I participated in an Art of Hosting community of practice call today. Via Zoom.
The opening check-in was in groups of three for 15 minutes total.
A man spoke of his recent Art of Hosting. “We danced. We laughed. We ate. We told stories. My heart is full of love.”
I smiled. It is the feeling that brought me into the Art of Hosting in the early 2000s.
A woman then spoke of her interest in the call. “We host process. We host meetings. I’m interested in how we host fields.”
I smiled again. It is the kind of question that has stayed with me for over 20 years. “Fields” is reference to the energetic of the group as a connected whole. I have found it to be the deeper work of facilitation.
What a sweet group.
What a sweet reminder of the deep and lasting layers possible when people come together with heart, to learn and explore together.
A few more words of exploration here — some praise for this body of work.
Reminds me of a great poem by Stanley Kunitz:
The Layers
I have walked through many lives,
Some of them my own,
and I am not who I was,
though some principle of being
abides, from which I struggle
not to stray.
When I look behind,
as I am compelled to look
before I can gather strength
to proceed on my journey,
I see the milestones dwindling
toward the horizon
and the slow fires trailing
from the abandoned camp-sites,
over which scavenger angels
wheel on heavy wings.
Oh, I have made myself a tribe
out of my true affections,
and my tribe is scattered!
How shall the heart be reconciled
to its feast of losses?
In a rising wind
the manic dust of my friends,
those who fell along the way,
bitterly stings my face.
Yet I turn, I turn,
exulting somewhat,
with my will intact to go
wherever I need to go,
and every stone on the road
precious to me.
In my darkest night,
when the moon was covered
and I roamed through wreckage,
a nimbus-clouded voice
directed me:
“Live in the layers,
not on the litter.”
Though I lack the art
to decipher it,
no doubt the next chapter
in my book of transformations
is already written.
I am not done with my changes.
Thx Lisa Hess. “How shall the heart be reconciled
to its feast of losses?” Rich.