Ohhhh Fuckers, welcome back! We have so much to pick up on, from where we left off last time and I hope you’re ready to dive in.

1. Can we all agree, again, that Fall fucking rules? I hope you’re living your best weirdo life out there right now.
2. What an enigma of a preposterous doofus Zak Bagans is, as a public figure? “Hey ghost, I bet it hurt when you were hanged!” I love it and I’m never done talking about Ghost Adventures.
3. There is still so much to say about NonViolent Communication. I could put out a different show each week on the implications of this topic… but… I’m already doing that over on the private stream, where we’ve been hitting it REAL intensely lately. 

Which brings us to:

4. And, thank god, there’s now a way for these deludes of recovery information to be organized for you there. They’re called “Collections.” 

That’s right, because Patreon is now offering something that’s actually helpful. I swear, up until this point, the platform was being run by three raccoons in a trenchcoat – I’m so fucking glad they’ve finally had any development to help the Patrons make sense of years of posts that have been released. 

So. Check out the “Collections” tab of your membership, where you’ll now find hundreds of episodes, videos, polls, and workbooks that have been released… grouped and categorized, for your accessible ease. 

Including, a big hefty one that’s populating week by week around NonViolent Communication. The topic that seemed uninteresting to me at first, until I realized how many implications it had for t-brain recovery… not ONLY relational rehabilitation.

And that’s what we’re here to talk about today. As briefly as I can, with all these details I want to tell you about swimming in my head.

Let’s just get started, eh?

t-Beliefs to disband

SO, at the root of it, NVC asks us to change our minds about a few important… pretty victimizing… beliefs that are common in our earthly culture, and even more common in the traumatized family narratives most of us grew up with. 

Here’s just a handful of them.

1. What we think about what we observe is true.
2. Our emotions come “from” what we’re observing.
3. People and circumstances MAKE US feel certain ways.
4. If we have food, water, and a roof over our heads we should shut the front door and pull our bootstraps more tauntly.
5. If the people around us would do what we wanted them to, our world would be a better place.
6. What we say is what other people hear. It doesn’t matter HOW we say it, as long as we express ourselves they can interpret our meaning clearly. 

And to all that I say… Nah, Fucker.

The reality is?

1. Humans are judgey assholes, which ruins our entire experience on earth AND the experiences of everyone around us. (step one of NVC)
2. Our emotions come from inside of us. So do our evaluations. Very little of what we believe internally is directly related to what we observe externally. (step two of NVC)
3. Therefore… No one can MAKE you feel anything. Your emotions belong to you. Own them, or else you’re making yourself a damn dirty victim to the earth. (Also step two of NVC)
4. We have so many human needs that we don’t know about. And ignoring them is not a sign of piety. (step three of NVC)
5. We can’t control anyone. No matter what approach we take. And if we try, it will only create bigger problems for us. (step four)
6. People don’t understand you and you don’t understand other people. We have to be careful about how we present our words and clarify our meaning within our conversations if we want to be on the same page. (also step four)

So these are some of the beliefs / perspectives that need to be re-examined and challenged before we can truly utilize NVC. If we DON’T rethink how we’ve been thinking about these points, NonViolent Communication doesn’t align with our underlying beliefs and we won’t use it. 

In general, I would say that NVC is a process for challenging that historical, toxic, programming most of us contain from our upbringings, as well as increasing our emotional intelligence, groundedness, autonomy, and personal power… not only improving our social skills. 

All of which? Are highly CPTSD recovery relevant. 

But it only deepens from here. 

Because…

NVC is founded on the principle that our unmet needs drive the rest of our unwanted experiences on earth. 

Think back to our conversation last time. We’re asked to halt our automatic, negative assessments of earth and the people on it. Then to figure out what we’re feeling, specifically, in reaction to what we’re observing. And then to investigate the reasons for our feelings through a lens of unfulfilled, universal human needs.

So, our needs drive our feelings, which drive our evaluations, which drive our actions. 

… And we just learned that there are exponential numbers of human needs besides food and shelter. Which implies that no one ever taught us what needs existed OR what needs we were “allowed” to have. Which all makes a lot of sense, considering how many of us were raised in neglectful homes where we were treated like burdens for even being alive.

Why do I only recognize the need for food, water, and a roof over my head? Because that’s all I ever received… and I received it with an enormous amount of guilt, as it was already “asking too much from my family.” 

SO, NO, we traumatized motherfuckers don’t know what our fucking needs are, how to identify them, how to honor them, or how to request their fulfillment. Instead, we DO know that we’re trapped in horrific emotional states on the regular, they seem to come out of nowhere, so therefore we look for reasons externally to explain the things we’re detecting internally. 

