Stop Apologizing for What You Need: A More Compassionate Way to Communicate

In this episode of the Changeology podcast, I speak with Kate Brown, coach, holistic therapist, and educator, about how we can communicate our needs clearly and without guilt.

If you are like many women I coach, you probably hesitate to ask for what you need. You might feel guilty. You might feel selfish. You might believe that someone will think less of you if you stop trying to anticipate and meet everyone else’s needs first.

This is a problem. It keeps women stuck in unsatisfying careers, depleted relationships, and patterns of burnout.

In this conversation, Kate introduces a simple four-part framework called Compassionate Communication. It helps you name your feelings, identify your real needs, and ask for what you want in a clear and kind way.

We also talk about what happens when you stop trying to manage everyone else’s emotions and start taking responsibility for your own. And we cover the very common experience of guilt that surfaces when women begin to prioritize their needs for the first time.

If you are navigating a big change or simply want to show up more fully in your own life, this conversation will give you tools to start.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

-How to communicate your needs without apology
-Why feeling guilty about needing things is so common for women, and how to move through it
-How most people get their feelings and needs wrong, and how to build real clarity
-Why meeting your own needs first allows you to give from a place of strength

 Connect with Kate: calmatworktherapy.com, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn.

The REAL Change Kickstart is a 45-day 1:1 coaching intensive designed to help you:

• Identify the behaviors keeping you stuck
• Unlearn what is no longer serving you
• Create new patterns that align with what you truly want

Click here to get started.

Interested in longer-term support for making a significant change? You can apply to work with Meg here.

Want to learn more about the art, science, philosophy, and psychology of making significant life changes? Sign up HERE for my weekly newsletter and have the Changeology podcast delivered straight into your inbox!

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Transcript

Kate Brown

@3:06 - Meg Trucano 

So hello, hello. to another episode of Changelogy. My guest today is Kate Brown.

Kate is a coach, holistic therapist, and educator specializing in compassionate communication, which helps individuals and groups express and understand the needs driving their behaviors.

And through her work in further education and in her own business, comment work, Kate empowers people to navigate change with empathy, self-awareness, and meaningful dialogue.

Her approach fosters deeper relationships, emotional resilience, and a more connected world.

@3:52 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

Welcome, you so much for having me your podcast.

@3:55 - Meg Trucano 

Absolutely. I'm delighted to speak with you today. So as you know, The changeology podcast is all about making big, bold, bad- life changes, and unsurprisingly, one of the most consistently difficult parts of making any big change is around communication, right?

communication with our partners, with our family, colleagues, supervisors, and really even communication with ourselves in terms of understanding what our genuine needs are.

@4:27 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

Absolutely, yeah.

@4:28 - Meg Trucano 

Yeah, and so I think it's something that each of us does every single day communicate, right? But I'd love to hear you talk about a different way to communicate, and one that really focuses on the primary goal of communication, which is to convey needs and feelings so they get fulfilled.

So, Kate, please tell us what exactly is compassionate communication?

@4:51 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

So, compassionate communication is another name, if you like, for non-violent communication. So, some people might have heard about it in that, that, that.

So non-violent communication is an idea that was sort of written down and put down in book form and taught by a guy called Marshall Rosenberg, so people may have come across it that way.

passionate communication was the name he wanted to give it, so the story goes, but actually non-violent communication was the word that sort of stuck for it, which he was never overly keen about, again, so the sort of legend story goes because it's telling you what it isn't rather than what it is when we're saying non-violent, we're not actually saying what we are doing.

And the whole point of non-violent communication, compassionate communication, is to say what is and what you want rather than what isn't and what you don't want.

So it was a little bit of an irony almost that that is the name that stuck for it. So compassionate communication, you sort of already alluded to, is all about deeper connection and proper connection with people by getting your needs met.

So it's got quite a simple but not easy formula if you like, it's a four-part formula so it's letters say the name ofna so O is observation so you start by making an observation and that sounds easy but actually it isn't an observation has to be just an observation which means that absolutely anybody would agree with what you're saying there's no judgment in there there's no story in there there's no expectations or emotionally laden language in there there's nothing in there that anyone could take any sort of offense to or start to become on the defensive about it is just an observation and then the F part of the off-neck is your feelings so in response to this observation how do I feel so my feelings in response to this observation and sounds super easy right but we often don't have the emotional literacy to actually know

our feelings are. Most people know mad, sad and happy and very few people can name emotions beyond that, especially under pressure, especially in a situation where you might want to be able to.

So that's a difficulty in and of itself and also actually naming the feeling and getting it right helps you with the next stage.

So just saying I'm angry might not be true. You might actually be frustrated, which is not quite the same as angry or you might even be something completely different, but you're lumping it in with So you might actually be lonely, but you've sort of made that an anger thing.

