Stage: Development Phase
Closer Soft Skills
Our model of relational skills
In our model, we view relational skills as both needs and skills. For now, we consider them one by one and will later develop a hierarchy as well as the relationships between them.
Relational skills as Jewels of humanity
Jewels of humanity
The more they are developed, the more humanity can evolve toward greater harmony — with oneself, with others, and with the world. Conversely, when they are lacking (lack of respect, empathy, positivity, etc.), it opens the way to tensions, conflicts, and destruction.
A small selection of jewels of humanity
Empathy
We understand empathy as the capacity to understand and connect with the emotions and needs of others as well as one's own.
Emotions
Robert Plutchik's wheel of emotions is a psychological model that organizes human emotions into fundamental categories (joy, fear, anger, sadness, etc.) and shows their intensities, opposites, and combinations. It helps us better understand emotional nuances as well as how some emotions can transform or combine with one another.
Needs
In Max-Neef's perspective, taken up by Rosenberg, nine fundamental needs cover roughly the entire range of human needs:
- Physiological needs, physical well-being;
- Safety;
- Empathy, understanding;
- Creativity;
- Love, intimacy;
- Play, distraction;
- Rest, relaxation, recovery;
- Autonomy;
- Meaning, spirituality.
Each of these families of needs contains more detailed needs. For example, among physiological needs we find hunger, thirst, the need to sleep, and so on.
There is no definitive list of needs. The Center for Nonviolent Communication's website provides a list of needs organized by family, noting: "The following list of needs is neither exhaustive nor definitive. It is meant as a starting point for anyone wishing to deepen self-knowledge and to foster better understanding and connection between people."
Example
The video below shows, for instance, how paying attention to needs — rather than clinging to predetermined strategies for meeting those needs — can prevent or resolve relational conflicts.
Dates and details coming soon
Positivity
Our program on positivity will include an introductory part, the setting of the framework and the foundations. Then will come a series of workshops.
Foundations
The different forms of Positivity
The benefits of positivity
- Emotional well-being
- Building opportunities and positive transformation
Nuances
- The importance of leaving room to acknowledge difficulties and more challenging emotions (the "Self-awareness" skill)
- Reconciling Positivity with Realism
Practical Workshops
Practicing positivity in our vocabulary
How our vocabulary, grammatical structures, and word choices influence our state of mind.
Moving from the "glass half empty" to the "glass half full"
Learning to spot opportunities in situations initially perceived as negative.
Developing a positive outlook on others and on oneself
Finding the positive in others' points of view, even when it doesn't seem obvious.