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</head><BODY BGCOLOR="#F8F8F8" ><div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;">Dear Harrison,</SPAN></div>
<div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;"> </SPAN></div>
<div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;">I am very happy to find your posting here, thank you.</SPAN></div>
<div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;"> </SPAN></div>
<div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;">I think this is really the key point, we (the western world people) are so very much used to think in this logical framework, that we do it "automatically" by reflex, not noticing, that this thinking is based on the notion of separability. In the case you are promoting (community><individuum), it is very much clear that there is no individuum thinkable without its social context ("local community"). The wisdom of language tells us exactly this aspect: in-dividuum. The other aspect is, that the person, we would call an individuum can not become a such, without experiencing "individualization", without getting into conflict with this (inseparable) context, without passing through phases of clear contradiction with its community.</SPAN></div>
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<div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;">And if I look back at my in-dividual development, I have to admit, that it was by far not enough to "understand" this, but it needed and needs a lot of practice and exercise to be able to not react according to the logical reflex. Living in Africa helped a lot, because I notized, that I am not forced to think that way, and that it is not self-evident, and that others think in other ways.</SPAN></div>
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<div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;">Our language is not always "wise" and the either-or reflex is very much hidden in our grammar and syntax. Which means, that talking about this problem produces lots and lots of complexity and make it difficult to be understood. If we stay below the level of being driven by our thinking reflexes (in meditation or contemplation) it seems to be easier because we do not "think it" but "feel IT" (the fundamental interconnectedness of the "conflictuous" poles).</SPAN></div>
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<div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;">This gives me a hint to what many in this list seem to be pointing at, when they use the word "community". They seem to mean a social agglomerate, where all the interacting persons do not only "understand" this aporetic/dialectic situation, but FEEL it. And Open Space practice seems to be quite good in producing this feeling.</SPAN></div>
<div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;"> </SPAN></div>
<div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;">A question to all of you: If what Harrison wrote is true, which are the consequences for our way of communicating in this list (and elsewhere)? Or are we not "part of the problem" and driving the ball on and on?</SPAN></div>
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<div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;">Any ideas?</SPAN></div>
<div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;"> </SPAN></div>
<div class="body"><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;">Bernd<br /><br />Am Tue, 23 Aug 2005 08:13:49 -0400, schrieb Harrison Owen:<br /></SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;color:navy;">> It has often occurred to me that the "problem" of individual and</SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;"><br /></SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;color:navy;">> community is less a function of our experience than our logic. Or</SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;"><br /></SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;color:navy;">> maybe our logic forces a false distinction so that we expect the</SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;"><br /></SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;color:navy;">> individual to be in conflict with community? This is the logic of</SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;"><br /></SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;color:navy;">> "either/or" -- and not both/and. It is a logic dominated by an</SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;"><br /></SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;color:navy;">> awareness of contradiction as opposed to paradox -- and somehow all</SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;"><br /></SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;color:navy;">> paradoxes are thought to be contradictory and therefore to be</SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;"><br /></SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;color:navy;">> resolved and eliminated.</SPAN><SPAN style="font-size:10pt;"><br /><br /></SPAN></div>
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