Dear friends and colleagues in Open Space Technology, I have done a great deal of thinking over this last week about my feelings about training and learning and where I am at and what I am prepared to do to shift my beliefs into actions. Last evening I was in discussion about all of this with my husband and partner Ward, exploring the possibilities. And so I share with you a story of my perspective and on behalf of Ward and I, make two offers. If you aren't interested in my personal learning story just skip the next few paragraphs and go right down to the offer.
One of the loves of my life is Reiki, a healing art that works with energy. Until recently, I did my Reiki Training with a Reiki Master who learned through a certain lineage. She advised us from the beginning that she combined two healing arts in her teaching: Reiki as learned through the lineage, and Hands of Light work, as learned through Barbara Brennan. My teacher is a Master in both. I was thrilled and was excited by the combination. I was naive. And during this last month, I had to face a lot of things about the Reiki work that I have been doing. And it paralleled my concerns that I raised on the list about Open Space Technology. It is funny in life how there are always wonderful mirrors to get us to look at ourselves. My teacher was a Master in each of the healing arts separately and she is very very good at the healing work she does. However, by learning the combination from her rather than by learning either Reiki (although we called it Reiki) or Hands of Light, I did not grasp certain key and critical components about the energy work of Reiki as a true practice. And there were several key and critical parts that were not taught to me. A very mixed recipe. So...I have been doing Reiki healings. Some of them go well. Others have not gone well but I didn't know it at the time. I just thought that "whatever happens...". I sought out the new Master because I knew she also did healings with crystals, combining crystals and Reiki and I have learned all I could about crystals from books and now I wanted a teacher who would show me how to combine all of this. I love working with crystals. The new Master would not combine the learning until she was sure that my Reiki practice was good. Over this past month, the new Master that I have gone to that was going to teach me at a more advanced level had to go back to basics with me and reteach me and make sure I had the right components and the essence for each. I have now done this. And now next week she is ready to instruct me about healing with crystals and then when I have mastered that, she will teach me the combination of the two. Work with energy of whatever healing art, and Open Space Technology is also a healing art, is very powerful and needs to be understood and worked with with care. In my training, I paid attention to how I learn, and I needed a lot of repetition and practice to really understand and learn to use. I would learn something important and between sessions would forget completely and have to go over it again and again until I had it. There is not one right way to do it, but there are certain ingredients to attend to and to attend to diligently. I now know that some of the Reiki work I did in the past caused harm, despite the fact that I am a powerful healer. Would we still say "whatever happens...". I don't. Negative things emerged from the work that didn't go well that could have been prevented. Or do I shrug this aside and say it is all as it is meant to be? I think of one Reiki on a friend where there was so much negative energy that everything in her and around her was black at an energetic level. I did what I knew how to do at the time. Today, I know I did exactly the wrong thing in terms of the placement of my hands. By placing my hands palms toward the person, the negative energy remained in her. If I had done the work of drawing out the negative with my palms away from the person, the negative would have been released. From that day, I experienced many negative situations with the person and we are no longer friends. It might be meant to be, or it might have been deeply affected by a Reiki practice in which I had been taught incorrectly. I'm sure those of you on the list can see where the strong urge in me about the key ingredients with Open Space Technology was becoming stronger and expressed so on the list. I saw such a parallel. The offer: 1.Our training manual was developed only to be distributed at our training programs. The new manual of 146 pages was just completed this month. It is a thorough resource called Working With Open Space Technology: a learning journey and is a workbook. For anyone who has been through either Harrison's training,training of the team of Gabi Ender/Michael Pannwitz or my training that would like this as a resource, we want to make it available to you. It is only for those who have gone through training. We don't want to add to the confusion by making it available instead of training. If you would like a copy, the price is $50US and should be sent with your request to Birgitt Williams at P.O.Box 19373, Raleigh, North Carolina, USA 27619 2. Our Open Space Technology training program that is available in various locations in the world costs $600US per participant for the four days. Most of the locations have local sponsors and there are various financial arrangements involved in the sponsorships. However, the annual Open Space Technology training in Raleigh, North Carolina, USA is sponsored by ourselves because it is our home base. The training in Raleigh for the year 2000 is October 2,3,4,5. For anyone who has taken training with either Harrison, Gabi/Michael or myself in the past and would like a refresher, honouring the need for spaced repetition for deeper learning, Ward and I will make the 4 day program available to you for $200US (just to cover the direct costs of having you there). We realize this offer doesn't deal with travel and accommodation which for some of you may be the biggest part of the dilemma, but we make this offer in case it is of help to any of you as you go deeper and deeper with your learning, or if you've taken the course and have been too afraid to head out to do your first Open Space Technology meeting. Coming back for a repeat may be just what you need. We make this offer to you for this year or whatever year you can join us in Raleigh. Some of the other locations may be able to offer some reduction but often this isn't possible simply because of all of the costs involved. But you can always check with us to see what is possible. We hope that either of these may be of help to some of you, Kindest regards, Birgitt Birgitt Williams Make Genuine Contact! Dalar Associates: organizational effectiveness consultants Striving for Success? Ready to exceed your expectations? Contact us for consulting services, training, conference and meeting facilitation, and keynote speaking. www.openspacetechnology.com
