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At 10:26 AM 2/17/2003 -0800,
<font face="Courier New, Courier" size=2 color="#0000FF">Chris</font>
wrote:<br><br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite><font face="Courier New, Courier" size=2 color="#0000FF">This idea of grief work as a fundamental tool is interesting too. I see what you are saying Harrison, but something feels to me like that s only part of the answer. <br>
</font><br>
<font face="Courier New, Courier" size=2 color="#0000FF">When I work with the grief cycle, the thing that people respond to is the map. They can find themselves on the map and it validates what they are feeling. And of course because it is a map, it also points out some places they might go, and this is powerful for people, especially people who are in the midst of the anger or denial stage or that deeply unresourceful and collapsed point where all they want to do is sob. Knowing that it gets better can help honour that moment and open space for the pain of the now to be fully experienced. When someone leaves that stage it is with the knowledge that they had been fully present there and so there is no residual pain to carry forward as suffering.</font><font face="Courier New, Courier"></font></blockquote><br>
The Griefwork process is definitely a map, and certainly can be used in the manner you suggest. But I have a strong feeling that in this case the map is pretty close to the territory. Not the same for sure, but close enough for Government work, as we used to say when I was in government employ. From where I sit (both theoretically and quite personally when the grief is mine), the process described is, in and of itself, critical to the phenomenon of transformation as it works itself out through self-organization. <br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>Speaking very broadly, the process of self-organization follows a path which might be described a) Steady State (life as we know it.) b) Flapping Butterfly (some nuts and bolts fall off and the system heads towards dis-equilibrium) c) Periodic doubling (The system tried everything it can think of to get back on course) d) Chaos (The Sh... Hits the fan, and the system falls apart.) e) One of two eventualities occur -- the system dies (disappears) OR The system reconstitutes at a new and higher order of complexity, and life goes on in some new and interesting ways. <br><br>
The critical point to notice is that one way or another, the old system dies. This system could be you, your family (relationships), your business, city, or country -- or I guess the planet itself. When death happens, grief starts -- not when we push a button or choose it -- it just starts. Totally automatic. Shock/Anger, Denial, Memories, Despair, Silence (Open Space), and if we are so inclined, something new which I call Vision. This is my version, based on Kuebler-Ross and a number of other folks. Other people have some different names, but I think we all come out at about the same place. Anyhow, I see the Griefwork Process as the critical mechanism through which we as human beings negotiate the (often) painful process of Transformation and/self-organization. Thus for us (Homo sapiens) Griefwork enables self-organization, and without it we would be dead in the water -- literally. And like the process of self-organization it seems to happen all by itself, and has done so for the million years, or whatever, that we have been around. <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 301-365-2093<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://mywebpages.comcast.net/hhowen/index.htm" eudora="autourl"><font color="#0000FF">http://mywebpages.comcast.net/hhowen/index.htm</a><br><br>
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