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At 10:25 AM 11/22/01 -0900,
<font face="arial" size=2 color="#800080">Julie</font><font face="arial">
</font>wrote:<br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite><font face="arial" size=2 color="#800080">Yesterday I came across this quote from Carl Jung:</font><br>
<font face="arial" size=2 color="#800080"><br>
"The art of letting things happen, action through non-action, letting go of oneself, as taught by Meister Eckhart, became for me the key opening the door to the way. We must be able to let things happen in the psyche. For us, this actually is an art of which few people know anything. Consciousness is forever interfering...."</font><br>
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<font face="arial" size=2 color="#800080">This seems to resonate well with what you are saying, Harrison. </font><br>
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<font face="arial" size=2 color="#800080">It seems to me that your thinking about things is also very similar to a style of mediation called Transformative Mediation. In most styles of mediation, the mediator is encouraged to let go of the <b>content </b>of the discussion, but in varying degrees to lead in (control) the <b>process </b>of how the discussion will unfold. In Transformative Mediation, the mediator is encouraged to follow rather than lead in both the content and process of the discussion. The role of the mediator practicing Transformative Mediation is to support empowerment of each individual and recognition of the relationship. In other words, to support each individual (empowerment) and to also support the relationship (recognition). With just this bit of presence, support and encouragement, many people who have been unable to resolve their differences find a way to do so. </font><br>
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<font face="arial" size=2 color="#800080">Perhaps there is a continuum here...... how to be helpful with individuals experiencing internal conflict (psychology), how to be helpful with small groups experiencing external conflict (mediation), and how to be helpful with large groups experiencing external conflict/need for problem-solving (facilitation). Within each of these sets, we have many choices..... many ways of practicing psychology, mediation, and facilitation. </font><br>
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<font face="arial" size=2 color="#800080">If we are interested in looking at choices that are infused with certain characteristics, like spirit, or letting go, or self-determination, or openness, or whatever it is we're trying to express, then we can look for how those values are being expressed at other places on the continuum, and then we have the opportunity to transfer knowledge across disciplines. Maybe we can consciously engage in the fractal dance.</font><font face="arial"></font></blockquote><br>
Julie -- the points you are making here are most important I think. For a long time it has been obvious that for the facilitator of Open Space, it is much more about "being" than "doing." Obviously there is not long training for the participants, and the opening remarks typically take 15-20 min. and things go from there -- The powers of rational cognition which are utilized in so many of our other activities take a clear second place to other powers which we all posses, but which many find weird, strange and uncomfortable. For me, the essential task is that of "creating and holding space," which can be effectively accomplished to the extent that we are "totally present and absolutely invisible." Obviously, nobody achieves "total presence and absolute invisibility", but that is a goal to be strived for. There are, of course, a number of ways that one might go about this, but for me my practice of meditation is central. When we move from the open space of an event to the ongoing open space of our lives, I think the same principles hold, and suddenly the esoteric (as we used to think about it) and the everyday shake hands. Not to bad.<br><br>
Harrison<br><br>
<x-sigsep><p></x-sigsep>
<div align="center">Harrison Owen<br>
7808 River Falls Drive<br>
Potomac, MD 20854 USA<br>
phone 301-469-9269<br>
Open Space Training <a href="http://www.openspaceworld.com/" eudora="autourl">www.openspaceworld.com</a> <br>
Open Space Institute <a href="http://www.openspaceworld.org/" eudora="autourl">www.openspaceworld.org</a><br>
Personal website <a href="http://www.mindspring.com/~owenhh" eudora="autourl">www.mindspring.com/~owenhh</a><br><br>
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