Before there was what became known as the Genuine Contact program, there were the initial components of what became the Genuine Contact program. I had already been on tour in different parts of the world offering workshops in Working with Open Space Technology, Whole Person Process Facilitation, Cross Cultural Conflict Resolution, and what was originally called the Conscious Open Space Organization (later called the Genuine Contact Organization).
I met Ward, fell in love, we had a whirlwind courtship that involved people in the workshops listening to the many segues I made about Ward and my big joy.
I visited Ward on one of my adventures and he said “you do know that what you have here is a program”. I of course said “no, I didn’t realize it. It is simply what I do”. And so I took in the idea that a program was being born. I returned to Ontario Canada and while on the subway coming out of Union Station in Toronto, I was in a meditative state with the inquiry of “what is the name of this program?”. A loud voice, that apparently only I heard, was “Genuine Contact”.
I looked around to see who had spoken and didn’t see that it was any of the people around me. I looked to see if they had heard this voice and it didn’t appear that they had. I smiled and felt I was introduced to “Genuine Contact” by the Universe.
That is my first memory of Genuine Contact.