I took my first Nonviolent Communication mediation training around 2009. It was there that I first learned and witnessed how, when two people are guided to hear each other’s internal realities, conflict begins to melt away. That was a turning point in my life.

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I often hear the famous quote by Rumi: “Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I’ll meet you there.” But rarely have I heard it followed by practical guidance for how to get to that field — a place beyond polarization, especially when nervous systems are activated. Throughout my life, I’ve navigated both/and realities: being bisexual within lesbian and gay spaces where bisexuality was often overlooked; editing an anthology by feminist sex workers while hearing that no such people existed; and being Jewish while opposing both antisemitism and also violence toward Palestinians.
 

I’ve come to see how war — and its less obvious manifestations such as polarization, estrangement, and recurring conflict — begins when one or more people abandon their own inner experience, frame reality as requiring a harmful action, and attach firmly to repeating that action.
 

In sessions, my work is to help both clients reconnect with their inner experience, and also support them to hear the other person's inner experience. When that happens, both people feel more seen, more heard, more understood, and better able to move forward. That is the heart of what we do at Mendful.