Peace and Violence

I appreciate your editorial, “Teaching Peace,” (Valley Edition, March 11) and your support for programs that address the deeper and more complex factors that give rise to violence. I note that some of those programs tend to focus on stopping something, such as hate speech or bullying behavior. I abhor violence in every form, but if our attention is on stopping something we don’t want, we have less energy for creating what we do want--people knowing how to meet their needs in ways we can all enjoy. Viewing violent behavior as ill-expressed feelings and needs, our programs in nonviolent communication teach people how to express their own feelings and needs in a way that others can easily hear, and to hear with empathy the feelings and needs of others.

We recognize that success in this work requires a fundamental shift in how most of us have been taught to think and speak, which often involves labels, judgments, blame and punishment. Undoing habitual patterns of reaction when people do things we don’t like will certainly take some time, but when people learn to focus their attention on getting everyone’s needs met, all our lives will be profoundly enriched and violence will become a distant memory.

GARY BARAN, Executive

Director, Center for

Nonviolent Communication

Glendale