Beautifully written Tree! You bring it back to me. I had never done fund raising before and we started getting international requests to attend. As with many of the miracles surrounding that gathering, a professional fund raiser showed up to help us. I sent out a note to just about everyone I knew asking them to contribute something. Others did as well. We raised about $5,000. Not much, but it helped bring people from unlikely places.
I had a similar experience to Chris Corrigan. The Practice of Peace influenced everything about the way I work and created friendships that continue to this day. Peggy _________________________________ Peggy Holman Executive Director Journalism that Matters 15347 SE 49th Place Bellevue, WA 98006 425-746-6274 www.journalismthatmatters.net www.peggyholman.com Twitter: @peggyholman JTM Twitter: @JTMStream Enjoy the award winning Engaging Emergence: Turning Upheaval into Opportunity <http://www.engagingemergence.com/> > On Jun 12, 2016, at 3:22 PM, Therese Fitzpatrick via OSList > <oslist@lists.openspacetech.org> wrote: > > Of course, depending on an event's goals, and planning team capacity, you do > as much outreach as possible. My friend Lisa Heft has sometimes offered a > workshop, which I have not attended for I consider myself an professional, > expert OS facilitator, in which LIsa does a lot of training on what goes on > before an OS event. The more outreach you do, the more open the space. And > some OS events are sorta closed, such as an event for employees of a > organization. > > A key part of the planning work is the invitation: how wide is the invite? > > I am recalling a time that I, and several others, organized an event called > Practice of Peace, shortly after Harrison's book of that name came out. We > invited, and funded the costs, of OS facilitators working in conflict zones > around the world. We had everyone we knew putting out our invitation and, > lucky for us, one member of our team had some great connects in Africa. We > did not have any formal speakers, other than Harrison speaking of his > then-new book but by having what we labeled "invited guests", who were each > free to do whatever they wanted in OS and, guess what, most of them offered > sessions about their work! > > It was a big reach for us to fund airfares for three OS professionals from > Jerusalem, one from D.C. (the event in Seattle area), one from India, one > from Colombia, one from NYC -- the airfares!!!! We had no capital, just > registration fees so we had no lump of money up front. We trusted things > would work out and we developed some pride as it looked like we were gonna be > able to finance all the airfares, housing and food of our 'invited guests'. > My memory is incomplete but I think we had 8 invited guests to fund. > > We listed the invited guests in our invitation and that invite went all over > the globe. I am sure it made it to this list. We ended up with > participatns from 26 countries including N. Ireland, Herzegovina, Nigeria, > Burundi . .and many I am leaving out. > > Now to the point of my story. Just as we were feeling confident we could > finance all our invited guests, a minister from Burundi wrote to us and asked > if there was any scholarship funds. Whew. We had not considered scholarship > money. Airfare from Burundi to Seattle is not cheap. > > So. What to do? Our planning team realized that if we were who we said we > were, open space facilitators, that we should try to facilitate the > participation of whoever was showing up. That guy from Burundi was trying to > show up!!! And we were the right people to try to help him for there was no > one else. We decided we would fund whatever scholarships we could and we came > up with a brief application. Prosper, the Burundi guy, returned his > application almost instantly. We got a couple other financial aid requests > but could not fulfill many. But we paid for some. And the first scholarship > was to Prosper. > > When Peggy arranged to wire over $3,000, which was a huge chunk of our > resources back in 2003, she realized that, for all we knew, this person > claiming to be from Burundi was just looking for money. And, besides, by then > a guy from Nigeria had asked for some help and we have all heard about > Nigerian online scams. (NB: the guy from Nigeria, Joel, turned out to also > be an awesome guy and on the up and up). Peggy, if I recall correctly, took > a big breath and reminded herself "this is about who we are" and she wired > that money to Prosper. Poof. It was gone. > > But Prosper showed up. He made contacts that he still works with to this > day, working to heal some of the wounds of genocide in his homeland. Joel > married one of our team, although they are no longer married, and together > they raised seed funding for