Seeds for a happy planet

Here we go! Second morning of our gathering!

We start our circle with a song sent to us by Luke Concannon (England), a friend of ours who is doing hosting work with his music. “It is a state of mind!” that is what the singer tells us.

We feel that our global community is very alive. We received many beautiful messages and good wishes for our time here, and its importance for the turning of the world. They were read yesterday in the circle and more were there this morning.

We invited our wholeness of knowing this morning by picking up on the tread of yesterday evening, but this time experiencing the whole field of past – present – future and the other dynamic from what is visible and conscious to the space of pain and what is not visible (yet). We were invited to enter a deeper level of experiencing – understanding with our bodies moving through the space. Deep wisdom was surfacing; very visible which space in the whole the different people were occupying.

Jan Hein (Denmark) is now inviting us to open space and referring back to the stewards meeting two years ago. Art of Hosting doesn’t have a little ‘c’ (trademark), it is not owned by somebody. Every steward – regardless of all the differences – added something to this pattern. He reads now the wisdom that was gathered in this meeting, so that we can go in the open space in connection to that.

Jasmina (Croatia) reminds us that Open Space releases responsibility and leadership, it brings the best out in people and in the whole. What can we do together? What can we be together?
Creativity has its own flow… and there is a rhythm: it is over when it is over. Will this Open Space be a Croatian one? Yes! There are some Croatian sweets!

What do I need to explore to be able to live the next level of Art of Hosting?

Right now – actually since yesterday morning and even the day before when I picked up people from the airport – we are running the gathering here in Belgium that is called the Art of Hosting on Art of Hosting. We are all practitioners in this field, more or less experienced, and we came together to see into the next level of our art, in many aspects.

The check-in circle yesterday was intense, fascinating and deep! Because I’m the organiser – dealing with all the practical details – I don’t have a lot of time to blog about it… too bad! But take a look at Chris’ blog, he already posted one entry and more are on their way.

The new thing is that there is no hosting or facilitation team. Maria suggested to do it like this: whoever is hosting one part is part of the conversation with the ones who are hosting the next part. This to make sure that everybody is aligned with the deeper stream. It seems like a new pattern in our art of hosting.

Another good thing to see is how the harvesters just stand up and do their thing. When you come into the room after the break, some took responsibility to harvest the previous conversation, and it is there! Beautiful and well!

More later!

Being part of the World Café community and the Art of Hosting community I see three movements happening, which can all be seen as a translation of a re-connecting with wholeness.

First of all we see how meaningful conversations become part of bigger processes, which lead to or are intended to foster community building. It goes beyond having now and then a meaningful conversation, but we see these meaningful conversations arise as an operating system in a community (like Kufunda and the Shire), a region (like in Ohio), a city. It is an expression of what Phil Cass came to see as the difference between ‘the individual voice’ and ‘the official voice’. People in their position tend to feel victimized by the big system they are working in, but when asked to act as an individual they are willing to engage in conversations, even when the outcomes are not sure. People tend to be resilient, positions are not!

A next development tha I see is that body, movement, stillness, meditation, martial arts gets bit-by-bit integrated in these ‘talking’ communities. It is another integration or re-connection that happens. It will lead us in the end to – what I call – a wholeness of knowing. An integrated knowing of mental, physical, emotional intelligence; together with what we learn from nature’s intelligence, systemic intelligence and so much more!

The last topic is about how to steward his kind of global movement, global communities. There is not one leader, and we see people all throughout the global netwerk taking up responsibilities. How to host this kind of living being? How to keep is somehow ‘on track’; meaning: congruent with it’s initial pupose, but flexible enough to include diversity and evolve over the years? We see both networks flourish on the friendships that are build over time. Isn’t this also a sign of reconnecting with wholeness, when work, life and voluntary engagementt is all one, and shared with each other?

The complementary part of reconnecting with wholeness is that each uniqueness can become visible and manifest. Then what is the difference between these two networks?

The Art of Hosting is more focused on the inner art of hosting, and trains people in and outside communities to become better hosts, which can then train other people. Something like martial arts in the field of hosting.

World Café has its own book and gets translated in more and more languages. it has a new website and is building up it’s online community through blogs and forums. It seems more outside oriented. Please add your thoughts on this!

Lots of enthused people for the first Art of Hosting Learning Day, but finally we gathered with six – and a baby. And a learning day it was!

My body held still some sadness as I arrived, triggered by some last minute cancellations. I felt my face was closed.

We were welcomed by Rik in nature – his favorite working space – and by the sound of his flute. We stood in circle under a very old tree, hearing the sounds of working machines and closeby stood some building materials. It felt right to include them in our circle… including the ones who choose to do some ‘work’ and not to be here with us; and including the world ‘out there’…

I felt that nature, the silence and slow pace of our conversation and the music opened me up again… what a relief! My face opened up, my breathing became deeper and the smile returned on my face!

