<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE>1. Evolution, 2. Kurds</TITLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
<FONT FACE="Times, Times New Roman"><SPAN STYLE='font-size:18.0px'>1. Peggy Holman wrote...<BR>
<BR>
</SPAN></FONT><BLOCKQUOTE><FONT FACE="Times, Times New Roman"><SPAN STYLE='font-size:18.0px'>We are calling into being our collective soul so that our <BR>
many-storied world can find its way and each and everyone one of us <BR>
has our roles to play in it.<BR>
</SPAN></FONT></BLOCKQUOTE><FONT FACE="Times, Times New Roman"><SPAN STYLE='font-size:18.0px'><BR>
I like this. For a long time now, open space has seemed to me the closest we have to evolution as a meeting format.<BR>
<BR>
2. Susan Coleman’s story of the Kurds in New York did include me as one of the holders of the space for the final two days of Susan’s five-day event. I want to add two facts not mentioned in the version of the story Peggy reproduced on this list.<BR>
<BR>
</SPAN></FONT><UL><LI><FONT FACE="Times, Times New Roman"><SPAN STYLE='font-size:18.0px'>First, most of the participants spoke no English, and neither Susan nor I speak Kurdish or Arabic. We had a very helpful translator. He helped us produce the necessary flip chart pages (in both languages), etc. and was obviously crucial. One effect of the language “barrier” was that Susan and I sat through evening news and morning announcements with few clues as to what folks we’re saying. We smiled a lot.
</SPAN></FONT><LI><FONT FACE="Times, Times New Roman"><SPAN STYLE='font-size:18.0px'>Susan is more than a little amazing. Consider this: at the time we did the event, Susan had never <I>been</I> in open space and had never even <I>seen</I> open space. She gets my all-time award for most courageous consultant. There was a lot on the line for her personally, for Columbia, and others. I had nothing to lose; I knew what role I was playing and what I had to do, but Susan was in an open space within an open space that was hers alone to occupy. Picture us sitting there together that first day, with an empty open space circle. She kept asking, “This is okay, right?” And I kept on answering (because there was nothing else one could say), “Sure.”<BR>
</SPAN></FONT></UL><FONT FACE="Times, Times New Roman"><SPAN STYLE='font-size:18.0px'><BR>
Ralph Copleman</SPAN></FONT>
</BODY>
</HTML>
*
*
==========================================================
OSLIST@LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
------------------------------
To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options,
view the archives of oslist@listserv.boisestate.edu:
http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html
To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs:
http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist