Already-thereness, Empowerment and Such (this is a really long reply...omigod it's a thesis)

[Harrison Owen]

At 10:26 AM 2/17/2003 -0800, Chris wrote:

>This idea of grief work as a fundamental tool is interesting too.  I see
>what you are saying Harrison, but something feels to me like that s only
>part of the answer.
>
>When I work with the grief cycle, the thing that people respond to is the
>map.  They can find themselves on the map and it validates what they are
>feeling.  And of course because it is a map, it also points out some
>places they might go, and this is powerful for people, especially people
>who are in the midst of the anger or denial stage or that deeply
>unresourceful and collapsed point where all they want to do is
>sob.  Knowing that it gets better can help honour that moment and open
>space for the pain of the now to be fully experienced.  When someone
>leaves that stage it is with the knowledge that they had been fully
>present there and so there is no residual pain to carry forward as suffering.

The Griefwork process is definitely a map, and certainly can be used in the
manner you suggest. But I have a strong feeling that in this case the map
is pretty close to the territory. Not the same for sure, but close enough
for Government work, as we used to say when I was in government employ.
 From where I sit (both theoretically and quite personally when the grief
is mine), the process described is, in and of itself, critical to the
phenomenon of transformation as it works itself out through
self-organization.
         Speaking very broadly, the process of self-organization follows a
path which might be described a) Steady State (life as we know it.) b)
Flapping Butterfly (some nuts and bolts fall off and the system heads
towards dis-equilibrium) c) Periodic doubling (The system tried everything
it can think of to get back on course) d) Chaos (The Sh... Hits the fan,
and the system falls apart.) e) One of two eventualities occur -- the
system dies (disappears) OR The system reconstitutes at a new and higher
order of complexity, and life goes on in some new and interesting ways.

The critical point to notice is that one way or another, the old system
dies. This system could be you, your family (relationships), your business,
city, or country -- or I guess the planet itself. When death happens, grief
starts -- not when we push a button or choose it -- it just starts. Totally
automatic. Shock/Anger, Denial, Memories, Despair, Silence (Open Space),
and if we are so inclined, something new which I call Vision. This is my
version, based on Kuebler-Ross and a number of other folks. Other people
have some different names, but I think we all come out at about the same
place. Anyhow, I see the Griefwork Process as the critical mechanism
through which we as human beings negotiate the (often) painful process of
Transformation and/self-organization. Thus for us (Homo sapiens) Griefwork
enables self-organization, and without it we would be dead in the water --
literally. And like the process of self-organization it seems to happen all
by itself, and has done so for the million years, or whatever, that we have
been around.

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

OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options,
view the archives of oslist at listserv.boisestate.edu
Visit: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html




*
*
==========================================================
OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
------------------------------
To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options,
view the archives of oslist at listserv.boisestate.edu,
Visit:

http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.openspacetech.org/pipermail/oslist-openspacetech.org/attachments/20030217/f5058179/attachment-0017.htm>