We were then invited to have a creative presentation as an answer to the question: In your wildest dreams, who – what – where do you want to host? Of we went for 20 min to let the ideas come up…

When we gathered again Sander was the first to invite us to join him in putting our nose to the window glass of the big room where he sees himself hosting leaders of the world. What did we see or hear while looking inside? This picture is what Helen saw: looking through the window, through the room, through the window on the other side, throught the garden, and through the gate and still seeing Sander’s reflection! Amasing lessons were shared from these small observations and Sander had the impression these answers were why he came all the way from the Netherlands to join us in this day.

Next was Hannelore to tell her wildest dream of having a farm and a garden connected with the Heerlijckyt, so that ‘a whole life’ experience can be offered to all visitors. She invited us in the field with the three donkeys…

Now it was Rik’s turn, and to keep his – and our – fire burning, he invited to build together a structure with some wood we could find around the place. This was an amasing experience! Nobody took the lead, the men were more collecting the sticks, women tended to build the foudation of the structure… and we managed to build something that was nice and exceptional! Again different lessons about working together, how things can emerge with no plan beforehand and lots more!

All this strenghtened my idea of how important it is to include the wholeness of knowing – all the different ways of accessing knowing.

Time for lunch!

This time we gathered around the fire-place inside, and I started harvesting on a big sheet of paper what we already got out of our conversations. If you ever were part of this kind of flowing, inspiring conversations you know it is almost impossible to capture. So rich, so many links, deep silence, building on each other, deepening our understanding together…

Some of the sentences:
We host the new world, as it emerges. Hosting means: holding the field outside the content; hosting the container for questions; hosting the process between people; hosting the trust.

We are creating the new, conscious groove.

What spoke to me the most was: We come together as hosts – without content – as the field, and this is an evolutionary, collective act and practice.

It was clear to us, after some time, that we were not here to organise something or to find a next step for some kind of action. This coming together, our search for deeper meaning, this inspiring conversation was our purpose!

Since earlier in the conversation we were talking about the history of the venue, De Heerlijckhyt van Elsmeren, where we were gathered and that we all have a strong relationship with. It was here that the first Art of Hosting happened last October. Julian remembered his first visit, when I showed him the barn that is used these days for storing wood and all the working materials. Somebody proposed to visit it right now, and of we went…

It is truly a remarkable place… a deep silence is almost tangible… an emptyness…

Rik started playing his flute, two others joined in with sound… Who is singing? Who is singing me?

The last words on the flipchart:

simplicity of love

power of silence

the mystery

as a gift

Thanks to Helen, who made so many beautiful pictures, go and visit them here! I’m pleased that I could use some of them to beautify my blogposting. The harvest team is building!

In the Art of Hosting community more and more attention goes to the Art of Harvesting. In email exchanges these last few days I saw some good, useful stuff and some challenging questions.

A beautiful, nice and simple presentation was made by Cris Corrigan for one of his clients, but it can be inspiring for all of us: What else could harvest be?

Last week I sent out an invitation for a follow-up day from the last Art of Hosting training in Belgium. I stated my own learning as: “How to design a gathering like this that will feed into the next step, in the best possible way?” I really don’t have a clue, it is on the edge of knowing and not-knowing…

Simone answered with some more questions: “There are a few questions about harvesting, with which I have been sitting many years now: Can the harvest become something that just naturally emerges from a gathering? If yes how? How can harvesting the outcome of a gathering become a natural, joyful and creative task? … ”

Hilde Vandormael responded: “Isn’t it so, that the harvesting is there, all the time, as we are witnesses of our lives? How to become aware?”

Also for the workshop Women Moving the Edge, early March, we are confronted with this question. How to design this gathering not only for the days we are actually together but also for afterwards? What is the harvest that we want? What format will serve our purpose best? How to integrate harvest on the spot?

Last a little harvest jewell by Lenore Mewton :
“Harvesting is reaping the simple elegance and wisdom of our souls and hearts—- leading to inspired action.“

I found this beautiful quote from Anne Stadler, which speaks about the hosting of our self.

“In my view, the first place one ‘hosts’ is the Divine essence within, so you can BE the gift you came into the world to give!!! Hosting (i.e.: welcoming!) whatever comes into your field IS the daily practice, including finding out what THAT means to you, where it has shown up in your life history, in your many lives, etc, and releasing yourself from your attachment to that story.  Disturbance of the status quo is always a portal for the new learning you are being offered.  See Rumi’s poem The Guest House!!!  It is the “text” for this observation.

