[OSList] Earliest known reference to {holding the space}
Jeff Aitken via OSList
oslist at lists.openspacetech.org
Tue Oct 21 15:45:24 PDT 2014
Another related piece that comes to memory is an early phrasing that I
have not seen for a long time.
"Preserve and protect the Law of Two Feet."
Now it's often called the Law of Mobility or other terms. But the
words "preserve and protect" I have not seen for years.
I remember my early understanding that this is the one job of the
person holding space. The only occasion to intervene in the event is
when a person (such as the CEO, despite our pre-work) interferes with
another person's ability to exercise the Law. It's our job to preserve
and protect the Law.
Along with being "completely present and completely invisible" and
"picking up coffee cups" ~
Jeff
On 10/21/14, Daniel Mezick via OSList <oslist at lists.openspacetech.org> wrote:
> Hi Harrison,
>
> Curiosity motivates my original search, dating back to 2011 or so. Words
> and phrases are important symbols and so I am curious about these
> symbols, and their origin, and what these symbols might now mean.
>
> And so I wonder if 'holding space', as /you/ use it, might mean 'holding
> void'.
>
> Also, I am hoping there might be previous post or two, perhaps located
> in OSLIST archives, where your earlier thoughts on this term may be found.
>
> Kind Regards,
> Daniel
>
>
>
> On 10/21/14 10:56 AM, Harrison Owen via OSList wrote:
>>
>> I'm not quite sure what motivated the search for the "earliest"
>> reference to "holding space" or Open Space, but I can assure anybody
>> who cares that in one form or another it substantially predates the
>> Quakers and, obviously, me. As Jeff correctly observes, my usage was
>> first in context that had nothing to do with OST, if only because I
>> had yet to drink the cool aid. But I had been thinking a lot about the
>> process of transformation, an interest that dates back to the early
>> 60's. And in many traditions, particularly Buddhist, there is a
>> critical period/phase/moment of silence and nothingness. Goodness
>> knows what the original words were, in whatever language... but a
>> typical English translation is "void." Works for me, but I guess I
>> found "open space" to be more congruent with my intent and experience.
>> Anyhow, that's how it came out.
>>
>> Harrison
>>
>> Winter Address
>>
>> 7808 River Falls Drive
>>
>> Potomac, MD 20854
>>
>> 301-365-2093
>>
>> Summer Address
>>
>> 189 Beaucaire Ave.
>>
>> Camden, ME 04843
>>
>> 207-763-3261
>>
>> Websites
>>
>> www.openspaceworld.com <%20www.openspaceworld.com>
>>
>> www.ho-image.com
>>
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>>
>> *From:*OSList [mailto:oslist-bounces at lists.openspacetech.org] *On
>> Behalf Of *Jeff Aitken via OSList
>> *Sent:* Tuesday, October 21, 2014 12:34 AM
>> *To:* Harold Shinsato; World wide Open Space Technology email list
>> *Subject:* Re: [OSList] Earliest known reference to {holding the space}
>>
>> While tangential, it may be useful to remember that Harrison's own
>> first definition of Open Space was not the methodology we know.
>>
>> Rather it refers to the mysterious place in a journey of
>> transformation - for the individual, for the organization - 'between
>> what was and what might become.' (In 'Spirit: Transformation and
>> Development in Organizations' 1987.)
>>
>> While the methodology showed up in 1985 to later become a powerful
>> means to support individuals and organizations 'across the open space'
>> it was not mentioned in the book.
>>
>> 'For the organization standing at the edge of open space with a full
>> realization that the old way isn't working anymore, and the new way
>> has yet to be found, the primary issue is the passage through that
>> Open Space, and the articulation of a new story... a new way of being
>> there. ... It would not be stretching a point to understand the
>> process at hand as a dramatic event or sequence of events, with the
>> leader as director or conductor...'
>>
>> The job of the leader is 'leadership by indirection, which
>> orchestrates a new, positive story, created so far as possible out of
>> the existing elements of mythos, which captures and excites the
>> organizational Spirit, and focuses it in productive directions.'
>>
>> And so we give thanks for Open Space Technology, which helps make all
>> that work SO much easier.
>>
>> Jeff
>>
>>
>>
>> -------- Original message --------
>> From: Jeff Aitken
>> Date:10/20/2014 8:21 PM (GMT-08:00)
>> To: Harold Shinsato ,World wide Open Space Technology email list
>> Subject: Re: [OSList] Earliest known reference to {holding the space}
>>
>> Brilliant work Harold. I also was thinking about the famous
>> pediatrician and therapist Winnicott and his theory of the mothering
>> 'holding environment' in which children develop. As the child grows,
>> the space being held grows too, tho not named that way specifically.
>>
>> Another child therapist Sandner literally talked about an Open Space
>> held by the mother role along similar lines. He once came to a talk by
>> Harrison.
>>
>> Nozick reminds me of good old Werner Erhard saying we are a 'clearing'
>> in which bodymind and the world show up. Influenced by Heidegger et al.
>>
>> Which takes us to the Kabbalist notion of 'tzimtzum' as the ein sof
>> gets lonely and contracts so that a space appears for a universe to
>> emerge. Jewish people who follow torah are rereading the first
>> chapters of genesis this week. But that's another story.
>>
>> Jeff
>>
>>
>>
>> -------- Original message --------
>> From: Harold Shinsato via OSList
>> Date:10/20/2014 1:40 PM (GMT-08:00)
>> To: World wide Open Space Technology email list
>> Subject: Re: [OSList] Earliest known reference to {holding the space}
>>
>> Hi Jennifer!
>>
>> Thanks for referencing such a great research tool. I looked at all the
>> books listed from 1900-1981. Check this out!