So yeah, it sort of depends what your feeling is, but you're going to try and get it as accurately as possible.

And then the reason it's so important to get that accurate is because the next part of the statement is the end, the need.

So I'm now going to tell you what my feeling. So my feelings are just communications. They're not good or bad.

They're not positive or negative, even though we label them such, they're just communication. So our feelings tell us about our needs.

So if I am able to label my feeling correctly, it's going to really help me get to my need so much easier.

And the feelings that we normally label as positive or good, they're telling us that a need is getting met.

And the feelings that we normally label as negative or bad, all their telling us is that we have an unmet need.

So then I'm going to tell you what my need is. And it's what my need is, not what I need you to do.

That's completely different and something that isn't my need at all. And then the last part of this four-part formula is the R.

It's the request. So once I know what my need is, I'm going to request something, either of you or of myself, which was going to help me fulfill my need, get my need met.

And that's how life becomes better for everyone, right? As we get our needs met, just life becomes a better, more enjoyable experience.

the connection comes because it doesn't matter how different I am to you as a human, I can experience and will experience the same feelings and the same needs as you.

So even the way that this has been used in the past and the way Marshall used, it was in really big mediation situations, you know, sort of really big world conflict situations.

So it doesn't matter if you have any image of the other person, it doesn't matter if you absolutely hate their actions, you can completely and wholeheartedly disagree with them on pretty much anything they believe or anything they are doing and still connect with them on a feelings and a needs level.

And it's that connection that allows us to start seeing the other person as human again and allows us to get to resolution and to get.

through conflict. So if that can be done, and it has been done on a world stage with major conflicts, then we're using that same idea in our everyday really, for conflict, also for just deepening relationships and having clear communication that is, you know, Brenny Brown says, you know, clear is kind, right?

So if we're having clear communication, we're being kind and compassionate with each other, and that's going to make everything a lot easier.

@10:32 - Meg Trucano 

Yeah, so what are some of the, you know, the connection and the depth of connecting with another human being?

What are some of the other benefits that you've either witnessed or know to be kind of benefits of compassionate communication, just in general?

@10:51 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

I think, so the whole, so like I say, the whole point of using it is to enhance life, on and have deeper connection.

So that's the philosophy of it, that's why you go into it, you're not going into any sort of conversation where you're using compassionate communication with the aim of making the other person do something, changing their point of view, you're not doing that.

So it really is a curiosity and an openness to learn about the other person and the other person's point of view and what is driving them in the behaviours that they're taking.

So our needs drive our behaviours, so every behaviour that anybody shows they are attempting to fulfil a need. Most people, most of the time, aren't actually aware what their needs are that are driving those behaviours and so it's a little bit hit and miss whether we actually get our needs met with the behaviours that we undertake.

So sometimes our behaviours can actually push the likelihood of us getting our needs met further and further away and sometimes they don't.

Whereas if we have an awareness of our needs, we increase the likelihood that will actually do a behavior that will actually fulfill that need.

@12:02 - Meg Trucano 

So that's another sort of spin-off positive.

@12:06 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

Also, once you know what your needs are, it's very, very clear to have boundaries with people. Because if I know what my need is, then I choose to violate that need by allowing a boundary to be crossed, I'm aware of that.

And so that becomes a conscious choice then. And there are times, I mean, that sounds like something you'd think, well, why would you ever do that?

But there are times, for instance, as a parent, where you might have to do that, where your needs may well have to come secondary to your children's needs.

But if you haven't aware that you're doing that in the moment, and you can keep an awareness of that, then you also know that at some point in the future, and the probably not too distant future, I'm going to have to fulfill this need that I have.

Because if I don't, that need is going to start to faster and become a frustration or an annoyance against the very, you know, against my children, against the people who are stopping me for fulfilling that need.

So, yeah, there are, it's a really big awareness raising and sort of personal growth way of being as well.

The other thing that personally I found when using it, which was really frustrating, was that you'd go through it, go through, I've done my observation, done my feelings, I've done my need and then, oh damn it.

The thing I really want to ask, I was my request, that's totally unreasonable for me to ask out of anybody else, totally unreasonable, actually, oh no, this is something I'm going to have to do.

And that realization can be really annoying and frustrating but also really painful as well and can really start to show up for you in your life the times and the areas where you've sort of put that on other people and unfairly, you know, asked the people to do things that you wouldn't be happy with, so let's not do that kind of thing.

And the other thing as well is around the verbalization of what you're asking, of the quest. And so that the other person knows what you're asking and they know whether they can say yes or no to that.

It's very clear. Which also means that the other thing that I, which is related to this island very early on was that I was trying to hold my husband in particular accountable to things that he hadn't actually agreed to do.