Unless hosting begins ‘at home’ in one’s heart/soul, one cannot truly host (i.e.: serve the evolution of all as you Self-evolve) in the world.  So the process of ‘hosting’ is always an inner/outer process.” (email Jan.’07)

What was emerging in this Art of Hosting?
What is emerging for the future?

In the debrief of this workshop by our diverse hosting team (in age, in culture and different parts of the world) we came to see some patterns that will nurture the future of the hosting trainings. First of all, because it is very close to my heart, we see that the hosting ourselves, or the ‘be present’ became more in the centre of the training. Every day there were two opportunities to train for individual practice, Aikido or meditation. ‘Hosting yourself and others’ was the theme of our second day. As presencing exercise participants were asked to walk the circle – in silence – which was very intense and meaningful. It invited everybody to show themselves in an authentic way and becoming comfortable in a circle of human beings. Toke called it: weaving humanity back into the field. Because of this little training we saw a lot of new hosts walking the circle in confidence, whether for opening space or for the opening or closing of the day.

Another point of the new design was that there was a teaching about the Chaordic Path on the first day, as part of the theme of the day: What is this? This created a safe environment, a good container, for all participants as they understood that being in chaos and feeling uncertain was part of the path to go. It was a collective meaning making and became part of the language for everyone.

What we see afterwards is that the stories of the eight little helpers, combined with the Kufunda story and later the teaching on the five breaths, combined with the story of the Health Care Systems in Columbus, Ohio – even if they are about large scale change, which can be very far from the actual day-to-day experience of some participants – actually it gave a story of hope! One of the participants said: “This gives me hope for my country!”

The Flow Game was used on the last day as a converging tool, which worked out in a good way. Participants had a safe environment and some focused time for their own, personal question. This was a good preparation to make the bridge to their own situation in life.

We saw a very strong closing of the three days where there was first a longer poem, then the invitation for everyone to write a little, reflective poem and then to sign up for commitments we are going to take in the future. The speaking out of some of these commitments in front of the whole group was a very powerful ending.

In our collective looking back we came to see that there is, within the Art of Hosting, the Art of Design and the Art of Harvesting. In an open space session we saw that harvesting is actually about reflecting back the process, the learning or change that happened; and not about what was said or done. The use of metaphors, pictures, poems, important quotes and testimonies is a good way of making a creative presentation instead of a dry report. What is needed in the future is probably that in the preparation both a facilitation and a harvesting team is set. They can both invite apprentices to train on the spot.

In our hosting team we see that in the future the Art of Hosting can become a 5-day training – or even longer – with more time for individual practice and good, explicit teachings. Maybe it becomes the Art of Hosting Life, or the Art of being hosted by Life; as we see within ourselves and within the Kufunda community here that all areas of life need to be included if we use Art of Hosting as an operating system for meaningful communities.

As a last point we see that a follow-up gathering or the start of Art of Hosting Practitioners Circles can or will be the next level of the Art of Hosting training(s).

Breath in, breath out.
Breath in, breath out.

A poem written and read by Tichaono Murungweni, known as Ticha

It’s never too old to learn, or too old to turn
Don’t just spend time, invest it
Worry is like a rocking chair
It will give you something to do, but it won’t get you anywhere

It’s good to follow the teacher who follows the master teacher
The harder you work at what you should be
The less you’ll try to hide what you are
Dull minds cannot see sharp corners

The heart sees further than the head
Dare to dream with Peace
Very happy we are what we are, not looking back
Armed we are ready to journey on into the world

Let everything happen to you
Sweet or bitter
Journey on with love, joy and peace
No feeling is final
Stupid is the guy who put seed in the ground and never dared to care for them

Then the invitation to all to make our own little poem….
Some examples…

I
give to
all (including myself)
powerful questions wrapped in
irresistible gift paper.
Steffi

I
am ready
to dive into
the waters of fellowship.
Are you?
Marianne

I
stand still,
offering my breath
and voice. Future is
happening.
Ria

Dissolving
into now-ness
has giving birth
to the future in
the present.
Silas

Among
the heat steeped granite
I dare dream a peaceful harvest.
Jackie

What
a thing
this present moment
from where I offer common-unity
and gratitude.
Toke

The Invitation
Can we go on
this journey together?
I now understand myself.
Pamela

Marianne shared today the story of Kufunda, related with a teaching on the little helpers of Art of Hosting

The Call
Kufunda started 5 years ago in Mondoro, on my birthday where I invited friends from all over the world for a week to celebrate life. We spent a night in … and it was incredible. In the morning, the chief made a speech and belittled all what the community had given to all my friends. He couldn’t see how transformative was what they had given us. That was for me the call, the need that was here.
Being present
It was clear, I had to come home (from Denmark back to Zimbabwe) and on a meditation retreat it came to me; I couldn’t make it up in my head. Tuning into what Life is asking of me…
Find my mates
I went home and talked to Fedi, my mother, friends and family and we sensed that something was needed: something about communities, but what?
Listening and conversation
We went on a journey: What have the communities here to offer to the rest of Zimbabwe? To our surprise, they didn’t understand, they didn’t even hear the question, instead they asked for help!
Harvest something of value
The process of Kufunda has been about appreciative what was/is already there, in the individual and in the communities.
Make a wise decision
We learned to work with communities and not just individuals, because that had a bigger impact. We want to invite, especially women, to find their mates and do something real.
Dare to dream
And now we are in the phase of entering: Dare to dream (bigger).
Now is the next level of dreaming and listening for a bigger call, that can be hosted by the community and not only by me.

