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The “shaman” is actually Harrison Owen
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Chris Corrigan
February 12
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One of the hundreds of Open Space Technology Principles posters I have used in
my time, this one from an Art of Hosting training in Minnesota in 2012, and
designed by a team member.
There is a post going around on the internet called "The Four Laws of the
Shaman" or the "Four Laws of Spirituality." The four laws are ascribed to some
unknown shaman or some exotic culture like "Indian spirituality" or "Native
American wisdom." You can visit the links I've provided here to get a sense of
the text. And, of course, this stuff is all over Facebook, where it gets shared
endlessly. The earliest reference to these "Four Laws of a Shaman" I could find
is from a Facebook page in 2011.
This kind of thing always gets my hackles up because it is possible that these
sorts of sayings are attributable to a person who may be a specific teacher in
a specific spiritual lineage or tribal community. Erasing their voice is a kind
of colonization, so please don't share these kinds of unattributed nuggets of
wisdom unless you can quote a source.
In this case, however, the source is not a tribal elder from an exotic locale,
but is Harrison Owen from Maryland, USA and the "Four Laws" are actually the
original four principles of Open Space Technology. Here is one version of these
"four laws of a shaman" from the posts:
- "The person who comes into your life is the right person"
- "What happens is the only thing that could have happened"
- "Anytime it starts is the right time."
- "When something ends, it ends"
Anyone familiar with this blog or Open Space Technology will recognize right
away that these are the original four principles of Open Space Technology, to
whit:
- Whoever comes is the right people.
- Whatever happens is the only thing that could have.
- Whenever it starts is the right time.
- When it's over, it's over.
(And there is a fifth principle that was added within the last decade or so
which says "Where ever it happens is the right place" but I'm old skool and the
truth is I forget that one all the time)
The original reference for these principles is Harrison's "Open Space
Technology: A User's Guide, first edition" originally published in 1992. The
principles and the law of two feet are outlined in Chapter Five, pp 68-74.
Before that, these principles were articulated in the late 1980s and published
in the original set of notes Harrison wrote about the process sometime in 1987
or 1988. You can find that document at the worldwide archive of the Open Space
Technology community of practice.
Harrison is incredibly generous with his work, and you can find much of his
out-of-print work available at the Harrison Owen Library at openspaceworld.org.
There is a library of his papers there too.
Sometimes, it is asserted that Harrison got these principles from a Liberian
village. This isn't true. Harrison did a stint in the US Peace Corps in the
1960s and documented village life in Liberia while working on community
projects. You can read a beautiful photo essay of his observations in "When the
Devil Dances" at the Internet Archive. He never claimed to see Open Space in
action there. Rather, he was taken with how the community addressed a complex
agricultural issue, and he cut his teeth on designing participatory processes
in that work, which is documented in some detail in The Practice of Peace.
The Organizational Transformation conferences he helped run in the early 1980s
(documented here) were the first use of the method, specifically at OT3 in
1985. His story of how he came to develop and use the method with many others
is documented in his many papers and books, especially Expanding Our Now. He
has been interviewed countless times, done TEDx talks and is always up for a
chat, so if you want to hear the story from the horse's mouth, you have
abundant opportunity to do so.
Harrison is an incredible guy, a deep river of experience and knowledge. His
folksy manner and his constant exhortations to simplify one's facilitation
practice don't come close to giving the full breadth of his life's work its
due. He is a priest, a theologian, a scholar of Near East religion, myth and
culture, a former bureaucrat, community organizer, consultant, teacher, and
author, and his whole life has only partially been about Open Space. I'm pretty
sure he wouldn't describe himself as a shaman but he was an important mentor in
my life. He was the first person to introduce me to complexity theory, to
spirit in organizations and to the dynamics of self-organization which
transformed my facilitation practice.
So. The next time you see these "shaman's laws" shared in your circles, feel
free to bring these receipts and give Harrison his due.
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