Going Deeper and personal vulnerability

[Harrison Owen]

Doug Germann quotes me to the effect that going deeper involves the
withdrawal of the facilitator (Pg 110 of the User's Guide). I checked, and
I certainly said that, but that is not all I said. I was thinking mostly of
physical presence, and therefore physical withdrawal -- as in moving out of
the spotlight, always expanding the space in which people can find their
own power.  In my experience, however, "withdrawal" is never to be confused
with leaving. As I withdraw I find myself more intensely present. Somewhere
else, I came up with the odd notion of being totally present and absolutely
invisible. For obvious reasons, we never quite pull this one off, but we
can make some real progress. And when we do, I find that amazing things
happen -- most of which we never could have predicted, and none of which
occurred because of our control. I call this, letting go, but not giving up.

Judi Richardson explores this strange paradox magnificently, sharing her
own sense of vulnerability. Speaking personally, I surely know that feeling
of vulnerability. Yet in an interesting way, the greater my sense of
personal vulnerability, the larger my sense of my own personhood -- and
maybe even power.  I find myself by losing myself. I am sure that this
experience is not my alone, and I think of my young Palestinian friend,
Carol Daniel with whom I had the pleasure to work in Ramallah several weeks
ago. She shared her experience with colleagues from around the world who
have joined me in The Practice of Peace program. With her permission, I
share them with you.

  "I'm still overwhelmed by the experience I had with Harrison in Ramallah,
he introduced the word 'Peace' for the Palestinians in a fantastic way as
if it was used for the first time and never existed before in the
dictionary. Palestinians used the real meaning of Peace all over the
training, they brought it up in nearly every small discussion group they
created, peace within themselves, peace at work, peace with their children
and later on passed to the causes of non inner peace: sexual frustration,
wrong education, how to raise children to be more open and keen and so on.
I personally never witnessed such openness within the Palestinians and more
amazingly between men and women. Until that minute I wasn't sure about the
power of the OS spirit and its immediate influence on people.
Harrison whispered in my ear the second evening that he will be leaving
Ramallah early, and asked me to continue the third day with the
participants, I was really shocked and in disbelief that I could do it
without him. I didn't sleep that night, I was happy and confused and tensed
all at the same time. When the time arrived and I had to swim alone without
my teacher, I looked at the great group of people that were there and
started to go around the circle over and over again while they were sitting
in silence, waiting for myself to feel more relaxed to open the space and
then I requested that they join me."

Somehow, vulnerability is power of the very best sort.

Harrison


Harrison Owen
7808 River Falls Drive
Potomac, MD 20854 USA
phone 301-365-2093
Open Space Training www.openspaceworld.com
Open Space Institute www.openspaceworld.org
Personal website http://mywebpages.comcast.net/hhowen/index.htm

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