Self-Organization???? OS just one of 18?

[Julie Smith]

Michael wrote
 
The levels, yes. This is one of the things I'm trying to get in the
attention. Not as an explanation or a way for convincing, but that there
is some powerful essence that can be discovered keeping in mind what a
real Open Space is: to respect the Space of the others and to leave it
up to their choice what level they would like to go in to.
 
This conversation reminds me of some things I’ve read recently about and
by Meister Eckhart, a 14th century theologian.  Eckhart talked about
letting go and letting be as an essential aspect of spirituality.
Eckhart’s description of letting go and letting be, as well as his
linking of that choice with spirituality, seems to parallel some of the
conversation here.  Here are a few excerpts:
 
“Eckhart invented the words for letting go and letting be.  The two
words are Abgeschiedenheit and Gelassenheit respectively
.”
 
Abgeschiedenheit evokes a mind that is on the way to dispossession from
all exteriority which might spoil its serenity.
 
Gelassenheit comes from the word lassen, to let go, to relinquish or
abandon.  It also means to allow or permit.  It suggests openness and
receptivity.  “It means, says Eckhart, to be ‘receptive of all spirit.’”
 
“Thus what letting go does is to develop sensitivity and openness to the
spirit and this receptivity results in letting be
. Letting be is an act
of respecting the autonomy of all things.  ‘It designates the attitude
of a human who no longer regards objects and events according to their
usefulness, but who accepts them in their autonomy.’  Thus a good
synonym for letting be might be reverence.  Letting be is an attitude of
reverence for all things that allows them to be themselves and God’s
selves. This represents one more reason why the path of letting go and
letting be is not one of putting down anything or any event.  It is
rather to enter so fully into events and things that we reverence all
that is there.  This reverence is a gentle letting be.  ‘What is being
spoken of here is to meet with gentleness, in true humility and
selflessness, everything which comes your way.’”
 
“Letting oneself be oneself and letting others be themselves.”  
 
“One cannot learn this [to perceive God in all things] by flight, by
fleeing from things, and from externality to solitude, but one must
learn to cultivate an inward solitude, wherever or with whomsoever one
may be.  One must learn to break through things and to grasp one’s God
in them and to be able to picture him powerfully to oneself in an
essential manner.”
 
“The letting go Eckhart advocates
. is a letting go of the I in order to
let the We happen.”
 
Julie
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.openspacetech.org/pipermail/oslist-openspacetech.org/attachments/20011212/700cf0dc/attachment-0017.htm>