Fwd: Re: My first (Re: Greetings from Ukrainian OS)

Thu May 26 05:13:04 PDT 2005

Bernd:

I have loved your first OS experience(s). Some comments.

First, one can understand OS from a metanoic self-organizing experience without knowing OST (and even before OST was invented). Indeed my first experiences with self-organization are also related with post 68 events...

Second, it is interesting to see how in both cases (Arena in Berlin and Cabo Verde) the "larger system" (socio-political system) quickly "closed the space". (A crystal has somehow self-organized in a crystal - but after it is created in stops self organization within itself. To Harrison to comment on...)

In your last experience in Cabo Verde there is a further application of the principle that says that a good head and good heart can use OST without any "certification". Until now I always thought that reading the "User’s Guide" was enough. From now on I understand that it is not needed at all - as far as someone as understood the "fundamentals" of it.

Thank you very much from your story

Agraços

Artur

PS: And yes, michaelh: today is holiday in Portugal ;-)
---------------

WeBe TrainConsult <wb-trainconsult at gmx.net> wrote:
Sorry, here we go

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Von:
An: WeBe TrainConsult
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Betreff: Re: My first (Re: Greetings from Ukrainian OS)

> hello - this long interesting response reached just me...resend it!
> warmly Agneta
>
> WeBe TrainConsult wrote: > My first experience with Open Space The
> first time I felt and understood what Open Space is, was 1976 at
> the Vienna ARENA. ARENA was a post-68 event. Young people flowed
> into an ex-abattoir with end 19th century buildings which the
> Vienna City council was about to sell and destroy. Lots of young
> people just stayed at the place after the last concert (the area
> had been used for cultural events for a year or so before) and
> decided to stay until the City would accept a self-organized big
> youth and culture centre. Self organization of several hundreds of
> people - thousands during the weekends - took place. I got a smell
> of freedom and "what could be" reminding me of the sweet taste I
> had before perceived, when I was in Paris in 69, a year after the
> 68 "explosion". Everybody there was caring for the whole, I decided
> to move in completely. A house for children, art galleries,
> mechanical workshops, en enourmous kitchen, Info-center, theater
> groups, working groups of most diverse characters, info-groups
> which informed the people in our environmet, a social center, a
> motor-bike club ... were established. I decided to move in
> completely, I loved the sweet taste of freedom and self-
> organization. I was a physics student, alternative school teacher
> and group dynamics trainer in a micro-sociology team at Vienna
> University at that time and got big big eyes by looking at self-
> organization at work. At that time many of my group dynamics
> collegues and I absorbed the systemic approach and did their/our
> first steps from the "group" paradigma to the "organization"
> paradigma. I could not understand why none of the other trainers
> and scholars felt the same way. I thought: here they have a
> wonderful opportunity to see self-organization out of chaos to take
> place. Why don't they study it "in situ". Until today I have no
> answer to that question. I assume, some feared to leave their
> "ebony tower", others just feared to have their believe systems
> challenged, many feared the loss of control, because there was no
> "central commitee, steering commitee, nobody knew what the next day
> would bring, everything was extremely complex. In the long run we
> were, of course naive and, above all, not strong enough against the
> forces at work at a higher level. Too much money involved. After
> some months the City council had - step by step - applied their
> "divide et impera" strategy, offered a "controlled" youth and
> culture centre at another place for the "good-willing-ones", hunted
> those "unable to be reasonable" by the police.... I have never
> before and afterwards in my life learned more and more important
> things than during my three months life there at the ARENA. My
> basic experience was "self-organization is feasable, I experienced
> it, I felt it, it made me happy". Each time, my thoughts are going
> back to this rich treasure of memories, I feel new energy flowing
> through my body and soul. What I did not really understand then, in
> 76, was "why did it work there and not elsewhere" and "how did it
> exactly work". Since then I was looking for answers and trying to
> contribute to self-organization at all levels of my personal and
> professional environment. OS germinating Around 1993 I first heard
> about OST. What I heared were just bits and pieces, but I
> immediately recognized the "spirit". But I was then leaving Europe
> and going to Africa. I had a lot of work in my function as project
> manager and trainer for the 'Austrian Development Cooperation' in
> Cape Verde since 1994, at first in an NGO for educational and
> cultural exchange, then in a district development project (Projecto
> Boomerangue-information and training for leaders of grass root
> iniciatives), then in a 3 years training's program for micro-
> entrepreneur-consultants/trainers MECTs and trainers of MECTs
> (Projecto TransFORM) at a national level for the 10 islands of the
> Cape Verde Arquipelago in the Atlantic Ocean at the west coast of
> Africa. My first OST facilitation When TransFORM arrived at its
> final one week training in 1998, the micro-entrepreneur's trainers
> to-be perceived on basis of our collective analysis of the
> institutional environment and the actual political context there,
> that there would not be much support for their further activies.
> The originally planned 2nd phase of the project "Implementation of
> the TransFORM knowledge into our home institutions" had been
> stopped. So our basic question was "What now? How can we organize
> to provide a living as consultants and trainers for ourselves. We
> invited all the stakeholders of TransFORM (trainees, institutional
> representatives and micro-entrepreneurs for a big one day event.
> After presenting the results of TransForm in a creative way
> (simulations and role plays) I opened the space. I had no real
> knowledge of Open Space Technology, I knew nothing of the
> principles and the law or the animals. So I just informed the
> people about the time and breakout spaces available and told them t
> hat there is not defined agenda and nobody who takes responsibility
> for them. The results they would achieve would be their results.
> What they would not do, would not be done. And then I said: "the
> space/time and the working tools (bulletin board, space
> organization charts, markers, flip charts, pin boards etc. are
> yours. Please make a brief documentation of the outcomes your work
> in a convenient way. All the walls of the big room can be used for
> the results or any postings about the process, your questions, your
> recommendations, your ideas. I will be around, but will not take
> any decisions for you. We meet again for the final circle at 5.pm."
> At first nothing happened. Everybody stunned. "That's it? Now what?
> How should we proceed? " My final remark was the answer " "This is
> exactly the question in a twofold way: YOU will find the answers.
> Organize yourself. Get clear about which aspects of your personal
> concern you want to work. Find others, who will collaborate in a
> workin g group with you. Go!" Then I left the room. It worked. It
> was only two years later, when I got the chance to participate at a
> OST Learning Workshop with Harrison in Vienna (2000). Thank you
> Andriy for your question. I loved walking back in my memory. Bernd
> > Andriy Klymyshyn wrote:
>> ..... > > Do you remember your first experience? Can you
>> share it with us, please?

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