And that's not fair is it? You know like I've decided this is the thing. And I'm going to now get really annoyed with you that you've not done it, but actually you never agreed to do it in the first place.

And so that's a part of that as well that we we can only hold people accountable to things they've agreed to.

And they can only agree to it if we've been very clear and asked the question or made the request.

And if it's all in my head, there's no way the other person can know that.

@14:48 - Meg Trucano 

Yeah, exactly. This whole idea of like showing your work, right? You have to take it out of your head that I want you to unload the dishwasher in the morning and ask, make the, make the,

Quest, make the ask and, know, what are some, have you noticed in common ways that people kind of confuse either the feeling that they're experiencing or the need, probably the need, I guess, where they think it's one thing, but it's actually another?

@15:19 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

Um, so as in they get the wrong need or the wrong feeling?

@15:24 - Meg Trucano 

Yes, they just, yeah, mark entirely.

@15:26 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

Yeah, and I think sometimes a lot of that is learning because not only do we not really have the feelings literacy, we really don't have the leads, the needs literacy there either, do we?

you don't always know, you don't always know. So you think, oh, well, my needs might be for a long time, for instance.

And so I have some alone time and that's not really doing it. Actually, needs were for connection, the complete opposite, you know, but maybe it was connection with specific person or specific people.

@15:54 - Meg Trucano 

And it's not, so I'm with my kids all the day, I'm completely overwhelmed, I need alone time. Actually, no, what I need is going

actually with adults.

@16:01 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

Do you know what I mean? And that's a different, so we can assume or think that it's one thing, but actually it's another.

But unless we trial and error it, unless we sort of have, again, the curiosity for ourselves and almost have it like an experiment, right?

Like, we'll see if this works. If it does great, if it doesn't, then I've learned something, and I can try something else.

And that really is the test. If the action you take isn't identify the wrong need, or there were multiple needs.

And maybe it did address one need, excellent, brilliant. But all that it's done is now allow you to understand that there were multiple other needs there as well.

And again, that's great, because then it's more information, it's more ability to take that control for yourself and to make life better.

@16:50 - Meg Trucano 

I love this as a framework. since we had our initial conversation, I've been attempting it with my family, and I'm

I'm quite bad at it right now, but I know it's a learning curve and you got to keep going, and I love this idea of approaching it with curiosity.

I think that is one of the things when people are undergoing a big change in their life, that is one of the really big factors that kind of is a good predictor of success, to the extent that they're curious about things, that they're interested in exploring things.

Why am I feeling that way? What does it mean? What previous experiences have created this story and narrative in my head that I've decided to continue telling myself.

So I can definitely, that resonates with me a lot. So help us understand how we can practice compassionate communication and

have it help us during periods of of transition and change?

@18:05 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

So I think, and this is a sort of personal place that I've got to with this, but for me, compassion, like the definition of that word is all about meeting myself where I am, meeting other people where they are.

So not where I would like them to be or not where I'd like myself to be, but where I actually am.

And I think there's curiosity within that as well, isn't there like, well, where are you? Like, I might, I might have this opinion of myself as being in a certain place, but actually I'm not there, I'm struggling in some way or, okay, so why?

Like you said, why am I struggling? What need is not getting that? And I think as well, in terms of big change, we can sometimes not be our best self in those scenarios because so much is changing, so much is different.

And, you know, as humans, we like to know what's happening and we like similarity and any sort of change the body perceives as threat.

So it's understandable and it makes sense that we may not be our best selves in those scenarios because we're essentially quite often in sort of heightened fight or flight sort of state trying to see if this is the dangerous thing or we're going to survive it or whatever.

And I think every time you realize you're not being your best self, it's to have compassion with that and to say, okay, that wasn't the best I could do in that situation.

But I wonder why, I wonder what need of mine is not getting met right now, because if I can meet that need, then I can show up as my best self.

And I think that as well for me and being a mum as well was a big learning for this, that I can know it all intellectually and I can learn this as a formula or as a, you know, a communication tool and method and I can know it intellectually.

when I'm in a good place, I can, you know, spout it out like the best of them. But when I'm not, when I'm

under pressure and I revert back to ways of being that I've had in the past that I don't want to be like it's again having compassion with that and going that's interesting that wasn't how I wanted to be that wasn't my best self I do know better but in that moment I wasn't able to do it I wonder why what was it that was not fulfilled for me what needs were not there and usually there's a whole list like we said before it's usually not one oh I'm tired I'm hungry I'm really thirsty I need a way blooming heck there's quite a lot here that's stopping me being my best self right now and and they're just like the really obvious ones right underneath that you've got the other ones like we said before like need for a long time or need for real adult connection or to be seen to be appreciated to be understood you know there are some other you know deeper higher other means that we might want to put them that again we might not even be aware of his needs autonomy is such an important

or to need. And how many of us have it ourselves, how many of us give it to our kids, how much of the behaviour we see from our kids is because they have no autonomy.

