[OSList] WOSonOS 2013 - A love note and a giant thank you

[Linda Stevenson]

Dear Suzanne,
 
Loving you and everyone who participated virtually and otherwise right back!  
 
Your local team was indeed a global team sharing their lives of wisdom and networking as you so graciously invited us to and hosted us in St. Petersburg.  My heart is full from the wonder of it all, and there is sand in my shoes to remind me that it was not just a beautiful dream.  :)
 
Thank you to all, and my deepest gratitude to you for all your heart-felt contributions to this emerging, amazing, inspirational, never fails to knock my socks off, world-wide community.
 
Linda

 
Date: Tue, 21 May 2013 08:16:14 -0400
From: sdaigle4 at gmail.com
To: OSList at lists.openspacetech.org
Subject: [OSList] WOSonOS 2013 - A love note and a giant thank you

In London, we extended the invitation to come to Florida.  We did not have an active community of practice; we were just a few who knew Open Space and we imagined there could be many more if we invited the world.  A little over 5 years ago, I had fallen in love with Open Space and it changed my life (or rather it gave me the keys to my life and opened a door that I had shut long ago). I recognized immediately in the most powerful way that Open Space was something that urgently needed to be shared with others for all the reasons we know and most especially to bring many voices to the table in solving today's problems so we can get to work together on the big opportunities that are out there -- big work, wonderful work and real work that is waiting to be done!


I asked friends, my Global Open Space colleagues, if they thought it would be a good idea to invite to Florida and all said yes.

So we invited and a bigger community got built... a vibrant community of all ages, with all kinds of folks with the University of South Florida St. Petersburg who became our partners.  We adopted a motto for our planning: "one less thing to do"!  Our intention was that we all do a little and share in the work, having fun doing the bits we love most just as we do in Open Space using the law of 2 feet. And oh what fun we had... a multi-generation treasure trove of skills and experience. 


You will hear more about our experience in our briefing book, which will take longer to prepare than typically happens after an  Open Space because we have much to share.  So please be patient with us!  

Our hosting has continued with friends staying here in Florida.  During the event, we lived in "real time"  focusing on the new Google doc way of running the news room plus the Virtual Tapas menu.  The students who joined us (more than 25) attended Lisa Heft's training, WOSonOS and now many are doing Scrum training and this after just finishing their exams and in the midst of their new summer jobs and internships.  


This was an amazing journey. We experimented a lot and even though we were scared in our brazenness on the virtual trailblazing to try so much all at once, we decided to follow our gut. It was not perfect (sound,etc); never is when we try new things but in its own way, we felt it to be wonderful to have you there with us. Our deepest intention was to invite others in the world to join us so they too could share in the joy and feeling of our conversations, the learning, the sharing and the "being together" -- in a way that still honored the privacy and intimacy of small group conversations.


Now it is Serbia who invited! 

In passing the beautiful WOSonOS Talking Stick gifted to our World Open Space community by Chris Corrigan more than 10 years ago, it was an expression to Jasmina Nikolic, to Belgrade and to Serbia that we are delighted to accept her invitation and that we are happy and ready to jump into the sandbox with her, with many folks in Florida and others around the globe, who want to help a bit here and there as she prepares for next year. Perhaps she too, will choose the "one less thing to do" and it will be like a Giant Pot Luck gathering that will attract others just as we felt it to be here. Our WOSonOS had a little bit of everything, much joy, lots of learning and sharing, a few bumps along the way which happens when passions collide and people care deeply. It's what creates the magic of Open Space - this tension between talking and doing, chaos and order, feeling separate and together, speaking our own truth or choosing to not speak. 


Such gratitude and so many people to thank, too many to thank here now -- our briefing book will capture the full expression of this. For now, I am now taking a bit of a vacation nap with some pals who are still in Florida, a nap I did not allow myself during WOSonOS as it was too exciting to be on the edges as a facilitator, chatting here and there with old and new friends as if a butterfly or rather a bumblefly to borrow Tricia Chirumbole's new term!


As I was writing these last few lines... an email jumped into my inbox.   It embodies all that is beautiful about this community - a place where we can honor, admire and learn through the amazing work of others.  Congratulations to John Engle (who could not attend) and to our most wonderful Haitian Friends Benaja, Abelard and Maxandre who we had the great joy of meeting.  http://haitipartners.org/2013/05/john-receives-lifetime-achievement-award-at-worldblu-live/


 
Suzanne


-- 
Suzanne Daigle
NuFocus Strategic Group
7159 Victoria Circle
University Park, FL 34201
FL 941-359-8877;  

CT 203-722-2009
www.nufocusgroup.com
s.daigle at nufocusgroup.com
twitter @suzannedaigle



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