Beautiful words everyone You have all brought me to the guts of my initial enquiry: how does one find the balance between fear/control and letting go/going with the flow?
Finding that balance comes back to being a co-creator with spirit for me. I am spirit's hands, eyes, ears, mouth piece; yet I am not all of it! Spirit flows regardless of whether I hold its waters tight or with open palms. My experience is enhanced or diminished depending on my stance. This is what open space is teaching me. My co-operation, malleableness, flexibility, ultimately openness to spirit is what life is all about. The four principles, one law and spirit of open space are not just for meetings. They are for living! In trying to live these things out, in the furnace of everyday trials, especially in relationships, open space provides me with a framework to be receptive to spirit; mine and the world's. That's all Mike Copeland -----Original Message----- From: Peggy Holman [mailto:pe...@opencirclecompany.com] Sent: Tuesday, 4 November 2003 9:35 a.m. To: osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Subject: Fw: Fear and control (waxing lyrical) Robyn -- lovely image! This conversation reminds me of one from last January called "self-organization is what consciousness (spirit) does". I pulled this snippet of mine from it: I recently was given a gift of an image around this that I've found quite helpful. A Buddhist priest attended Spirited Work (a learning community that gathers quarterly in OS). He used an image of hands for holding space. Actually, here are Master Chang's words: >Since I left Whidbey Island, I've constantly thought of OS and its spiritual manifestation in earthly conditionings. It's dawn[ed] on me that >we constantly create mental boundaries and then transfigure them into organizational rules, etc., which we call containers. Thus, there are >levels upon levels of containers, depending on levels of minds that we have. What OP[OST] methodology attracts me is the way it can >facilitate and accommodate multi-levels of containers by very few simple rules of gathering and interaction. The challenge for me in >creating an OP[OST] organization is to be able to make available (and to promote) evolutionary & consequential levels of >unfoldment ... so one can evolve from "container/2 hands cupped, facing each other" to "supporter/2 hands open, facing upwards" to >"being/handless gesture" ... I LOVE this picture of hands reflecting the evolution of space, perhaps because it mirrors my own growing comfort with space. (While I aspire to it, I'm not sure I'm ready to hang out in the space of "look ma, no hands!") It reminds me that we are all at different places of comfort with openness. I may go screaming from the room when the space feels too closed and someone else go running to their room because the space is too open. Peggy ----- Original Message ----- From: "Robyn" <p...@iinet.net.au <mailto:p...@iinet.net.au> > To: <osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu <mailto:osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu> > Sent: Monday, November 03, 2003 6:22 AM Subject: Re: Fear and control (waxing lyrical) > RE: > If you close those two hands - you end up with two fists. Definitely not > what we want. > > ~ (delighted laughter!) I pictured the closing of two open hands, like > an almond. The result, according to a dear and wise women that I know, > is the mandorla, which has become a very powerful symbol for me in my > journey towards wholeness. > * * ========================================================== osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu ------------------------------ To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu, Visit: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html ############################################## This e-mail (and attachments) is confidential and may be legally privileged. ############################################## * * ========================================================== osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu ------------------------------ To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu, Visit: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html