And it is a basic human need and drive to be able to choose to have that bodily autonomy and self autonomy and ability to direct your life, you know.

So, yeah, sometimes we can feel that we're stuck and we want to make the change because we're stuck or we're stuck within the change.

Like you said before, almost like I don't really know what to go now or I've kind of started but I don't know which direction and I'm just really giggling, spinning around now, like where's up, where's down.

And I think, yeah, just having the curiosity and asking yourself, okay, well, what is my need? What is my need right now?

Because I might not be able to solve everything. If I can solve one thing and move myself a little bit further forward then, that would be, yeah.

@21:58 - Meg Trucano 

I really Appreciate that you mentioned some of those more higher order needs, right? Of course, you have your basal body function needs, right?

But sometimes those don't get those don't get attended to, right? I haven't had sleep, I've, you know, I, oh, shoot, I forgot lunch today, whatever it is.

But some of those higher order needs like autonomy and boy, do I feel that in my kids right now.

They're two and a half and they are just learning that they are whole damn people and they have their own wants and desires and, and yeah, and you forget that, oh, yeah, that's, that's a really critical part of being human and it comes online in a very abrupt way sometimes, but, but that's what it is.

Something that I have observed in women who are kind of just starting their change journey is that when they've identified what needs to change, be it a job or a relationship or anything like that, they struggle to own that need, whatever the need is for intellectual stimulation or maybe it's freedom or autonomy or maybe it's whatever the need is because they're afraid of what other people might think.

So can compassionate communication help us to convey our needs in a way that that allows for us to not feel guilty about what other people think about our actions.

@23:40 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

How does it work? I think that's a really interesting one because again, sort of coming back to us as a feeling.

We often have this view that other people making us feel guilty by their actions or by their response, but non-vallic communication, compassionate communication to each other.

that you are responsible for your feelings. Nobody and nothing can make you feel anything. And so if we're feeling guilty and we're putting it out there and saying, well, they're making me feel guilty, that's a really interesting one because I'd be thinking, but they can't make me feel anything.

What is it that they are doing that is causing me to have a response of guilt. And what is that story based on?

What is the story I'm telling myself about that? And because guilty is essentially beating yourself with a stick, right?

No one else usually is actually doing that. You're doing and you're, you know, we're our own worst critics and our own worst enemies.

I mean, you say that all the time because there's the truth to that. And I think when we instigate change, and again, there's probably a special as women, especially if we are in some sort of family unit.

Well, with changing or making a change to the status quo, it upsets the whole family unit or if you're in a work scenario and you're trying to make a change in a work scenario, you're upsetting the whole work unit.

When you upset the status quo you're going to impact other people and so with that comes other people's response to that upset and it's about not taking on your responsibility of the people's feelings.

So you are I am responsible for my own feelings. You are responsible for your feelings. I am not responsible for your feelings.

So if your response is an audience frustration anger, I could start to internalise that as guilt or I could say that's a really interesting emotional response you're having to this.

wonder what needs of yours starting to be highlighted. as going unmet if this change takes place and how can we fulfill that need so that this change that needs to take place that my needs can get fulfilled doesn't negatively impact in this way for you because that is normally why people kick off if you like about the change because at the minute they're doing all right they don't want to change because their needs are okay they're getting that and you're coming along or I'm coming along and going hang on a minute though my needs aren't so I need to make a bit of a change here and if I make this change and I stop giving to you all this then your needs suddenly aren't getting met and that also highlights that imbalance quite often between how much emotional labor women particularly are doing to support the wider community family work whatever it is and that can be really quite challenging to have in the conscious awareness as well for

But, you know, so the will, I would say that whenever we're trying to do any sort of change, whenever we're going to change anything, we're going to, by its very nature, upset the status quo, which by its very nature will put some people out.

And you will have a response from those people. And it's about not taking on that response, not taking on the responsibility for that response and internalizing it.

But almost sort of coaching them through, that's a really interesting emotional response. I wonder what needed of yours is underneath that.

And I wonder how we could go about fulfilling that. And I understand that at the minute, the status quo means that everything's great for you.

And what I'm telling you is that the status quo is not great for me. And so it needs to change, because my needs are no less important than yours.

@27:47 - Meg Trucano 

Yes. And this is something that I run into a lot as well with some of my clients is that they think, you know, again, own worst critics, right?

they, either they expect that they should know exactly what comes next for them and how to do it perfectly, know, they should fearless and brave, but the truth is, you know, change is super scary and sometimes when clients are on the precipice of making a big change, that's better for them and more aligned with their authentic desires and purpose, that it again disrupts the status quo of other people and they internalize that as being selfish.

