AW: New member

[Catherine Pfaehler]

Dear Dominique

What you write resonates very much with me, all of it. Welcome to the list,
and keep your spirits up
 Wonderful what you share about your first OS
experiences. Congratulations!

You might find a lot of kindred spirits in France who would love to
participate in a public OS on the topics you raised in your first paragraph.
Can you find a city council who would be interested in such input from its
inhabitants?

Love, Catherine

Catherine Pfaehler
Kellersriedweg 8
CH - 2503 Biel/Bienne
T/F/B ++41 - (0)32 - 365 68 41

-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: OSLIST [mailto:OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU]Im Auftrag von Dominique
Proudhon
Gesendet: Dienstag, 16. Dezember 2003 08:58
An: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
Betreff: New member

Good day all,

I joined the OSlist a few days ago and have been lurking for a while. I am
very impressed with the quality of the exchanges on this list and find
myself drawn to participate. Several threads called my attention; in
particular the one questioning the list itself (what are we doing? Aren’t we
loosing our spirit, Should we split?) –I find these conversations very
healthy. And also the one about Civil Conversation, which resonates with an
old questioning of mine around ways to implement real participative
democracy – I am dreaming of initiating some real debate around the question
“what world do we chose to build for tomorrow?”. I believe we humans are
caught up in our own contradictions: after centuries of evolving faster and
faster technically, and having more transformative power than ever, we are
now facing the essential question of  Meaning: How do we participate in the
world and to what end? What is our responsibility in regard to what is
happening in our world? Especially all the “not so nice” little things like
irreversible destruction of earth resources, loss of entire species, wars
and weapon builders, starving, and all that noisy ongoing disconnected
stupidity on our tv and radio shows that take people away from being
  I
believe that for the first time, we, at least in “developed” countries, have
won the freedom to look beyond simply working for survival, to ask
ourselves: how do I want to also make this place a little better?

Anyway. I’ll stop here for today. My goal was actually to introduce myself:
I am French and leave in Grenoble. After a PhD in molecular/cellular biology
and 6 years of research. I decided to do something else with my life and
moved to human resources development. I actually did that career move in the
US: I lived 10 years in North Carolina. I wanted to understand why people so
often get into conflicts because of “films” they make in their heads that
have little to do with reality. I wanted to find ways to work on
re-establishing lost connections, especially in the workplace, where they
could serve common projects and goals. I trained with Will Schutz,
originator of the Human Element, became a mediator, trained in various
psychometric tools and got to work with various groups. Two years ago, just
before I came back to France, I bought a book that called my attention: Open
Space Technology, a user’s guide. I read it in the plane. It was one of
those “ha ha”: I found something I was looking for. A piece of extreme
simplicity that called on very ecological principles to set the stage for
real connection between people and for meaning to happen. On top of that,
this approach was shared openly without any bind, just as a gift to
humanity, which seduced me even more...  I decided to try it as soon as I
would get the opportunity, here, in France. Starting a new business as a
group facilitator/team consultant has not been easy thing. Things are slow
going and I often get discouraged. But I finally got the opportunity to run
two different open space events for two different clients in the last year
(30 people and 36 people). Both very energizing experiences and both around
the question “How could we improve the way we function as a team?”: I loved
the first moments of surprise in people’s eyes, and then the sudden rush to
bring up issues as they understood that the event was theirs. Several
persons approached me at the end telling me how much this work had moved
them from a negative reactive position to an engaged position and telling me
about a number of places they would see such work as useful. Thanks to
Harrison, they got a gift they deserved. Felt quite good to serve in such a
meaningful way. I’ll continue. I now would like to share this approach with
others in France and starting a French Open Space Institute (web site in
preparation for sometime next year). Of course, I have plenty of questions
around OST, but I’ll wait: This post is already long enough, you guys are
busy, and I need to read more of the documentation to make sure I am not
asking questions that have already been answered 20 times.

All the best to each of you,
Dominique

Note: I am a guy, for those who would wonder.

Dominique Proudhon
Group Facilitation
Problem solving
Conflict resolution
Dampierre
38470 Notre Dame de l'Osier
(33) 4 76 36 71 34
(33) 6 78 91 48 77

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