Marshall Rosenberg, the founder and director of educational services for the Center for Nonviolent Communication, an international peacemaking organization, states that "empathy is a respectful understanding of what others are experiencing."

Rosenberg, who is the 2006 recipient of the Global Village Foundation’s Bridge of Peace Award and has traveled all over the world helping others resolve conflicts, says that "instead of offering empathy, we often have a strong urge to give advice or reassurance and to explain our own position or feeling." He adds that, "Empathy, however, calls upon us to empty our mind and listen to others with our whole being."

Many times people focus on changing other people's behaviors and are only concerned with getting what they want. When this occurs, the person asking has a closed heart to the other person's feelings and needs. If the other person says "yes" to their request and does so unwillingly, it will come with a price. Resentment and bitterness may be present and disconnection occurs.

There seems to be a widespread assumption that praise is always a good thing. It is not uncommon for teachers to be told to praise a child every day.

Some are even evaluated on how close they come to this standard. Many books on parenting encourage praise and don't mention any negative effects of using it. 

Yet there is now research that shows that using praise can be unhealthy.

We all communicate in different ways in conflict situations. Some of us communicate in healthy ways and others in unhealthy ways. Below are some different types of communication personified by animals. Which do you most identify with? Which do you want to most identify with?

The Turtle - This person is hesitant to share his feelings and needs with others if it is not safe. He is scared to be honest and vulnerable with others. He may hide in his shell for some time before facing the situation.

Making an apology is never easy. It means we accept responsibility for having done something that was unhealthy. We all have done it at some time in our lives. Many times we dreaded doing it and quickly wanted to get it over with. We recognized that we did something to stimulate pain in another and we had a desire to apologize. But what happened next was probably very superficial. We said those two famous words people usually say when they make a mistake, "I'm sorry."

Many times that is not enough. People may respond, "that doesn't do me any good" or "it's too late for that now." That is probably because they want more. They want what all of us want when somebody does something that stirs up pain in us. They want understanding, empathy and sincerity. 

From a young age, I was taught that all human beings were selfish from birth. This was instilled in me as a boy and later as an adult.

This theory of human nature seemed to explain why there was so much violence and evil in the world. It was because human beings were inherently selfish; and when there was not some mechanism of punishment to keep them on track they would resort to selfishness.