@28:30 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

It's like, oh, my actions disrupted this whole situation. Right. And that comes up a lot. And again, when I teach this, it comes up a lot.

And my instant comeback to that is always play an analogy of the put your own gas mask on first.

So if you're in plane and they do that safety announcement thing, you go, if we lose oxygen, gas mask or fall, and you must put your own on before putting on any analysis.

And even then, I know some people will be thinking, oh, but that's so bad. If I put my own,

on and then my child, you know, I'm with a child or with an elderly person and I'm there care and I'm responsible.

That's not great. I'm being selfish, putting my own mask on first. But actually, if I put my own mask on and in that time, the child I'm with goes unconscious, yes, it's upsetting.

Yes, it's very difficult. And I can reach up, get that mask and put it on my child.

@29:23 - Meg Trucano 

And I can carry a child out if necessary.

@29:26 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

If however, I put the mask on the child first because that's the less selfish thing to do. But in that time and in the process of doing that, I become unconscious.

I'm now an unconscious adult casualty for the other adults who have put their mask on first have to deal with because that child can't deal with me.

That child can't reach up and get that mask and put it on me. That child can't carry me out.

And so actually, that's the selfish action because now I'm a burden to other people. And I think almost on a plane scenario, we can get our heads around that we can

eat that. It's so obvious in that scenario. But what we don't tend to do is expand that to our life, but it's true in our life.

If I am not fulfilling my own needs first, then either A, I'm going to expect somebody who cannot fulfill it to fulfill it like a child and usually perpetuates some sort of generational trauma in the process of doing that because it's a learnt behaviour and or expect another to fulfill my need without actually communicating it and that's not a great relationship.

It's a pretty toxic way of being in a relationship. Or I fulfill my own needs first and I become an active best member the society that I can be, my best self, I'm turning up as my best self, I'm giving from a place of fullness, willingness, wanting to give, able to give, rather than that pouring from an empty cup business, which we all like to do, and then wonder why on earth I hate the that

I'm late that I'm in and I'm really resentful of everybody and I'm very frustrated and angry. You know, there's this sort of, in our society, there's this sort of, um, isn't that of the sort of middle-aged woman, as this angry person?

And yes, there is a biological, obviously, basis for that, but there's also this basis. We get to this, we get so far and we go, know, if we can't do it anymore, I cannot keep giving when I have nothing and I cannot keep giving when no one else is filling me up.

And this is the other thing, we sort of give and give and give without the other person necessarily having to ask us.

And so we assume that somebody else will do that for us and then they don't. then we get really mad.

And actually, all we are doing is perpetuating this really unhelpful narrative of women can teach the next generation, right?

to speak we need to say we need to verbalize what is our feeling what is our need what is our request and here i am doing that i'm going to demonstrate this for you i'm going to role model it and also that role models the fact that everybody's needs are of equal importance nobody's need is more important than the other there are times like i touched on before when you may choose to put your need second because the child's need is greater or whatever and you might do that for adults too at certain times but when it's a choice it's a you know an unconscious choice and you are carrying that awareness with you and you're going to make sure that you balance that up and pretty soon know after the event as soon as you can yeah and and this this idea of of of anticipating other people's needs and meeting them before they even have have an awareness that they are going to have a need i know that's something that mothers do

very often.

@33:00 - Meg Trucano 

That's something that often the female partner in a partnership or marriage do that. It's socially conditioned. That's part of the script of being woman.

by the time you are at age, you're real sick of that narrative. And you either learn how to do things differently, perhaps using compassionate communication.

That's what I'm going to be using. Or you get so angry and bitter. that is, as you say, that is the source of this angry middle-aged woman who's, you know, looks 25 years older than she is, because she's just, she's put herself as the bottom of her own priority list for so long, hoping that someone will come and rescue from from that and acknowledge her and see her for all the sacrifices that she has made for other

people, and then, you know, expecting that someone else is going to do the same for them.

@34:06 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

And yeah, as you say, doesn't happen so often that way. No, it doesn't. And also, there is a real physical consequence to that, well, so when we suppress our own needs, either because we're not even aware of them or because we're doing exactly what you've just suggested that we are giving other people ways.

And we're the bottom of our own list. That's why we don't have so many more autoimmune diseases than men do.

know, it's why, and, you know, just, I mean, literally just have to pick up any gabourmate book to get stats on the background on all of this, don't you really?

But there's a massive gender discrepancy in autoimmune diseases, which are autoimmune diseases are happening because we're stressed, we have information within the body, and that is connected to suppressed emotion on met needs.

