Seeds for a happy planet

The evening of the second day, at dinner it was tangible that something had happened; that we got some clarity together: the Art of Hosting Meaningful Spaces, as a diversification from the Art of Hosting meaningful conversations. A next level up on the spiral, but still very much connected to its roots. There was energy and laughter in the air…

We saw how a community is forming within a community. Which is after all a very natural step in evolution: making differences more clear – diversification – to be able to hold more complexity, or in other words, more wholeness.

Being the caller is really something different than being a host; we saw deeper into these differences. It is only the callers themselves who lived the experience who can really speak of it. Being a caller for a certain place takes a longer and different commitment than being a host, who can come and go.

The spaces we are holding in the learning centers, are the places where people and place can work together. Where there is place for conversations like this: “That tree is so happy that you all are harvesting it!” (said by Panaoiti’s mom when we were helping them with the olive harvest). Basically we are learning that we have to love the earth, the places we live in. Part of this learning has very, very deep roots. There can be much pressure around finances, but we take a stand in not let the land be prostituted.

Enough is enough!

When we gather in these places all aspects of life are welcomed; also the children. We invite this kind of softness in, even when it makes us vulnerable.

We are here to learn again the lineage and learn again about relationships; instead of ‘things’.

The conversation went on…
You will notice how the conversation ‘struggled’, until at a certain time we reached collective clarity on ‘The Art of Hosting Meaningful Spaces’, as a next level or a new branch in the overall Art of Hosting community. Here is most of what was said:

* I’m holding a lot of resonance from the morning circle. We were touching into this heaviness… I feel called to speak… the strength of meaning is held outside… as if we are supposed to do the AoH in a certain way. Personally I am invited to step into hosting every moment! With real issues!
The AoH training is a doorway, and the Learning Centers is a new way. The community seems to value more the work in the world; but this is also the work! I don’t want to go into the judgment space. I live real emergence here. We are practicing the next level. The locations are inviting the integration. Hosting is huge! It is bigger than ‘hosting meaningful conversations’. If we don’t tend the fire, we are cold. If we don’t tend the food, we are hungry. It is in every moment. Learning Centers are a practice ground to send people to. For me it is a way of living. I want to find, to identify what is really going on here.
And there is something about the questions we each hold; they need to come to the front more.

* Here we have a good “f” product: the Art of Hosting; we have the best people, and the best places in Europe. Let’s start to walk, one step after the other! And yes, we don’t know where we are going!
How much are we really willing to put in? Are we scared?

* Are we feeding the wolf of fear? There is a difference in elder and steward. Who declares who is a steward or not?
A lot of consultants have taken the AoH training. Are they ready to deliver? Why are we crunching about the guru word?

* (To Maria and Sarah) You are now the elders of this place. Don’t look for others who are not here. Don’t wait for support from certain others. Be proud of what you do, and ask help from the ones who wants to offer. That’s the lesson we learned.

* Hierarchy – when it is good – it visualize who is most wise; something we have to pay respect to. Now hierarchy is mostly related with the one who gets the most money… How do we get rid of the burden… I think we need ‘to lift as a flock’… I’m asking for help here.

* If this land (Axladitsa) is part of the community that we are all part of, then we can look deeper and support this place; as a learning lesson for myself too. If we talk about the not-present world, it doesn’t work. What is the gift here, beyond the AoH community? What are you missing here? What is here and now the significant question?

* The AoH training is not ‘wrong’; everything has its own place. One sentence was very strong for me: life as a metaphor; or life as itself. ‘Flow’ and the other AoH concepts stop to be only tools and metaphors. AoH is now becoming my life and now it has meaning and I can explain it to others. AoH is a tool and a framing for some people; Learning Centers is another doorway equally important. The AoH and my harvesting-gardening becomes integrated. Next year as I will be harvesting olives I will have learned a lot.

* The layers upon layers of AoH… this is a living learning center… it is a pallet that we are learning. AoH is upgrading to the next level; bridging the masculine and the feminine; and it are only the first steps! Keep inviting!

