Open Space Principles

  The building blocks of any gathering are the people who are there, in the state they are in: energy, availability, focus, intention, passion. The substance of this whole process is who we are, what we bring, and what we do with that. The outcome will be who we are and what we have when we emerge. These two principles relate to the substance of the process.    

~ Whatever brings you there, and whatever you bring, are the right things

It might be your passion for local botany, your toolbox, your sewing kit, your pen and paper, your ideas, your questions… or simply your time, energy and enthusiasm.   Whether you’re bringing it to the project as a whole or a specific gathering, if you bring it into the space, it belongs in the space. Everything anyone brings can feed the community and the process - and you.   Sometimes you might be in a group, and sometimes you might be alone: both are valid. We aim to connect with our own and each other’s energetic impulses - sometimes this means a big group together, and sometimes you might find you have some time on your own.   Notice what’s useful for you about the situation you’re in - and know you have the freedom to embrace or change it if you need to.    

~ What's happened is what's happened. What's happening is what's happening.

This group is unique, and made up of unique individuals, and we will only ever feel this particular way today, a unique moment in time. Everything that happens is a result of the people in this place and the way they’re feeling right now, and the actions they have the energetic impulse to take.   Whatever way you are involved is the only way you were ever going to be involved in each moment, but from moment to moment, you can always make new choices.   Stuff happens and things change, and evolve. We can handle these changes by being responsive to them and to each other - noticing what is happening and how we (individually and collectively) feel and want to proceed.   The state in which we emerge, as individuals and as a community, is the process. The process is what we appreciate, over any commodity we might have produced.   We acknowledge that everyone has different needs, interests, and ways of working, and the next three principles give you permission to be present in the best way for you. They also allow flexibility for us to accommodate each other’s needs and ways of experiencing.    

~ Wherever you get involved is the right place

On your island, or any other island. In person or online. By phone, or in a handwritten letter. Face to face over a cup of tea at your place.   Great ideas, dreams, actions and conversations can happen in all sorts of different places. Sometimes we need to go visit the place we’re talking about, sometimes we need a moment to daydream on the edge, sometimes we need a comfy chair, sometimes we need a beach. This project already takes place online, on islands, on paper, and in person, and all of these can be the right place.   You might have the most brilliant idea whilst in the tinned food aisle, and that is also the right place. We can notice the right place for ourselves, and confidently occupy that place.   We can also adapt our environment to make it the right place - if you prefer beanbags to chairs, or you want to use weighted blankets or earplugs, that’s all fine.    

~ Whenever it starts for you is the right time

If you only have five minutes to pop in on the way home from picking up the kids, that’s the right time.   You aren’t ever late in Open Space - you’ve always arrived at exactly the right time, because it’s the time you were able to become present.   Additionally, we remind ourselves that creativity doesn’t run by the clock - we allow our play to begin organically. We are all juggling multiple responsibilities and passions - sometimes you just need to take ten minutes to clear something out of the way, or get a cuppa, before you can be free to fully join in with the thing you want to be doing.   Likewise, your participation starts when you have the energetic capacity for it to start. There might be lots of people who have the energetic capacity to start it with you, or you may find yourself on your own - in which case your energy might drive you to explore or capture whatever is alive in you about the thing you planned to do.   The capturing might further energise you, and others in the space. If you find you have no energetic capacity for something after all, you can follow the Law of Freedom and go where you can be re-energised.    

~ It’s over when it’s over for you

That could be five minutes or five years. We hope people will make connections that will be long-lasting, even when the gatherings are done.   That’s when it’s over for you. Practice noticing when you’re ready to leave or move on - maybe because you’ve done what you wanted to do, or because you’ve reached capacity for the day, or just for the conversation you’re in.   Any set timetable that is declared is simply an intention, an invitation for the community to get involved. It doesn’t know what you, individually, need. Therefore this principle is an invitation - not a rule - to notice when it’s time for you to stop. We might feel a pressure that something has to have lasted a certain amount of time to be ‘valid’ or ‘proper’ and we might expect a certain productivity or output. Instead of commodity, we are interested in community. Instead of product, we value presence and process.   Click here for information about the things we do at the gatherings
Click here for information about our version of Open Space Technology
Click here for information about the Open Space Principles
Click here for information about the Open Space Freedoms