>>
>> Nothing before '51, and over half of the 342 references were from
>> 1951-54. There was a dark age of holding space from '55-'70, with no
>> references. And of the 342, over 96% treated "holding space" as a
>> noun, rather than a process. They are about physical containers for
>> stuff, livestock, or prisoners.
>>
>> Below I list the exceptions - some of which seem to hint at the way
>> "holding space" as an element of facilitation, though none do so
>> directly. The Leibniz and Kant papers were interesting in that they
>> peered into the concept of space itself, holding the concept if not
>> actual space. Very interesting is that the military concept of
>> "holding space" related to the Vietnam war starts to come close to the
>> facilitation sense, but the last one by Robert Nozick seems to come
>> the closest.
>>
>> 1953 - Princeton Alumni Magazine - "holding space" for slots in a
>> talent show at Princeton.
>>
>> 1971 - The New Yorker Volume 46, Part 7 - page 85 - "Farther toward
>> Green, a young woman named Vaughan Kaprow, shivering in the evening
>> cold, began /holding space/for another organization that had a special
>> greeting for Billy Graham --- the Pasadena Women's Liberation Group."
>>
>> 1973 - A Paper about Leibniz's Philosophy which looks at space
>> differently, "/holding space/ to be relational."
>>
>> 1973 - the Michigan Library talked about "holding space" for sign ups
>> for tickets (flights to New York), similar to the holding space for
>> slots in a talent show in 1953.
>>
>> 1976 - Ecology - Volume 57, Issues 1-3 - Page 286: "Porter (1974)
>> speculated that the high degree of coexistance on Caribbean reefs is
>> due to a "balance of abilities" divided among the Caribbean corals,
>> such that no one species is competitively superior in acquiring and
>> /holding space/."
>>
>> 1976 - The Philosophy of Kant Explained - Page 89 - "It is thus
>> obvious that we can only explain how we can have legitimate a priori
>> synthetic judgments in geometry by /holding space/as..."
>>
>> 1977 - Object Relations Family Therapy - Page 72 - " the family
>> therapist gets transference information from the interactions in the
>> shared /holding space/of the family." Still a noun.
>>
>> 1977 - All quiet on the Eastern front: the death of South Vietnam:
>> "Time was a secondary dependent variable, a function of our success in
>> winning and /holding space/."
>>
>> 1978 - BBC transcript - Many reasons why: the American involvement in
>> Vietnam - "it's because you're holding this space in the territory of
>> the rural areas. Also you're /holding space/in another sense altogether"
>>
>> 1979 - Arts Magazine - Volume 53, Issues 6-8: "Moss now opens wide
>> gaps in the grid, erasing large segments of the retaining wall that
>> had been holding space 'back'. A new spontaneity and elasticity
>> develops between color and field: an energy."
>>
>> 1981 - Kant and the Transcendental Object - "And to all these
>> impressive reasons for /holding space/and time to be phenomenal, Kant
>> adds the further reason that there are a great many axiomatic
>> principles which govern things in space and time, which are not
>> logically necessary, since ...
>>
>> 1981 - Robert Nozick: Philosophical Explanations Page 83 - " The word
>> "I" might be the marker for the blank, /holding space/in which the
>> self can appear."
>>
>> Regards,
>> Harold
>>
>> On 10/20/14 7:41 AM, JenniferHurley-HFA via OSList wrote:
>>
>> If Google Scholar is any indication, the usage, at least in print,
>> seems fairly recent:
>>
>>
>> https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=Holding+space&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2CHolding%20space%3B%2Cc0
>>
>> Jennifer Hurley
>>
>> Hurley-Franks & Associates
>>
>> 267-971-4598
>>
>> Sent from my iPhone
>>
>>
>> On Oct 20, 2014, at 9:20 AM, Daniel Mezick <dan at newtechusa.net
>> <mailto:dan at newtechusa.net>> wrote:
>>
>> This is extremely helpful, Jennifer! Thank you
>>
>> On 10/20/14 9:14 AM, JenniferHurley-HFA wrote:
>>
>> I have no idea about the earliest usage, but it's a phrase
>> often used by Quakers.
>>
>> Jennifer Hurley
>>
>> Hurley-Franks & Associates
>>
>> 267-971-4598
>>
>> Sent from my iPhone
>>
>>
>> On Oct 19, 2014, at 7:33 PM, Daniel Mezick via OSList
>> <oslist at lists.openspacetech.org
>> <mailto:oslist at lists.openspacetech.org>> wrote:
>>
>> Since July 2011, I continue to wander, searching for
>> the earliest known reference to the term "holding the
>> space." Anybody know?
>>
>>
>> http://lists.openspacetech.org/pipermail/oslist-openspacetech.org/2011-July/334185.html
>>
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoSn2Y-b6wI
>>
>> --
>>
>> Daniel Mezick, President
>>
>> New Technology Solutions Inc.
>>
>> (203) 915 7248 (cell)
>>
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>>
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>>
>>
>>
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> --
>
> Daniel Mezick, President
>
> New Technology Solutions Inc.
>
> (203) 915 7248 (cell)
>
> Bio <http://newtechusa.net/dan-mezick/>. Blog
> <http://newtechusa.net/blog/>. Twitter
> <http://twitter.com/#%21/danmezick/>.
>
> Examine my new book:The Culture Game
> <http://newtechusa.net/about/the-culture-game-book/>: Tools for the
> Agile Manager.
>
> Explore Agile Team Training
> <http://newtechusa.net/services/agile-scrum-training/> and Coaching.
> <http://newtechusa.net/services/agile-scrum-coaching/>
>
> Explore the Agile Boston <http://newtechusa.net//user-groups/ma/>Community.
>
>
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