Wednesday morning started an Art of Hosting in Kufunda. What a diversity of people! Old and young, African and European and American; from rural villages and from the city; with high education and with only a little bit…

I enjoy very much being here and live on the rhythm of Life itself and not on the rhythm of our ideas.

Rather – or really – new in this Art of Hosting is that we don’t follow a linear path form self, team to community, but that besides experiencing the tools – which we did on the first day – we give lots of time and attention to being present. Every morning and in the late afternoon there is scheduled time for Aikido or meditation.

Today the guiding question is:
What is my hosting?
How do I host myself; and others?
What does it mean to be present? (‘Be present’ is one of the 8 little helpers for the Art of Hosting, see next posting)

After an introduction to what being present can mean on the mental, emotional and physical level, we went into a silent, walking exercise – one by one – before the group; with the invitation to go one step beyond our comfort zone. From this powerful experience we were sent out – still in silence – to be present with nature and learn to the teaching we can find there. We then gathered in silence in the big circle again and who wanted to share was invited to do so.

This was so powerful!
Imaging a circle of more or less 35 people, sitting silently, one of them gets up, takes the talking stone and speaks these words while walking around the circle…

Spoken by Silas

Your eyes reflect my inner being.
The step I have taken translate my inner heart.
The heart that interconnect with my body and soul.
My body tells a story of
fear to walk the Chaordic path
a story that celebrates the opportunities of more conversations, actions, creativity and space for actions embedded in the open space
a story of conflict resolution listening from the heart
and refinishing systems and processes found within the circle.
a story of appreciating the positive history so that the future will be built upon it, the Appreciative Inquiry wants us to do
a story told by the World Café of focusing on what matters and connect to deeper patterns emerging. Everyone who is present, represents deep passion about the question in the centre.
Only if the question matters and appeals to me, should I host myself and my community. This is a story of asking Powerful Questions
Hear me and do it from the heart. Give me your eye and listen from the heart’s eye that sees things as they are.
My story is about being in the practice so that I strike the balance.
I will walk the Chaordic path
If my practice is real
If I host my self
I cannot be you but me
That’s when I shine.

Spoken by Obert

Discovery
So much I thought I could change but it is not a question of changing things. It is a question of understanding myself. It is in listening and giving your time freely so as to understanding myself better. Whatever I imagine is the best way.
The lesson I had expected to learn was not to be, until I start experiencing something new. And that something new is understanding myself, and then the person next to me. Suddenly I discovered that understanding myself is a little bit more intricate.
Deeper Life. Soul Searching.
Whoever named this the Art of Hosting had not thought that is was heart-touching, but it is the Art of Understanding my Heart and sharing it with others. Understanding that resolves more chaos on my path than order. As much as I want to help, assist, solve, provide, there is more chaos within me.
I’m not going to say things, but I’m challenged as the emotions flow in me. How to look at your own very self and give a time picture of your own self?
I was contemplating on expectations I had and I discovered that that expectation was wrong. It is my heart ‘s desire that this type of training goes beyond Kufunda village. Because when you think you understand the next person …. no, you don’t…. understand yourself first! It has a type of impact that made me to rethink my weaknesses and my strength. I’m capable of being sincere within the elements of myself.
It is my heart’s desire for a Deeper Life Soul Searching experience to continue for the community I come from.
When you suspend judgment, still there have to be judgment. But I’ve just discovered that I have a Self to content with.
That Self has been touched.
Spoken by Bernard

I want to be in the circle again. This is the world in my hands (our talking stone is a crystal world) and – for a while – I feel empowered. I know you are all looking at me, but I can only acknowledge you one at a time. If I would ask a question, I could have answers … now I know how to ask questions, how to connect.
When you speak in a group everybody is focused on what you have to say… I never enjoyed speaking in a group … I would rather go away …. The best thing I found now is myself.
I asked myself so many important questions and gave myself the answers.

I didn’t think of hosting myself!

I’m able to face the world and speak my mind, without fear. Now I know it is OK to speak. This is what it has done to me: feel free and don’t worry about what others think.

I’m ready to face the world because I face myself.