whatever one says,people do whatever they want to do anyway

Mon Mar 6 03:06:47 PST 2006

Filiz,

sometimes it happens, that people appreciate conversations, but are not 
ready or willing or able to act. People are happy with what they picked out 
of the sessions for themselves. In this cases a convergence session does not 
make any sense. When it's over, it's over, may be another time.

If you can let go your expectations that there has to be something like a 
convergence, you will feel allright.

I try to be very aware for the energy in my preparing sessions and try to 
keep my mind open for everythng. It depends on so many things whether action 
planning is helpful or not: The frame context, the topic, the time you go, 
the expected participants, how far the orderer wants to go etc. etc.

Don't blame it on your opening.

warmly
Erich from lovely Vienna

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Filiz Telek
  To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
  Sent: Monday, March 06, 2006 8:46 AM
  Subject: [OSLIST] whatever one says,people do whatever they want to do 
anyway

  This is the newest principle for OS that Funda and I are proposing.after 
our experience in OS yesterday J

  Ok, just around the days when we have been contemplating on "whatever 
happens is the only thing that could have", I will share with you a brief 
reflection on this open space we experienced, a first for me, Funda and for 
all who attended.and perhaps dwell a little bit on what could we have done 
different or what can we do different in the future.

  Funda Oral, whom you know from this list, facilitated this meeting and I 
tried to support her to my capability. This was the first time we opened 
space together in Turkey, so it was quite a historical day for all of us, 
considering the work Funda has done in the last years to invite people to 
open space in Turkey.

  Today we co-hosted a group of people who are passionate about improving 
the public transport in Istanbul. Their immediate focus was saving the 
traditional ferryboats of Istanbul which are one of the important symbols of 
Istanbul that reflects the spirit of this city. Saving because the 
municipality wanted to get rid of them to bring in new and fast sea buses. 
So by taking a stand on the maintenance of these ferries, this group 
actually is one of the real citizens' movements in Turkey that has some 
effect on local decision making.the theme of today's meeting was to come up 
with activities for 2006 to improve sea transport and saving the ferries.

  All in all it went well with a little more chaos than usual.groups were 
formed, exciting conversations were held, actions were proposed.and Funda 
did a great job in opening the space.

  However convergence was a little disaster in my view, and good news is 
that I was hosting it J  there could be many reasons for this but I tend to 
blame myself or the group for the outcome. When it was convergence time, we 
re-opened space where I invited people to announce the actions they want to 
take. By the time I could finish my sentence, some people had left the room, 
some wondering around, some chatting to the person next to them, two people 
shouting at each other.I invited the group about 3 times and nothing 
changed. At the end, someone read some proposed actions from the previous 
session, put them on the floor and people who were interested signed up. By 
that time half of the group had left already. Unfortunately we didn't even 
have a closing, because we couldn't maintain the energy of the group 
anymore. The meeting finished an hour earlier than the proposed time.

  Now, whatever happens is the only thing that could have. But for my own 
sanity, I need some practical help here. Because this seems to be the 
general group dynamics over here and I am having a hard time as a 
facilitator to deal with it. Not only it makes me feel incompetent, it makes 
me also lose hope at certain points about being able to do any useful work 
over here.

  My main challenges are that people don't listen well, they don't 
concentrate during a meeting, so they miss and don't follow the instructions 
and the groups are not able to converge. In all of the meetings I attended 
so far, I found myself watching in awe how people disappear before we are 
able to say, so this meeting is finished. And naturally there is no 
conclusion. I then feel all the energy that was built up during a meeting 
gets wasted before we could channel it into something constructive.

  I have been told that being young and female does not help in Turkish 
culture. I do not accept this as an explanation.
  I would like to know whether any of you worked in a similar cultural 
setting where it was difficult to shift the group energy beyond the 
individual to the collective, where listening and focusing was a 
challenge.and people proceeded the way they wanted to. To which degree do 
you or do you not interfere? What do you do, when you propose a step and one 
(or more) participant suggests something else before your next step? (this 
happens so often here, drives me crazy, even if you say no, we cant really 
do that, people go ahead anyway) What are the conditions for being able to 
converge a group whose energy is all over the place?

  I am really interested in improving the flow under the conditions I 
described above and I am asking for practical suggestions.

  Thank you!

  f i l i z
  approach love and cooking with reckless abundance!
  www.barakam.blogspot.com
  www.bugday.org

  * * ========================================================== 
OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU ------------------------------ To subscribe, 
unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of 
oslist at listserv.boisestate.edu: 
http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html To learn about 
OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs: http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist 

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

To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs:
http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.openspacetech.org/pipermail/oslist-openspacetech.org/attachments/20060306/5e967265/attachment-0016.htm>