Walking the circle - outside

[Ralph Copleman]

On 1/21/03 2:39 PM, "Lisa Heft" <lisaheft at pacbell.net> wrote:

>> No chance to remove the table, no circle at all!!!! ...But how to open a
>> space and walk the circle if there is no circle?<
>>
>> So I decided to give to me and everybody else the imagination, there IS a
>> circle and walk it - outside. And surprise, surprise, it worked perfectly...I
>> felt the space open up.<

Two thoughts:

1.  Sometimes a group is so small (7-10 people) and the circle, therefore,
so small that standing and walking around seems like a silly idea, so I just
keep my seat and explain it all from my chair.  It still works just fine, of
course (did you really think otherwise?).

Once I had to open space in a room of 40 people milling around, coming back
from a break, doing other things, and probably about half the group not even
in the very un-round "circle", let along sitting down.  (Don't ask how I got
into this mess.  But it wasn't a mess, really.)  I explained what to do in
about 90 seconds (don't ask me what I said, because I don't remember), and,
guess what, it worked just fine.

After all, it isn't, ultimately, what I do in the opening that matters, but
what participants decide to bring to the space that opens.  Perhaps we need
to give ourselves permission not to be so surprised.

2.  Today I listened to a radio broadcast about how some women in Boston,
USA, with very different opinions about the abortion issue, learned to talk
with each other.  An expert in dialogue on the program said that any time
people come together to discuss an issue about which they are hotly divided,
there must be a  clear and strong structure in place for them to get going
with each other.  I think I may have smiled.

Ralph Copleman

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