* In the Greek language – the indigenous people – the word ‘hieries’ means the ones who were committed and practice the mystery. The word hierarchy comes from that root. My personal purpose is to bring back the ‘mystery school’. I am a doorway holder. I am a ‘hiera’, I do it with reverence, … I am not “a door”, only a doorway holder. ‘Guru’ is an imported word, so I don’t use it. I do know what an elder is, it is the lineage holder; that watches and makes sure it is passed on.
AoH is only an element of that. I would love to talk about Axladitsa, the practice of receiving. How to you open and receive? Instead of: you ask and it then means you are weak. The underlying issue is: What are we really doing here? How do we do it in a capitalist context and still holding our integrity?
Now I am a guardian, not an elder yet. I will become that. I am a student of the land. I am fierce about protecting its pulse. This land and we are birthing something very important here. The friendship with our neighbor will grow, but we have to wait till the timing is right.
I did great work and have deep friendship with some of who are not here. My path is at a different angle, I had to work with that: to be a host of a place, buffing down my sharp edges.
The root of AoH is very strong. My deep desire is to look deeper into the connections between the learning centers.
Bob Ziegler asks the question: If the Learning Centers are as a mandala, what is the core quality of the different ones? Then we can see the wholeness of it all. Is there a structure that would help and support us all? What is the flow of income of this place?

* There is a song that sings about the different levels of love. The first is an attraction on a physical level. The second level is the sexual relationship. You could have it with different people. The third level is being, is living together. Few people still do it. This is the diamond in Axladitsa. The fourth is surrendering your self to one another. Hosting is about that level, in surrender to the field.

* We are now offering the Art of Hosting meaningful spaces – and not meaningful conversations alone. We will evolve this practice and train people in it etc. It is important that some people stand up as the masters of this. Hosting is like giving love to someone.

* My legs are trembling… we are speaking about the legs now!! The diversification is happening, the next level of the spiral, but still connected to the root.

* It is about hosting meaningful life!

* This is THE meaning! We have to be careful not to close in on the financial issue… money is just one of the energy forms. We really have to focus on making it bigger than one plus one plus one. We are dealing here with big matters.
I am one of two (part of a couple); I/we are asking for help. Let’s meet as much as possible in each other’s places and doing the things together. It brings out the best in people. Instead of talking, let’s do it!

* I’m wondering if the next thing we need to talk about: are there patterns in the learning centers to get it into the tangible… bringing in the patterns of the places.

* It would be really important to hear the story of the different places and what are the needs and the ideas. And just listen for the pattern and the learning’s. Can we sprinkle some water on the spider’s web?

* Isaac Mendelssohn talks about this fourth level: One thing that is specific in this pattern is the practice of offering. And he says: part of being human is the act of offering. Being able to speak where the need is, is making the offering possible.

* We have now seen the shape of the legs. It is good to close this circle, and maybe we come back to it…

Further conversations happened while others were preparing dinner…
later more conversations on the financial issue…
but too much from preconceived ideas…

As we came back from the neighbor’s olive garden, the sun was still shining bright, so we gathered for the first time outside. Maria started with reading this:

Do: The Way

The Way, at the beginning, is obscure. Even the initiatory steps are wreathed in mist. The heights toward which the path leads apparently are closed within clouds, which seem, from a perspective below them, beyond penetration. And that is for the best, for to see too clearly what lies ahead would be altogether too intimidating. The sobering realizations come only in retrospect: the traveler on such a Way has left behind a familiar and comfortable place, he has entered a journey more challenging, more rewarding than ever he could have imagined at the start. Further along he comes to see that his Way is to a destination still utterly unfantomable yet intensely attractive to him.

It is not a physical transportation, this Way, though rare is the bugeisha who finds he can travel its length without leaving home. The Way is a journey of the mind and the spirit and, ultimately, the soul. The engineering of the Way is a contribution of the Taoists, those ancestral savants of China whose philosophy of the Tao – Do in Japanese – urged a life attuned to the currents of nature. Under the calligrapher’s brush, DO is written as a compound character. The stroke for “principal” or “main” are joined with those of the radical for “movement”. Hence, Do is an “important road”, a Way to follow in harmony and synchronization with the vicissitudes the universe provides, a path along which to discover for oneself the essentials of a worthwhile life.

In this sense, the traces of the Way are very old. It took form the first time an individual engaged in some activity with a consciousness beyond the utilitarian, past the restrictions of the ego. True, the Do may produce art. It may be of practical value. But the attainment of the Way is in the process. It is doing a thing not for the sake of doing it; it is doing a thing because the doing releases us from certain constraints of the limited self: narcissism, self-centeredness, preoccupation with the fears and worries and doubts that diminish us in daily life. The Way draws us into the domain of the potential self: self-realization, self-cultivation, and self-perception.