You know, so this not only is important in terms of increasing for connection with other people and openness and improving your life that way, but actually it's going to literally put years on your life or rather stop those years being taken off because that is the consequence of these long-term chronic illnesses, is they literally are short on your life.

And again, there's so much of the evidence, the numbers I don't have to hand but they're out there, you know, and a piece of being in the body keeps us, got all the rest of them that do all of these, but you know, just read any of these books and they're there and they've known about it for decades.

@35:40 - Meg Trucano 

It's actually much longer than that, that even indigenous cultures have known about this for a very long time, right, and we've sort of pretended like it didn't exist or devalued those cultures to the point where, you know, now it's coming out in the like more.

Antific. Here's the data kind of way. It's the same same concept, same principle. And it's it's been around for a while, but it's it's it is the truth.

And so I think we have an issue of not only quantitative life, like your life is literally being shortened by these stress diseases, but it's a quality of life thing too.

If you have lived most of your life for another person or for other people, because you thought you had to, or because you didn't know any other way, or because you haven't done the self-discovery to know what else you would have done.

You know, there there's a quality of life issue there too, I think.

@36:44 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

Yeah, so it sounds sounds like compassionate communication is the way forward.

@36:50 - Meg Trucano 

Um, what would you recommend though, when one person is into it, is like, okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna follow the formula, I'm going to do this.

And then another person or a group is just like, you're crazy, or I'm not going to do that. How do you reconcile one party being committed to this compassionate process and other parties being resistant to it?

@37:21 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

It depends whether the other part is actively listening or just doesn't know. Do know what because I think the point of compassionate communication, the point of the request is that the other person can say, no, that's fine.

A request is, no is a perfectly valid answer. again, no as a response is actually really, really good because it usually means that the other person is maybe not consciously, but is connected enough to their needs to know that if they said yes to that request, it would somehow negatively impact their life.

So again, that's a place for curiosity and stuff. I wonder what's going on for you and all the rest of it.

almost thing that isn't necessarily negatively impacting their life. And so usually it's met with, yeah, okay, or something along those lines, or like I say, it can be met with no, but then that's great because you can ask, okay, what's going on there sort of thing.

I don't know exactly how it would work if the other party was actively against it. So if they were actively just going to they know and shut it down at every particular moment and opportunity.

I would be tempted, in that scenario, someone was very, very against it, I'd be tempted not to use it.

In the way we've just described it, I would be tempted to use it instead for giving gratitude and compliments.

So instead of making a request, so this is how I introduced it into my family. So my family didn't know anything about it, I learned it, and I introduced it in daily gratitude.

So you can tell somebody, and what happened, and then how I felt and how that fulfilled a need for me.

So this is a positive way of introducing it. So when you brought me a cup of tea and bed, I felt joy because my need for love was fulfilled.

For instance, I don't know, soft stuff, I had it, they might not be right, it might be my need for support or understanding or whatever.

So you're giving it in a positive thing. So it usually people can't take offense something when you're saying something nice, just me.

And so if you introduce it that way, then it introduces the idea of what you're doing before you're making any sort of request.

You're not making request of them there. You're literally just thanking them for something. And so what you're using the formula, you're using an observation when this happened.

This is how I felt because this need, and this time we're saying this need is fulfilled, rather than this need is not fulfilled.

And that is really is to hear and receive. It's quite a gift to hear and receive that. An action I talk had this positive impact on you.

That feels really lovely to hear that and to know that. And the way of giving a gratitude or a compliment this way is that it's not putting pressure on that other person to do it again.

So it allows them to, it usually allows them to receive it in a way that they might not receive other gratitude or compliments or that in a way that they might brush off of the gratitude or compliments.

Oh, it was nothing. It was nothing. Usually when you really tell somebody this action in response to this action that you talk, I felt this way and this need of mine was met as a consequence.

Usually that's that it can feel weird, it can feel uncomfortable, but usually it almost takes people by surprise enough that they allow it to sit with them long enough to hear it rather than brush it off.

So, I would say if somebody is very, very resistant just to the idea as an outset, like I'm just not even going to consider it, then I would probably go in that way, or if you're not wanting to overtly discuss the fact that you're using this, I would go in that way, I would introduce it in a positive way like that, and also I would also say that you can't make somebody else use this, if they have to want to use it, they have to understand it, and also you can use this with people who have no understanding of it, and no notion of what you're talking about, they can still get it, they can still, and they'll just be like, was different interaction, this was a slightly weird or whatever, but differently, this wasn't, this changed them all, this was a conversation that didn't go down the usual track, this one that didn't get into you said, he said, I said, you said, blame game, we're not doing that, oh, not tick for that in now, what's going on here, this is different, and that's the whole point of it, you're trying to keep

people with you in the conversation for as long as possible. So quite often we lose people on the initial thing we say because we've put them on the back foot because we've blamed them in some way and straight away, they're not listening, in defence now, they're formulating their defensive comeback, they're not hearing anything more you've said.

