Ohana out of time (and sleep)
March 21st
While I walk along the huge corridors of Bangalore airport, in India, I realize that I have no idea what day it is, nor what time it is for my body. Jet lag completely dragged me out of my circadian rhythms. Then I start to calculate what would be the best time to try to sleep, so as to arrive in Barcelona, Spain, with the maximum possible alignment with the local time zone.
March 22nd
I open my eyes. I’m in my room in Barcelona. There is a vocal message from Stelio, sent at 11:03. Wait! 11:03? What time is it now? 12:00! Shit, I should have been at the venue two hours ago. My time zone calculations didn’t help.
I get up in a hurry, take a shower, get dressed, take my backpack and sling to the Ohana Meetup venue. People will soon arrive and I still have to write, record and edit the video that explains the Thanks. I have no chance of making it. The only thing I keep repeating myself is the words of Han Solo “never tell me odds”.
People begin to arrive and, with some initial surprise on my part, they come to greet me. I find myself removing the headphones, placing the laptop on the floor and hugging someone every 30 seconds. A river of friendly faces, reassuring smiles, words and laughs.
The Ohana Meetup has begun. And my focus on myself, my sleep, my video, it seems to me already distant and useless. I begin to perceive the endless stories that are concentrating in that room, bringing with them dreams, desires, fears, projects, relationships, memories, hopes. I begin to see the interconnection becoming interdependence outside of time and space until it becomes interbeing. We are a unique body that is about to take its first breath.
The Open Space Technology helps a lot, as a midwife who picks up the baby and handing it to the mother ensures that the breath is regular, this method lets you breathe and generates a safe space if conducted with mastery. Claudia, Peter, Giusy, Stelio, Letizia follow each other in opening this space. And then they abandon any possibility of control, diving into the flow of self-organization.
March 23rd
Yesterday David and Guido stayed up until 4:00 am to fix the Thanks app. I absolutely have to thank them for this. Before leaving home, I make sure to open the app and send them some THX. Then I go to the venue.
Dario and Alice are outside the door. We go up together.
A couple of people tell something in our 7-by-7 opening. Emanuele tells us his story of transition and it touches me, and I feel happy for him.
The day has an intense rhythm, yet everything seems to flow calmly.
Claudia reminds me that we have to decide who to interview and choose the right questions for the Ohana Meetup 2019 video. At lunch we are ready and we realize a corner for shooting. In the meantime, I observe the chaotic movement inside the room and I realize that it is not chaotic at all and is instead beautiful and orderly in its complexity. I propose a session that brings both me and the whole group on unexplored fields of reflection, redefining the very concept of “boundary”.
It is for me the day of opposites, which become unity.
And then it arrives.
Music starts to be spread at a moderate volume. Dinner is served. I speak a little with Chiara, Tommaso, Fabio, Thamara, Antonella.
And then the music gets louder, and it’s time to release all the energy we’ve generated. We jump, we sing, we hug, we improvise irreverent dances. Rya, Ana, Elvira, Valerio, Matteo, Clarissa, Justine. We are all there, experiencing the atavistic need for physical contact with what surrounds us, tangible and intangible at the same time.
Leo went home, but I know he doesn’t sleep. How could he? He was so immersed in the energy flow of these days that he too will need to release some of it.
March 24th
I’m in a small restaurant in Castelldefels, I eat a bocadillo, open my laptop and write this story. I realize that I could tell much more and mention all the people present because with everyone I shared a moment, but I would fall into the trap of reductionism, where the parties claim to represent the whole. Here, however, it is the opposite, the parts and the whole are one, and therefore I know that everyone, even those who will not find their name written between these lines, will recognize himself in some nuances of this journey. Even those who were not physically there may perhaps find a little of themselves. And basically, where is the boundary?
I will close the laptop soon and go to my new room, where I will try to sleep. I will try to find that rest I was looking for as I walked along the long corridors of Bangalore airport. But this time no calculation, I trust only in the love that comes from feeling part of something greater, something special, something alive and transformative: an Ohana.