a leadership center in Lagos, Nigeria. > > And all the 'invited guests' that we financed were awesome. > > And, gosh, it sure felt like as many of the right people as possible showed > up. We OS facilitators, we did our best to get as many of the people who > wanted to show up to be able to show up. > > I am not answering your question. Maybe I am telling this story because your > question included international collaboration. > > OS is about trust. The deeper the trust, the more the energy goes out into > the world to the right people and the more readily the right people are able > to show up. It's like that old saw, often wrongly attributed to Goethe but > which actually comes from the introductino to a book on the Scottish > Expedition (the first westerners to reach a big-deal summit in the Himalayas) > that goes something like this: until one is committed, there is hesitancy . > . .and then, it goes on, and I don't have it just right, as soon as one is > committed all kinds of things appear to make the commitment possible, the > goal achievable. > > If you are committed to having all the right people in the room, I can't > guarantee you that all the right people from everywhere will show up but I > can guarantee that the more your planning team trusts itself and those > seeking to show up, the more right people will show up. > > There is no perfect event with every possibly perfect participant > participating. This cosmos is too complex, imho, for that kind of perfection. > Instead, you get something better in Open Space: you get a tangible, hands-on > experience of energy coalescing around a theme, or invitation, that everyone > that does show up cared about enough that they showed up. Those are the right > people. > > Can you dreams exceed your grasp? I hope so. Then you always have more trust > and love to unleash with Open Space. > > On Sun, Jun 12, 2016 at 2:41 PM, christopher macrae via OSList > <oslist@lists.openspacetech.org <mailto:oslist@lists.openspacetech.org>> > wrote: > "the people who come are the right people" but sometimes doesnt that depend > on how much work has been done on the invitation process to include all sides > including those who may not know they are part of the broeken systems > > i guess when an open space is about a local community issue its relatively > simple to see whether everyone has been included but > > my main concern is on issues only global youth can mobilise if > sustainability is to be our future - and yet while i am interested in > movements that empower youth (sytarting with creating jobs) i also see > sustainability -whether we win it or lose it - as an intergenerational > compound crisis - > > does the generation of trump or clinton understand how much they have > presided over designing non-sustainable systems? has mass tv media becomes > such an intergenerational liar that we no longer have enough bases for > intergenerational trust? what 5000 people invitation to open space would > maximise a movement of networks to combat the national rifle association at > least on selling assault guns- > > here are these systems that seem so broken - are we deceiving youth in > implying that enough elders will ever come to celebrate youth's best endeavors > > I also have a suspicion that eg hackathons viralise their invitations and > get extraordinary collections of young participants in ways > that open space invitation agents may need to get smarter at - if > intergenerational space is to be convened as much as the coming decade of > tipping points will require > > just thinking aloud- any views? > chris macrae > www.globalyouth50000.com <http://www.globalyouth50000.com/> > > > > _______________________________________________ > OSList mailing list > To post send emails to OSList@lists.openspacetech.org > <mailto:OSList@lists.openspacetech.org> > To unsubscribe send an email to oslist-le...@lists.openspacetech.org > <mailto:oslist-le...@lists.openspacetech.org> > To subscribe or manage your subscription click below: > http://lists.openspacetech.org/listinfo.cgi/oslist-openspacetech.org > <http://lists.openspacetech.org/listinfo.cgi/oslist-openspacetech.org> > Past archives can be viewed here: > http://www.mail-archive.com/oslist@lists.openspacetech.org > <http://www.mail-archive.com/oslist@lists.openspacetech.org> > > _______________________________________________ > OSList mailing list > To post send emails to OSList@lists.openspacetech.org > To unsubscribe send an email to oslist-le...@lists.openspacetech.org > To subscribe or manage your subscription click below: > http://lists.openspacetech.org/listinfo.cgi/oslist-openspacetech.org > Past archives can be viewed here: > http://www.mail-archive.com/oslist@lists.openspacetech.org
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