And so we want to avoid that in a conversation in order to actually be heard and that's what this does.

It takes that blame, that story, that judge out and it also allows you to realise what that story is yourself.

So I teach this quite often, well always I get people to do it so I get them to have an idea of something, a conversation that badly that they'd like to redo or a conversation that they'd really like to have but don't have to start and write their observation about it.

And the first observation you come up with, usually, especially if you're doing it for the very first time is full of story and judgment and blame.

And that is brilliance, because again, that is giving you such an insight into your own unconscious thoughts and ways of being, and you know, by the time we're 35, is it that 95% of our brain is, is unconscious, it's on autopilot, basically, so by the age of 35, we're basically unconscious in most of what we're doing.

There's a really small part of the brain that's still like, oh, actually, what was that unaware? And so we don't know the stories we're telling ourselves.

We don't know those scripts that are running in the background that are actually driving our feelings and our behaviors.

And so to become aware of them is again gift because then you go, oh, that's really interesting. I didn't know that I was thinking that, or that actually isn't even time.

Where's that come from? I remember grandma saying that. That's interesting. I've taken that on, but I don't believe that.

And so, again, it's just becoming aware of those things and then and And that, again, this is another way it can come in, it's the reason like New Year's resolutions, for instance, are so difficult to keep.

It's because we're using that 5% of our brain against the 95% essentially aren't. We're like, now we're going to do this change, we're going to this new thing.

And then very quickly, it becomes very difficult to do it because that motivation disappears and it's such a big amount of the brain trying to keep the what's driving those scripts and what's underneath that, then we can look at that and go, that's interesting.

So I would like, I'm saying I want to do this action, but this unconscious script is saying, nope, we're doing this action instead.

now I can look at those and go, that's why I'm not succeeding in what I want to do, because this unconscious script that I've probably taken on usually pre age seven, sometime in our usually early childhood is running that and that is trying to keep me safe.

And I can look at that and go, that's great, thanks. You've kept me safe all this time and that script has been really useful.

Quite often, these scripts have been useful. They have allowed us to survive something. And I think acknowledging that for ourselves and in ourselves is really important, not beating ourselves up about the fact that we have this book going.

Okay, you've allowed me to skip this far. Thank you.

@46:19 - Meg Trucano 

And I'd like to and directing your own actions, right? knowing all the factors that are at play, that's going to make that so much easier.

And well, not easier. That's not the right word. It's going to make it much more clear the path forward, right?

of this is easy as you have. It's simple, it's simple, but it is not easy. So I loved something that you said

our previous conversation about the relationship between compassionate communication and what you mentioned earlier with compassion meeting yourself where you are, how can practicing compassionate communication help us kind of transition from operating from a place of like should I have to do this to creating more self-love and self-acceptance and like just being okay with where we are.

Do you have any kind of like tips or tricks or anything that can help us get to that place?

@47:36 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

I think as you were speaking that I just sort of had in my head the idea of the permission slip so again Brenna talks about this permission slip doesn't she and I think that once you have identified what your need is it is so much easier to give yourself a permission slip because you wouldn't deny that need to anybody else but why would you deny it to yourself and you are the person that can give you that permission slip you know.

And like we said before, if we're waiting for somebody else to do that, we're going to be waiting a hell of a long time and probably never actually getting there.

So we have to be the person to give ourselves our own permission slips. And that is part of changing the way we view ourselves so that we're not selfish.

We don't have to be guilty. We don't, you know, we don't need to maintain these ways of being if we don't want to, if they're not useful, if they're not helpful to us.

So yeah, I would say it's that for me. It's if you understand, if you're practicing this for yourself, if you're meeting yourself where you are, then you are able to identify what your feeling is right now, what your need is right now.

And once you've done that, I guess the compassion part is if the request is of yourself usually. So what can I do?

What can I request myself that would make my life better, would fulfill this need? And it's quite often it's I'm going to give myself a mission to

Number one, quite often, rest. Just what does rest look like? I'm not going to sit and then mentally beat myself up about the fact that I'm sitting because my body is physically exhausted and I need rest.

Or maybe it is, okay, I do need rest, but what is the rest? Because sitting isn't the rest I need.

The rest I need actually is a mental rest and the best way I can do that is get out in nature and have a walk.

And as I'm doing that, I'm gonna be really present in that and not mentally beat myself up about the fact that I'm not doing X, Y, Z somewhere else.