And that’s where all our shitty, shitty, evaluations about everything we observe come from.

Which (spoilers) feedback to create MORE negative emotions. 

So we’re trapped in an endless cycle of trash feelings and garbage assessments, that result in a button of projections onto the people and circumstances around us, which we then attempt to control in order to find any relief from our insides… 

Thus, making ourselves “helpless.” 

If we’re trying to force change outside of ourselves to affect the way we feel inside of ourselves? We’re going to find out that we cannot. Because… we cannot. You can’t force anyone or anything into the shape you desire, it doesn’t work. 

And therefore, we feel that we have no control. We have no way to feel better. We have no way to live better. We have no hope.  

Allllll because? We didn’t learn that we have needs which NEED to be attended to, or else we’ll be stuck in the role of “untenable miser” to ourselves and the people around us. 

Which brings us to the next point.

We believe it’s “good” to ignore ourselves and our needs.

Because so many of us were punished for having needs, at all, growing up… and that punishment only increases as you age among the capitalist narratives of “shutting up and working harder”… we learned that it’s “correct” or “morally upright” to neglect ourselves.

(just like the people who raised us neglected us and just like the fake stories of CEOs neglecting themselves led to success)

So we cut off our connection to our own needs. 

We’re great at physically disassociating from ourselves. We’re amazing at transmuting pained feelings into safer, more aggressive, feelings. We’re highly astute at distracting ourselves. We’re prone to staying busy (or, still, busily distracted) and worrying more about the needs of others as a way to keep ourselves directed.

But we aren’t great, amazing, highly astute or prone to noticing or honoring what the fuck WE are lacking. Because that’s danger territory and we’ve been informed we’re “not deserving or allowed.” 

All of this? Teaches us that it’s “good” or “correct” to be unfulfilled. To barely even notice that we exist, at all. 

And the result is? Depression. Perpetual, unending, inescapable, misery and hopelessness. 

Because, as the founder of NVC, Marshall Rosenberg, tells us, “Depression is the reward for being a good child.” And, as we age, it continues to be the reward for being… I would say, “just functional enough”… adults. 

Am I right?

We’re trained to forget about our own existences, in order to check bullet points of a to-do list for others. As we grow up, we’re tasked with neglecting ourselves through every moment of every day, just to “barely get by.” And then we’re told we don’t even deserve THAT. Not even the most basic of needs “should” (my least favorite word) be within our grasp, according to the folks who scream the loudest these days. 

Housing? Nah, live on the streets or with groups of strangers so you can afford rent. Food? Hey, corporate gains are more important than nutrition for the masses. Drinking water? Yo, we can’t inhibit our production lines by caring about the environment. 

The message, over and over again, is “stop complaining and just do what you’re told.”

Which is why we have to have longass conversations about defining NonViolent Communication and the fact that we can’t control others. Others HAVE controlled us, to the extent that we’ve completely detached from our own physical existence and recognition of needs… so it’s counterintuitive to realize that it doesn’t actually work. 

Unless, you realize how fucking miserable you’ve always been, trying to be “good,” by needing nothing, so you don’t disturb the people around you by being an inconvenience or a reminder of their own unmet needs. 

Depression is the only reward you’ll receive. 

And this is especially prevalent among the lady Fuckers out there. 

Since, supposedly:

Women “extra” learn to neglect their needs to care for those of others. 

Another big point from the text is how we’re culturally trained, by gender, to neglect ourselves. 

Because women are put into care-giving positions, they’re informed that they should pay more attention to the needs of the people around them than their own needs. Thus, they learn they can’t have needs at all, and they tend to poorly communicate the ones they CAN recognize. 

Rosenberg tells us that they over explain and over contextualize their requests, which confuses the situation and invites people to deny them in response. 

I also have to assert – I think the same thing happens for men, but in a provider-fashion. They’re taught that they have to be “too tough to notice their needs,” so they can keep performing in physical ways. Don’t want to be called a pussy, now do we?

And either way, in whatever gender identify you were socialized, it fucks us. 

We learn to deprive ourselves. We have unpleasant emotions about it, because our body wants us to make a change so we can reach fulfillment. We don’t understand that relationship, so we blame our feelings on other people and our environments. Then, we’re stuck with inaccurate and helpless perspectives that only get more radical over time, as we continue to have projected thoughts and feelings that validate themselves cyclically through creating negative consequences for us.

But we miss the message. The negative consequences are related to our unmet needs.

What we see, instead? Is that the negative consequences are related to the emotions of ourselves and/or the behaviors of others.  

Which further inspires us to try to control and oppress them. 

Sigh.

And that’s how unending conflict and continual abuse happens, personally and interpersonally.