The Do is both singular and universal; it is open to all with the resolve and inclination to walk it. Those who do, however, take a variety of disciplines in approaching it, for the Do extrapolates from the specific to the general. Tea ceremony, flower arrangement, gardening – each is a route of the Way. The route chosen by the bugeisha is the martial Way. While the particular form the Do takes does not matter, the Do of the bugeisha bring shim into a most immediate confrontations with the elemental struggles of reality: life and death, pain and comfort, temporal matters and matters of the soul. The martial Way requires moral stamina along with visceral and emotional courage. It demands a social conscience as well as physical endurance. To be sure, each of these qualities will be tested on the journey. They may, as well, be purified and fortified in the process. But they must be present in the individual in some degree from the onset if he expects to journey very far.

An individual embarking on the martial Way must be brave and virtuous. He must possess a sense of commitment and a sensitivity to the values of the past. In spite of having these laudable character traits, the would-be bugeisha will also have inner uncertainties, including a suspicion something is missing in his life, something vital. And so he sets off on a path to mysterious destinations. He does so in spite of observations by others that such a Way is naïve, outmoded, or idealistic. He goes because he knows others have gone before, because the unchanging direction of the Way attracts and calls to him. He goes because he is compelled. He has set out on a journey of a lifetime because he senses that, as the kanji for Do reveals, this road is the principal one for him. This Way is the one to lead him to a place very much worth the going.

Sword and Brush; The Spirit of the Martial Arts by Dave Lowry; Part One

Somewhere during Sunday morning, we had another generative dialogue, which of course built on all the previous ones.

Again there was our metaphor of the mycelium:

A definition: Fungal de-composition is the job of the mycelium, a vast network of underground cells that permeate the soil. The mushroom itself is the fruit of the mycelium.

If the ‘I’ is the mushroom or the fruit and the ‘We’ is like the mycelium… Who am I when I drop my separate identity? Frightening thought maybe, but on the other hand, it was happening right in our midst. Different voices in the circle said: “I don’t want to go back! (to old structures and separateness)”. There is excitement in the ‘not-knowing’; of going to that place, of being pregnant with what we have not known before. We must create a new way from there. How can we bring clear outgoing energy and still be connect to Source? How will we be fully alive while being pregnant, while not knowing what we will birth?
“What is real right now – here?” asked somebody else.

We came to see that women had been given away so much of our lifeblood. As we are so much identified with the collective and with relations, we tend to loose ourselves in it. “Pull it in” was one way of naming the way to go; “draw back in the lifeblood we have given away”. Our primary relation is with Source, and not with others or outside ourselves. Being connected with Source is self-generative and will not deplete our energies.

“The future is already here! The collective She is present. We are her voice.” Les gave an eloquent contribution about the ‘self-generating fire storm’. And suddenly there was a big YES!

Probably there was much more, but these are the things that I remember…

Although many times I read and heard about Knowledge Management, I never was sure what it really meant. I give you four lines out of an interesting article about this stuff:

• A collection of data is not information.
• A collection of information is not knowledge.
• A collection of knowledge is not wisdom.
• A collection of wisdom is not truth.

Although days and weeks have past since we held the Art of Hosting on Art of Hosting early June, it is only now that I have the time to harvest some more of it. During some of the sessions I made notes, which I will now share.

After the Open Space sessions of the second day we came together in the big circle, and were asked to share the learnings of this day within the little groups formed in the morning, in honouring of this collective, emerging pattern.

I found myself in the morning immediately in the space that was named as that what is not yet visible in the pattern and the pain in the community, the world. Other words that were named: Seeing the whole, holding the field; seeing, naming what is not whole yet. Love and trust. Invitation from the field. Silent witness. Witnessing the pain.
Tom Hurley asked: In what ways is the shadow holding the field? I never thought of it in this way! That what is in the shadow is actually holding the field… maybe… embracing our own shadow is necessary to host other people in it… certainly…

One question was offered: What did you see, what have you learned today?