And so I think permission slip is in there, isn't it? This is my need. I've identified my need. I've identified an act that I can take that will help me fulfill that need.

And now I'm choosing to allow myself to do that.

@49:51 - Meg Trucano 

I love this idea of permission slips. And I think I was just talking with my coach about this this morning.

about this idea of Who's permission are you waiting for? Like are you are you waiting for someone to tell you that it's okay to go rest?

and again that might not ever come and the the taking the power back and taking ownership of your own well-being and To understand that the key to thriving in life is to meet the needs that you can meet yourself and to Be in community and relationship with other people where you have needs that you cannot meet yourself, right?

That's what allows us to to thrive through change through regular everyday life through Parenthood and tantrums and all the things so This idea of permission slips giving yourself permission and offering and respecting the fact that It's like you have a need

It is just as damn important as anybody else's needs.

@51:03 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

Yeah, yeah, definitely.

@51:07 - Meg Trucano 

So I'd love to hear if you could share with us any advice that you might have beyond what you've already shared, which has been incredible.

For someone who is kind of on the teetering edge of making a big change from your personal experience or from your professional experience, what advice would you have for those people?

@51:28 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

It's not in any way related to what I've really said in a lot of ways, but the thing that I try and hold on to all the time and come back to all the time is this too, shall pass.

And I think it's, for me, it's really important to hold that throughout my life. So when you're going through something really difficult, when you're making a big change so, you know, I recently moved house and changed jobs, they were two really big changes that happened simultaneously, that was a lot.

And it was really, really hard. So number one, acknowledging this is really... hard and yes it is objectively really hard for all of these reasons.

Okay so I'm acknowledging that I'm not trying to, I'm not gaslighting myself on how I'm feeling or on the reality of where I'm at and meeting myself there with compassion there and then also a reminder that this will pass this is temporary because when we're in the depths of really really hard things it can feel that this is forever equally and equally as importantly for me is when I'm in an amazing space and really happy with life and everything's going well this too shall pass this is temporary this is not permanent and so enjoy it be in the moment enough to acknowledge it and enjoy it and it doesn't even have to be the best day of my life ever it can be the days that aren't bad you know the normal every day this too will pass

Never get in this moment back again. No matter what it is that I'm in, it's never coming back again.

So how much can I be in it rather than thinking about my future or mulling over my past? How much can I be in this moment?

Because again, when you're in this moment, you can meet yourself where you are because you're in that moment. Usually when we can't meet ourselves where we are, it's because we're trying to make ourselves somewhere in the future or we're beating ourselves up about something that's happening in the past and we're seeing ourselves in the past.

So the more we can be in the moment, the more we can destroy life and also know what is real and alive and true for us in that moment and that's how you meet the need in that moment really.

@53:43 - Meg Trucano 

Oh, that is such beautiful advice. Thank you so much for sharing that. yes, I wholeheartedly back that up as something to keep in mind.

And you know, it can be really hard when you're... you're kind of used to the grind, I guess, and then you maybe do make a change and then you land on the other side and you're like, my god, this is great.

And then you kind of aren't super comfortable with it because you know, so learning this, settling into the moment and not making it about your past and not making it about your future, but just being here is probably one of the hardest things that human beings can learn to do.

And I mean, all of us struggle with this, but such beautiful advice, thank you so much.

@54:35 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

I welcome.

@54:36 - Meg Trucano 

And I am so grateful that you have shared your expertise with us today. And you know, I know that I'm certainly inspired to use compassionate communication more in my life, and I know that our listeners will feel inspired in the same way.

So we will, of course, include all of the links and all of the things to how people can connect with you, but for people who aren't near,

computer right now. How can they connect with you if they want to continue this conversation?

@55:05 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

I have a website, so you could check out my website if you like. I am also on Facebook and Instagram and LinkedIn.

So they're the sort of main places you can get me online. I think if you want to learn more about what I'm talking about though, going to the source is always my top advice.

So get compassionate communication book by Marshall Rosenberg or there are literal hours of Spotify free podcasts where they've uploaded his training.

He's actually training in it and you can literally listen to hours and hours and hours and hours of it.

Do that, do that. There's also the Centre for Non-violent Communication which is a website that you can go to.

I'm not in any way affiliated to that. They are the official people and there's loads of information there as well.

So yeah, I'm always up for more conversation on this and always talking people, I coach in this, I train people in this, but if you want to go to the source, which I always think is a place to go, that's what I would recommend, yeah.

@56:09 - Meg Trucano 

Okay, wonderful, wonderful. So thank you again Kate, it's been such a pleasure and thank you to the listener for listening to another episode of Changeology and I will see you in the next one.

@56:23 - Kate Brown - Calm at Work

Oh, thank you so much, back.