As co-founder of Bay Area Nonviolent Communication (BayNVC) and The Social Change Project expanding access to NVC’s unifying principles, Miki Kashtan lives her calling as a practical visionary pursuing a just world through compassionate relating.
Her frameworks guide justice movements and divided communities to reconcile by appealing to our shared humanity beyond limiting identities. Exploring how honoring universal needs and shared humanity heal divisions, she guides individuals and groups to transcend polarization’s dehumanizing effects by staying anchored in care and vulnerability. Grounded in the framework of Nonviolent Communication created by mentor Dr. Marshall Rosenberg, Miki works extensively with marginalized communities to nurture empathy, self-compassion, and collaborative trust – illuminating why meeting all people’s core requirements through equitable contribution leads to collectively enriching outcomes. In acclaimed books like Reweaving Our Human Fabric and her blog The Fearless Heart, Miki models dialogue, mindfulness, and compassion as instruments of reconciliation. Her method convening conflicting groups emphasizes listening instead of reacting, to arrive at mutual solutions including everyone’s well being by recognizing needs over positions. Her courageous facilitation always dwells in that sometimes messy, compassionate middle way, buoying our hearts to trust the power of the storms that swell within us as the path to authentic love within relationship.