One session was on Creating an Art of Hosting field book. How would a book look like, when read, it would invite more hosting? It would need to be an example of the Art of Hosting, it would hold space…

Another session was on new tools or practices to use within Art of Hosting: How to express – and experience – its essence without words? The main message was, whenever we are hosting: use more senses and trust that there are people in the group so that you can start co-hosting…

But this sharing was not a mere reporting back of what was the content of the Open Space sessions, it was also giving words to some deeper patterns.
Tom, as an outsider of this community was privileged to reflect back to us: “I really appreciate and honour there was simultaneously a continuing sensing into and inquiry in to the essence of the Art of Hosting and at the same time, also probing the edge: where this work is evolving. Art of Hosting as a dojo… as something we need to develop… actually – in each of the conversations – the pattern of this morning was present – all the elements… It is a testimony to you all: each person is fully welcomed and being listened too. A real honouring of relationship. I want to bear witness, it is not just a nice set of words; it is a practice that is tangible. The invitation to live in the next level, it was embodied. I saw a community growing itself, by practicing its own patterns.”

Toke said: “When life is at stake – the big turning, the future – and we are ready to be learners and teachers, then de dojo arises. It can happen in the car, in a retreat, but it has certain boundaries. The next level of the Chaordic pattern is: practice generosity, share freely what we learn as quickly as possible; be a student; be a teacher, and practice relationships/friendship/trust. Maybe that’s all. This is a code of ethics for an Art of Hosting practitioner. I have experienced the generosity – when people hold big work – “It was enough that you took the time to come.” That is the service we can offer. This happened here: we showed up for each other. That is my mate: to whom I can speak of my fear, and he will not shy away…”

In that moment in the circle I saw lines coming together… George talked at different times about an Evolutionary Guidance System. Suddenly I saw how it is comprised of different arts:
the art of calling
the art of convening
the art of hosting
the art of harvesting
the art of governance
the art of wise acting

And who said this, I don’t remember… “I have just sat with a circle of grandmothers, on the third day in listening to the guidance. There was a pattern that wanted to come through the pipe. On the fourth day we surrendered, and it came. We saw the four paradigms of governance, and then the fifth paradigm. The intelligent, wise collective use – the sphere – this is a structure in which the spiritual, the social, the business, the public sector, can live together in reasonable harmony. To bring it into place takes time, takes conversations…”

Tom: “Some of what I’ve been hearing, I hear in other circles as well. Different circles see the same thing, connected to the same deeper source.
But how do organizations and networks relate to other groups? What form might conversations and partnerships with related circles, related organization take? We clearly need each other; we need all the circles to co-operate that will support the re-invention of all these sectors. Art of Hosting has some real thing to offer it. By standing in the circle you get to know the essence, but somebody from outside can see it different. Fascinating to explore….”

Toke: “Duri and I have this dream to call the founders of all these lineages…
it might not be the founders… I feel most at home here, if the dojo is to practice friendship…The gathering need to be of people… not attached to one form…. they will only really ‘produce’ when ‘what really matters’ is in the center.“

Yesterday, there was a part in a conversation that really ‘got’ me. Rainer was talking about the scientific fact that there are many, many more dimensions than the 3,5 we now see as reality. We said 3,5, because of the three dimensions of space, and the half one is time going in one direction – which is only half of the truth.

Connecting this with Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle (as I understand it) – that on the level of particles there are no ‘things’ that exists, but what exists is a probability until it is observed in one way or another – it brought me to the power of thought and conversations.

If the world that we want exists as probability, then the mere act of thinking about it – and even better: having conversations about it – brings this probability closer to manifestation, because it is observed in this way!

In my understanding there are many levels (dimensions scientist would say) between our manifest world of space and time and the world of spirit. The simple act of thinking about ‘the world we want’ guides its probability into existence. The act of talking about it, which in my understanding is denser or closer to the manifest world, is an even stronger pull of this probability into the more manifest layers. And if more people talk about it, that’s even better!

This links with a new blog that has this topic as focus: Conversations as co-evolutionary force. It is set up by friends of me and it will become important reading, I guess.

A voice – sometimes soft, sometimes very clear and loud – urges me to write since a long time.

Me? Writing? In English?

But the call is clear and the start is now. My blog is ready, ready to read for anyone who wants to. Still I don’t feel I’m a writer. The call is to reflect to the world what is happening. Woow, way too big!! More precise…
What is happening on the edge? What is happening where people consciously engage with each other to bring forth a sage and sustainable future?
I want to be a mirror, to the best I can, and reflecting back the patterns that I see, the dynamics that I see emerging.

