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<TITLE>playback ost: to converge, or not to converge?</TITLE>
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Dear OSLIST,<BR>
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I am seeking design advice, once again!<BR>
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Yesterday I held an excellent pre-meeting with three members of the local Playback Theatre company in anticipation of our OST meeting next weekend. We spent most of our time creating the company's "story line," a technique I learned from Birgitt. The remarkable six-year history of this theatre company unfurled itself in multi-dimensional glory. These people have done phenomenal inner and outer work in this community.<BR>
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As often is the case, we're deeper in the grief cycle than I expected. In fact, we're working with the theme, "Letting go of our first phase, beginning our new."<BR>
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This Saturday night we will begin with a storytelling session. In contrast to Playback forms, I will be holding the space for stories to be told individually from personal experience. I believe that this is what needs to be shared at this time.<BR>
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The OST is scheduled for a 9 to 5:30 day on Sunday. <FONT COLOR="#800080">So here's my question. </FONT>Should we do our OST with three 90-minute sessions and a standard closing circle? Or should we do 75-minute sessions, and have a little more than two hours at the end for a closing circle/convergence?<BR>
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I have just visited the Meta Network and re-read the "Converging Convergence Approaches" thread. There is an outstanding discussion there by Chris Corrigan, Jeff, Larry, and Laurel about converging a one-day event, which helps me a lot. My sense is that it is wise for the facilitator to be flexible and responsive to the group's energy as the closing circle draws near. Larry describes a "twice-around" closing circle, where the second round invites people to express commitments for future actions. I am also fascinated with Jeff's offering about inviting people to write individual commitments, and then to group these and open the space for short action planning meetings. With a group of 13, we might have time for this...?<BR>
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So I post my query to the list in case there is fresh thinking/experience about converging a one-day event.<BR>
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Many thanks,<BR>
Chris<BR>
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