It’s also how… essentially everything we think of as being “pillars of CPTSD” happens, solo. 

Negative, skewed, historically-based narratives that become perceptual goggles strapped onto our faces. Emotional numbing, projection, and transference. Physical disassociation and self-neglect. Learned helplessness and hopelessness. Over-reliance on being in-control in whatever ways we can, including avoidance and abuse. 

And cyclical patterns of trying to help ourselves, which produce the same negative results time and time again…. Because we’re never truly addressing what needs to be ironed out. Our needs. 

Instead, we get stuck trying to treat or avoid the symptoms of our deprived state. 

And we never break out of the CPTSD lifestyle. Instead, becoming another case of what I call “trauma typical outcomes.” 

NVC and our own rehabilitation.

I tell you all this because… Sure, NVC is a great practice in relationships. Truly, it can produce instantaneous and surprising results, in my experience. 

If you use it, you might find yourself also sending screenshots to your trauma-recovery friends, stating “look at this! Is this… progress with someone who I never expected to see any positive responses from?” 

But, even if you aren’t communicating with OTHERS using NVC… 

Use it with yourself, Motherfucker. Throughout your days, stay tuned in to the 4-step process. 

1. Separate your evaluations from observations
2. Identify, specify, and claim your emotions as your own
3. Notice, identify, and honor your unmet needs via the list of human requirements
4. Make a request – to yourself – to fulfill a need. And respond empathetically if you can’t do it for yourself right now. 

And through doing this, you’ll break the spell of a lifetime of traumatized thinking. So you can find a path away from traumatized living. 

Actually fulfilled. Actually experiencing POSITIVE emotions. Actually assessing your world neutrally, factually, and groundedly.

And with improved relationships – between yourself and others, between yourself and your circumstances, and between yourself and yourself – unlike what you ever imagined was possible. 

The reward for taking care of yourself? For fulfilling your motherfucking needs after decades of deprivation? Is contentment. Emotional and mental clarity. A realistic acknowledgement of your personal power. A healthy relationship with independence, in which you can also ask for support from others. 

And freedom from accidentally transmitting abuse that’s been programmed into your bones since birth. 

Because at the core of everything? 

Let me say it another time. Infinite times. 

We can’t control others. All we can do is teach them to deceive us, to resent us, or to leave us. 

And, that’s good news, because we don’t even want to control other people. Hell, we have a hard enough time recognizing our own needs and controlling ourselves to fulfill them. Do any of us REALLY need another brain and body to manage?

Fuck no.

What we’re really aiming for when we try to control other people? Is to control our own experience. 

And we can do that, safely, in a way that doesn’t transmit trauma or depression, by using NonViolent Communication to rewire how we think about how we feel, and how that relates to caring for ourselves with autonomous actions. 

Wrap

… so, if NVC doesn’t equate “trauma recovery” for you? 

Maybe you have some evaluations getting mixed in with your observations, driven by your feelings that “nothing ever works,” spawned by your unmet needs for efficacy and growth. 

Or, IDK, maybe you’re not quite ready to be a little more… NonViolent. AKA – (you’re going to hate this) Effective. 

Because it’s actually pretty terrifying to realize how much power you DO have, after a lifetime of stranding yourself in narratives about what you CAN’T do.

And with that, I say… 

My Fucker, sincerely, I hope you’ll check out the full story about this topic over on the private stream at patreon.com/traumatizedmotherfuckers. 

I don’t normally “push” my content this hard… and I don’t normally talk for so long on this public platform… the reason for both? 

Is because of how much I believe in this tool. After, originally, honestly, not giving a single shit about it. Because I wasn’t in a place where any of my needs were being fulfilled, and therefore I hated everything on this planet. 

So. Please, take a dive into NVC – with myself, with Yvette Erasmus, or with Marshall Rosenberg. (You can find all those names in the transcript over at t-mfrs.com.) And please, start rehabilitating your life by – simply (but counterintuitively) – learning to start caring about your own needs. 

Til then?

Hail your motherfucking Self! It’s – not something you deserve. It’s your right.

Hail the perceptual clarity and improved life experience that lies in waiting, via NVC.

Hail Archie.

Hail, my brain getting so excited about this topic that I feel like a real, functioning, human again. Hence all the material I’ve been churning.

And cheers, y’all.

ps – one more dood.

Like visualizations? Ya might want to check out the Advanced Tier in the Blanket Fort, where all my whiteboard vids and mixed media doods accompany our audio learnings.

Help support the project and rehab yer t-brain at patreon.com/traumatizedmotherfuckers.

Thanks for being here, being you, and Cheers, Fucker!

Jess and Li’l Barks