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Writer's pictureDin van Helden

Deeper ways of knowing; exploring our agency within the larger context of time


It's already months back that we had our gatherings; in March the North American and in May the European gathering. And, there is still so much to sense into, unpack and learn from what we have experienced. One of the things that all the gatherings so far had in common is that something happened which we experience as deeply meaningful and yet hard to grasp.   


One of the intentions we hold with the OD for Life gatherings is that we tap into collective wisdom. That we enable a field where emerging qualities of social system(s) can be experienced. 


This is based on the assumption that there is a deeper source, a way of knowing that already exists. And as stated in our Maniflexo, we as OD for Life stewards are committed to deepen our awareness. 


We second the belief that Pomeroy and Scharmer express in ‘Fourth Person: the knowing of the field’: ‘This deep collective awareness is a gateway to emerging future possibilities that depend on our presence and agency to manifest’. 


Receiving ancestral messages 

In the North America gathering, there was a powerful moment when some of us experienced ancestral messages coming through. 

 

It was Cat Criger, Indigenous elder and knowledge keeper from the Cayuga Nation, Turtle Clan, who suggested in the opening of the gathering to add an extra chair in our circle. An extra seat so that other (ancestral) spirits feel welcomed. 

It was the next day, in a ‘visioning’ process, when messages were received through images and bodily sensations (experienced sitting next to or nearby the ‘ancestral chair’).  

 

One of the questions in the visioning process was: how will we know that we are on ‘the right’ life-sustaining track? It was from this moment on that something was moving through some of us, an identifiable sensory experience. 



Connecting with future generations

In the European gathering we guided an intentional deep time ritual: The Seventh Generation process, developed by Eco-Philosopher Joanna Macy. (originally called the Double Circle). 


The process guided us into imagined conversations with beings of the future, using the moral imagination to journey to a point outside of time where we met and conversed with people from seven generations into the future. Half of the group took the role of the future generation and half played the role of themselves at this point of time. 


In the debrief conversations, many of us were deeply moved: the future is within us and there is a lot to learn from it. The essence of this conversation is beautifully captured by Michelle Holliday in our poem The Present (below is the final stanza). 


‘Our deepest urge

Both human and ancient

Is to gather in circles,

Tapping into a cycle

Of source and resource,

Of radical presence

Of courage and play. 


And so we change the question, 

Ask a new way:

Am I feeding my wild

In this one precious life?’ 



Aligning attention, intention and agency

This year’s gatherings have invited us to experience our present lives, living out our agency within larger contexts of time.


Reflecting through the framing of Scharmer & Kaufer (Forthcoming) we can say that:

  • In the North America gathering, there was a quality of the field (source conditions) – a deepened form of Attention, which gave rise to Intention

  • And in the European gathering there was a deepened form of Intention, a co-presencing of the whole in the individual and of the individual in the whole, which gave rise to Agency. 


With respect for what we could experience this year, we hold this reflection with curiosity for resonance and continuation of our inquiry.  


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