Dear Harold,
inviting folks is per se a grand idea.
What they are being invited to is a vast spectrum.
Who does the inviting, too.
As a facilitator I dont invite folks to an open space event, as a
sponsor, sure.
Often I talk about the nature of the invitation and the nature of open
space with the sponsor or the Planning Group as I see it in my limited ways.
When talking with the sponsor I also talk about Life and Spirit as stuff
that are essential to groups, organisations and systems, with an
emphasis that they are definitely present (otherwise the group,
organisation or system would be dead) and could do perhaps better with
some loving tender care.
And I talk about selforganisation, reminding myself that
selforganisation is something I see all over, of which, however, I know
nothing (a little bit about preconditions) and probably never will.
Looking at it that way, my question is
How could seeing Open Space as a game help me in my work as facilitator
(working with a sponsor) to expand time and space for selforganisation
to unfold in the gathering planned? (keeping in mind what people are
gathering for in open space and that it is a good idea to be prepared to
be surprised).
Have a sunny Sunday evening
mmp
On 06.10.2013 16:39, Harold Shinsato wrote:
Dan,
There's a kind of 'vibe' around Open Space which might make it difficult
for people working with the format to necessarily see some of it's
nature, and I think this community is missing some gifts from your
perspective because the elusive nature of the spirit of Open Space
doesn't much care for boundaries, constraints, and prescriptions. My
hope is we won't lose those gifts because of the wrapping.
I'd like to respect the poetry of Open Space, and I'm not in any way
opposing the perspective being put forward by Harrison, Lisa and others.
The word constrain according to dictionary.com includes in its
definition words like "force", "compel", and "oblige". This is not in
alignment with the word invitation, nor with the spirit of what we're
trying to accomplish with Open Space.
But I'm drawn to your perspective of looking at Open Space as a game
with simple 'rules' and I look forward to grasping this better. It seems
part of a redefinition or clarification of power, authority, and respect
that is happening in both commerce, government, and families. This is
something I passionately care about, but it remains an open question and
probably will remain one until I die. But I sense from conversations we
had in Nashville at Agile 2013 that you have something for me and for
this Open Space community in this area. I hope this email will help that
happen.
Although Thomas Jefferson wrote "we hold these truths to be
self-evident", that certainly did not imply that British rule at the
time included awareness or acceptance of the "self-evident" truths
espoused in that document. Self-evident does *not* mean obvious. The
truths Thomas Jefferson wrote about could only be held within the
imperfect container of his words after millennia of study and reflection.
And notice the word "hold" in "hold these truths". Thomas Jefferson and
the other founders did attempt to hold and establish these truths into
society with rules, laws, constraints and containers. One of the biggest
things they were trying to constrain was the power and potential evil
inherent in governance itself.
Yes, whether we like it or not, the universe is self-organizing. This
might be a self-evident truth, but it certainly isn't obvious -
especially to those who think they're running this planet with systems
that seem on a bee line to multiple environmental and humanitarian
disasters.
I'll leave with a question. How could seeing Open Space as a game help
us better invite people to play with us in redefining our current
organization structures to let in more Life and Spirit?
Thanks,
Harold
Michael M Pannwitz
Draisweg 1, 12209 Berlin, Germany
++49 – 30-772 8000
Come join us for the Third European Open Space Learning Exchange from
November 20 through 22, 2013 in
Utrecht, Netherlands
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