For me the "letting go" is the letting go of the 25 years of training and experience I have as a "Facilitator." The training tells you that you must preplan agendas that are meaningful to the group, and that will lead toward "meeting outcomes" that you must think through possible pitfalls and design "interventions" and "preventions" so that the group does not get off track,etc. Also, in traditional facilitation, the facilitator often takes on the role of timekeeper to make sure that people are moving from one place or activity to another so that the meeting ends on time and the praise is that "we got a lot done and ended on time" and all of this feeds the Facilitator Ego. We learned about this as the shadow side of facilitation, and our balance was in recognizing the shadow, never questioning the validity of the mental model. A great thing about my journey as an Open Space "practitioner" ( the only way that I can describe it to myself) is that I have tons of things to let go of, and every time I think I have purged the last "tool" held by my Facilitator Ego another appears that I can happily let fly away, but some times they don't fly very far away. I know this is mundane, but remember this paraphrase of some old Chinese saying: The good facilitator is the one who people praise, the bad facilitator is the one who the people despise, the great facilitator is the one who the people will say "we did it ourselves". Or something like that. Keeping the space open inside and out.
Don >>> on.the.e...@sympatico.ca 06/22/01 08:44AM >>> Dear Artur, Meg and all! I agree... The process of evolution - letting go - is like peeling back the layers. I love both the shift of consciousness topic and the embodied experience sharing, and would appreciate hearing more. To that end, some playful questions have come to mind: - What are we 'letting go' of? This, for me, has been the adventure that I formerly experienced as embarassment, pain, etc... I now can play with myself, let the universe play with me, and even play with! :-) From my perspective, the bumps I hit become rides in self-awareness. - What are we 'letting go' into, if anything? Is the open space between states of being? Or is it an end unto itself? If an end unto itself, what is the ultimate open space? I hope someone will want to play with me! ... Best wishes to all! glory ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Glory Ressler, B.A., Dip. GIT Avalon Consulting & Associates www.edgeofavalon.com "...the edge where 21st century scientific insight and ancient storytelling wisdom meet in the service of transformation and growth" * * ========================================================== 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 * * ========================================================== 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
