dangerous of all behaviors may consist of doing things 'because we're supposed to.

People don't make us angry, how we think makes us angry.

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

Labeling and diagnosis is a catastrophic way to communicate. Telling other people what's wrong with them greatly reduces, almost to zero, the probability that we're going to get what we're after.

We are compassionate with ourselves when we are able to embrace all parts of ourselves and recognize the needs and values expressed by each part.

This objective of getting what we want from other people-or getting them to do what we want them to do-threatens the autonomy of people, their right to choose what they want to do. And whenever people feel that they're not free to choose what they want to do, they are likely to resist, even if they see the purpose in what we are asking and would ordinarily want to do it.