I asked Tom Hurley what patterns he sees arising in the regular, worldwide conference calls on the World Café Stewards? His answer was: “Great question about patterns. To be honest, not so much in the content of our conversations – more in the quality of listening/speaking, the rich texture of friendship and mutual respect, and the deepening of our capacity to sense into the field together.”

The pattern of friendship and mutual respect.
The patterns of deep listening, leading to meaningful conversations.
The pattern of a deepening capacity to sense into the field – or should we say Life – together.

What is the deepest ground out of which these patterns arise? It is about re-connecting what was fragmented. To see wholeness in the meeting of a group, to experience that we all hold a piece of a bigger truth. We are seeking our way in reclaiming back and translating wholeness in many and more areas of life.

That’s the only way to go.

Yesterday evening six of us gathered in Brussels to celebrate George’s birthday. Of course that couldn’t happen without some deep, inspiring conversations! George wanted to look beyond the circles that were born during this last year and which hold all a lot of potential: What is the deeper pattern that speaks through all of them?

What we saw were different communities on different practices – the how – (Art of Hosting on Art of Hosting, World Cafe Stewards, Collective Intelligence Conveners, Women Moving the Edge, …) and different places – the where – (Rivendell, Hazelwood, Kufunda, Heerlijckyt, …). We also see emerging a next level in group formation. They differ from the communities above. They are not gathered around one practice but around a calling in the world. The members of these new communities have different competences and different practices, and they are all present and centered in themselves. They know their individual place in the world. The synergy of these individuals can make a lot happen in the world!

This afternoon this conversation went on with Amy Lenzo, who is a steward of the World Café Community. She raised the same question: “What is this where the World Café is part of?” She also said: “In the mean time the different communities need to evolve and strengthen and be nurtured. Nevertheless, if it is an inward looking thing, we missed something! We need to look outward and link with others.” It reminded me of one of the principles of the Art of Hosting: ‘Find your mates’.

As a constellator (a facilitator of systemic constellations) it is fascinating to see how all this is about ‘finding the right place’; first for the individuals, then for the communities around the different practices, and also for Europe and other continents and cultures. What is the role or the gift of Europe in the world?
Each of us has a part to play – on every level. It is important that we know that place and then reach outwards. In partnering and coming to another level of working together we make the overall field stronger. We will need this for the time to come, when we are called to challenging tasks and difficult places.

I invite your attention to some striking patterns that I see happening in the collective field.

Finn Voldtofte – the initiator of Moving the Edge – wrote earlier this summer about what he sees happening:
“It seems to me that in these months patterns are being created – prototypes are emerging for gathering people around both a theme and an intention, with the intention being to participate for the sake of the whole (engaging a field of collective intelligence amongst the participants) and in service of the theme. As participants we are being powerfully called to stretch our willingness to show up — not for personal purposes and hopes of gain, but to be present, hang in, lean in, let ourselves get at times almost lost in confusion, and eventually experience ourselves as part of an unfolding great story. Oddly, this challenge makes people come rather than stay away.”

Almost at the same time, Hans Jecklin, was convening and facilitating ‘The Living Circle’ in Switserland. Very much with the same theme and intention then the gatherings that Finn initiated. I find Hans’ report of what he learned in this circle very, very meaningful. If you are interested in this kind of stuff, please read it.

Information that goes in the same direction, although it doesn’t come from life experience, but from an inspiring dream is the recent blog entry by George Por.
He is talking about the features of a group or community, engaged in “ramping up connectivity”. They include:

• A remarkable ease with which they fall into a deep, silent, causal domain of consciousness, in one another’s company

• A heightened capacity to pick up even weak signals from the collective field of the future

• Sustaining a loving attention to the well-being of each and the whole

• Staying alert to interference from any fear or unfulfilled desire that would want to impose its version of the future

• Letting their resonant rings connect into broader patterns of meaning

• Moving from inter-connections to inter-being, by expanding the self-sense to include the surrounding field created by all crewmates participating in it

Then another website is speaking about something similar, although they don’t give their information for free!
“Through the willingness to follow the VMC rules, this higher frequency allows a new viewpoint which resolves the seeming separation between the individual and the group, the one and the many.”

Look for yourself at all the links!