My Life in Open Space

[Rachel Bolton]

Nino and All,

Firstly I would like to thank you all for your kind words of welcome and the
reaction to my story.

I would absolutely agree with the points that you made about the "openness
of the space".  Keeping the space as open as possible seems to be very
crucial to a good experience, whether in an OST meeting or in everyday life.
Love is definitely a part of keeping the space open.  Especially with family
but, from what I've seen, to me there is also love in a facilitator.  There
is a love of the process, but also a detached sort of love for the group.

Rachel

-----Original Message-----
From: Nino Novak <nino.novak at tuebingen.netsurf.de>
To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU <OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU>
Date: January 14, 2001 8:50 AM
Subject: Re: My Life in Open Space


>Dear all,
>
>First, I want to thank you, Rachel, for sharing your childhood story.
>
>As I am father of three children myself, this story somehow touches my
>heart especially and gives rise to some thoughts that I in turn want to
>share with you:
>
>>>From an OS facilitator's point of view, there may be laws and principles
>that help him/her to manage to open space to/for some people. From a
>participiant's view, in contrast, there is only something like a "gut
>feeling" about a certain event. And if asked what makes the feeling
>being good in a particular case, the participiants might say: there was
>a good atmosphere, respectful communication, good results. And, in
>addition, there was a great amount of personal freedom. If this all
>holds true, than the feeling about this event cannot be bad, I think. I
>therefore would call this particular space "open". (In contrast, when
>they feel uncomfortable, or cannot rise their voice loud enough to be
>heard, or feel under pressure, and/or results are bad, I would call the
>space: not open. I don't like to say "closed", so perhaps "narrow" is
>the best term.)
>
>In my belief, any event or process has certain open aspects, and also an
>amount of narrow ones. Any (social) interaction may produce good
>feelings - or bad or unhappy ones. Would you agree to say, that the
>degree of "openess of the space" plays a major role on the quality of
>the feelings about the corresponding event/process?
>
>And - at least from my point of view - this is also true for family
>interaction. (I don't like the term "education" because it implies much
>more activity (of the educator on the educated) than needed for a "good
>education"). In simple words: the opener the space, the better the kids
>feel, and the better they can develop.
>
>By the way - the best "opener of space" towards my children seems to be
>love. I don't know if this can be compared to a facilitator's attitude.
>And I don't know if it can be learned in a training - but at least the
>OST laws and principles seem to be a substantial part of what I do when
>I love.
>
>Good wishes,
>Nino
>
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