inner aggression and the OST facilitator

Wed Apr 20 05:39:23 PDT 2005

Dear Raffi...

It's been really interesting to read your genuine insights and thought
process about inner aggression...thank you for that! 

I am writing because your call to hold space for Armenian Genocide urged
me to share with you all my experience, as a Turkish person as well as a
world citizen. 

I've been blessed with being able to travel and live abroad from an
early age which changed my life. It wasn't until my early 20s though
that I had heard about the Armenian Genocide. An Armenian friend of mine
had explained to me how today's eastern Turkey was Armenian land and
what happened in 1915. I remember the shock and how threatened I
felt...it was like a bad joke...but in reality it wasn't. 

I am afraid I still don't know today the details of what happened during
that time. Not because I don't care, not because I am ignorant. I had a
much stronger experience than I could have by reading books about the
genocide. Due to my work, I traveled to Armenia last year to work with
the local Habitat organization there...to be honest, I was anxious, I
did not know what to expect. But it turned out to be one of the most
powerful experiences of my life. I have never been received by any group
of people with such warmth, and generosity and openness. Believe me, it
was beyond the typical Armenian hospitality. I had the feeling that
people embraced me even more because I was very much connected with
their history. I was simply there, working with them and being open, and
all it took was to acknowledge what happened in 1915. I was a silent
witness of the pain. I listened to stories, I visited the genocide
monument. I learned to be humble...there was no aggression, there was
just sadness. When I stood near the Turkish border and looked up at
Ararat, I wondered why this border had to divide these two people so
distinctly...that was the aggression in my mind, and as a counter image
I envision that border wide open and both people freely traveling some
day. The Armenian lady who hosted me and fed me so well during my time
there, told me the story of her father who was a genocide survivor. She
told me that he lost his whole family, yet he was saved by a Turkish
neighbor...his father didn't even speak Armenian when he finally made
his way to Yerevan, he just spoke Turkish...

I did not literally do open space in Armenia but I felt I met Armenian
people in open space, in a very humane space. At a personal level, there
was such a strong connection, I felt extremely alive and inspired. In
fact, one of my biggest dreams is to hold an open space with Armenian
and Turkish people together some day...so people can experience what I
experienced: going beyond their fears, threats and stereotypes by simple
being together in healthy dialogue with open minds and hearts.
Remembering our centuries old close connections and just replacing the
aggression and the ignorance with that connection. Political system
managed to keep our people separate for a long time but I believe the
civil society can awaken us, especially Turkish society to this
sensitive issue. 

I just wanted to say that I am moved by your call and I will hold inner
and outer space on April 24th, I will also share this with my dear
Armenian friends and colleagues. 

Thank you once again. Maybe we can host an open space together for
Turkish and Armenian people some day. :-)

filiz 

every day is a good day

________________________________

From: OSLIST [mailto:OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU] On Behalf Of Raffi
Aftandelian
Sent: Wednesday, April 20, 2005 9:36 AM
To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
Subject: Re: inner aggression and the OST facilitator

[oops! I sent the previous message without finishing writing it; a

Spirit trick?]

Hi dear fellow openspacers!

I want to continue expressing my profound gratitude. I am really

enjoying this conversation. I would like to backtrack for a moment and

talk about what brought me to this conversation.

Being in the season of the teacher right now on the medicine wheel

means one of the things I am working with right now is discernment.

When I first put out this question, I am not sure I contextualized it

as much as I could have.

I want to speak to one of my projections (on to the listserv) right now.
I am worried that

people might be thinking that I am opening space in a really weird

way. I have never used strong language (besides "oh shit") in the
opening, but I do now know

that I have a much stronger initial awareness of my aggression than

ever before. And now, I can give a group much more quality in opening

space. Thanks to you!

I ask these questions because I am extremely motivated to do this OST

work with excellence. It would be great if I were motivated to commune

with One just because there is a One, but it is OST (and the Genuine

Contact Program) that has motivated me to really look at myself with a

German/Swiss/Japanese/Russian precision magnifying glass. And so when

I ask these questions I instantly make the connection with the life

work which has the deepest meaning for me. 

Doing anything, I imagine, can be a path to communing with the sacred (I
am a little shy about really exploring "doing anything" right now as I
wonder can prostitution, for example, also be a path to communing with
the sacred). 

Sometimes Quakers call themselves a "priesthood of all believers." I
think if we choose to live intentionally as a Community of OST
facilitators, we can be the same-- and take this even further to be a
monastic order. I see that this listserv has bits and pieces of this.
The issue of Community I would like to come back to at a later point.

