Amy Bean, LPTA, LMT, is the former Director of Northwest Attachment Parenting, a healer in private practice, a SpiralScouts Leader, mother to a 5 yr old daughter. She and Glen, her husband of 10 years are expecting their 2nd child in late spring of 2006.

With 5 yrs of practice and hundreds of hours spent training with certified trainers, Amy is a CNVC Certification Candidate, has offered multiple workshops in the community, facilitated a 10 member practice group for 2 years, and has been sharing NVC as a volunteer with inmates at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility since May 200.

NVC has helped Amy manifest an intention of living in compassion, empathic connection, mindfulness and the deep desire to create community in which the feelings and needs of all are valued.

Amy's Personal Testimony
I was introduced to NVC when my daughter was 6 months old, and it's amazing to see the burgeoning giraffe within express herself. Upon stepping on a caterpillar, she gently picked it up and stated, "I'm so sad, the caterpillar is sick." She went on to tenderly place it in a "comfortable" location and grieve that she was the stimulus to the tiny bug's pain. I'm inspired to hear her offer empathy and comfort to friends, characters in books or on her favorite videos, and even to me in times of duress. Empathy has been one of the most successful tools in our family when encountering the disappointments, confusion and frustration of toddlerhood and parenthood in general. It has also opened up the authentic connection necessary between my husband and father of my children to co-parent in mutually sustaining ways.

Learning the tools to connect with my own needs, as well as those of my family and others, has empowered me, and created a deepening of the connections between us. Integrating the consciousness and the purity of the language (without my own biases and interpretations intermixed) opens up opportunities for true intimacy and understanding. My dream is that compassion sweeps the world over, and we all come to a place of not seeing people different from us, rather, other human beings so much like us when we look deeply and beyond the confines of color, race, religion, creed, gender and class.

If you have questions, comments or stories to share I welcome your contributions with delight!