Michael, your teaching about anger was extremely valuable. I think I

am starting to suffer from wisdom overload-- what depth I am hearing

here as a consequence, and it will take a while to digest this all! As

I shared offlist, I have heard such valuable responses that I want to

print them out and carry them with me. (Might this be a variation of

the event Ralph Copleman mentioned-- "Poetry in your pocket day"?).

Just knowing that the energy of that wisdom is in my pocket would be

wonderful!

Lisa, you asked what made me sad (and again thank you for making space

for me to human). I can only begin to talk about this,

because I think it goes much deeper. I am/was sad because there is a

realization that at a very deep (but not core, I hope) level, I am

doing this work for ME. My prime motivator for doing this work is that

it has meaning and it brings ME joy. There is a part of me that

doesn't care about people, doesn't care when misfortune falls upon

others. And I want to befriend that part of me, to unsurface her (yes,

for whatever reason "she" came up). Your thoughts about being fully

human and being present were very helpful to see/hear.

This Saturday I have a workshop coming up (using not OST but Whole

Peson Process Faciltiation in this case). And I all along have been

visualizing the workshop, noticing where there is nervousness (this

will be a professional conference of trainers, facilitators, coaches

-- and while they know me, this will be the first time I will be

presenting on my own; I keep on wondering what to do to take ME out of

the room for the workshop. Yes, it is great to enjoy  what I am doing.

But, to paraphrase what a zen master might say, the next challenge is

to let the @#$%## thought go...

When I started this thread, I remembered about a book that is just the

bible, I imagine, for dealing with the very issue. And I took it off

my shelf. It's called Sitting in the Fire: Large group transformation

using conflict and diversity, by Arnold Mindell (founder of

process-oriented psychology). It is full of exercises on surfacing and

befriending all of our facilitator demons. Time to use this book?

I opened it randomly today to p.200:

"Watch your own high dreams as a facilitator. Do they call for people

to change? As I pointed out in the last chapter, an elder assumes that

people are exactly what they are meant to be. Perhaps they are full of

mundance characteristics like greed, envy, vengefulness and

abusiveness. Can you accept them? Better yet, can you change yourself

to love them?

Try seeing your own enemies, friends, and neighbors as they are in the

moment, not as you would like them to be. Although they are your

friends today, remember that next week they may be your attackers.

Remember that, historically, very few people have managed to uproot

from themselves the tyrant, the monarch, the oppressor, the abuser or

the one seeking revenge. It's we learn to expect negativity and to

move with it.

Luckily blasting a high dream to bits does not always result in

permanent depression. When we look back, it may seem as if our high

dreams had to be exploded in order to prepare the ground for an even

more comprehensive view of the world."

One of my dreams is to somehow marry processwork and OST. One day that

may very well happen.

Mindell is coming to St. Petersburg in May. I am holding space for

myself to be able to attend this workshop.

                                 ******

Another result of working with the medicine wheel is that for the

first time I have begun thinking seriously about my ancestors. What

gifts have my ancestors given me?

I think one of the biggest gifts my parents have given me is a radical

honesty.

And, my father in a phone call today reminded me of an important

anniversary coming up: April 24th is the 90th anniversary of the

Armenian Genocide. I am 1/2 Armenian and 1/2 Italian by blood. I don't

speak much Armenian and almost no Italian.

I have never taken this date terribly seriously. But this initial

curiosity about my ancestors and aggression makes me want to write a

little publicly about this.

The Armenian Genocide is a still unacknowledged atrocity. 1.5 million

Armenians died over 20 years at the hands of the Ottoman Empire

--1896-1915. I would like to ask those who feel moved to to hold inner

(and outer) space

on this date. I am not sure what kind of intention would be best to

put here-- maybe just to ask for awareness in all humans (ask for

awareness for self).

I notice the resentment I sometimes feel at some Jews because they see

talk about anything but the Holocaust as a treading on toes. There was

the Holocaust, period; there were no other genocides.

And yet, I know that somewhere in that resentment is a denying of my

own humanity and the person I am engaging with at the moment.

And I learned recently that I do have a connection to the Holocaust,

too. My great aunt (my Armenian grandmother's sister) was married to a

Jew (a banker representing the Rothschild family) from Tbilisi,

Georgia. My greatgrandmother refused to let her daughter, Margo, to

marry a Jew. She demanded that he get baptized in the Armenian Church

before getting married, which he did.

>From what we learned a few weeks back, Ilya Bunimovich died in the

Holocaust...What happened to Margo is not clear.

Raffi

                          mailto:raffi at bk.ru

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