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Barbara Marx Hubbard and Marc Gafni in Video Dialogue: Becoming the New Human by Joining Genius as Unique Selves

Barbara Marx Hubbard and Marc Gafni in Dialogue during her Evolutionary Testament Webinar

We are excited to share with you the recording of this exciting webinar from Barbara Marx Hubbard’s online course about her newest book The Evolutionary Testament of Co-Creation: The Promise Will Be Kept. CIW-Founder Marc Gafni was invited as a guest speaker.

In this webinar, you will learn:

  • Why God is not only the infinity of power but also the infinity of intimacy
  • How YOU are God’s or evolution’s unique intimacy
  • Why God (or reality or the universe) needs YOUR service
  • How evolution creates newness through joining separate parts into a larger whole
  • Why your birthday is the day when God decided that She couldn’t do without you
  • How to Become the New Human by joining genius as Unique Selves
  • What happens in the “tomb of metamorphosis”
  • How Sacred Text Study can be recovered as an essential part of our Evolutionary Spirituality Practices

Within a lively Question and Answer section, Barbara and Marc express their desire to work together more deeply for the sake of the Planetary Awakening and the Unique Self Symphony coming alive.

Watch and listen to the webinar here:

The Three Levels of Sacred Text Study

  1. Hach’na’ah = Submission: A total surrender to the text, where we read the text as if it was written directly by God to us. This is the way fundamentalists read sacred text as the only valid way. In Evolutionary Spirituality we recover Stage 1 as an important but not exclusive practice.
  2. Havdalah = Separation: Here we take a step back and separate from the text to analyze it. We look at the historic context. We compare it to other pieces. We ask ourselves: “What might that mean?” This level is the scientific way of reading the text.
  3. Hamtaka = Sweetness: This level transcends and includes the first two. The reader penetrates the text while simultaneously fully receiving the text. In the non-dual merger between the reader and text, new revelation is born. This is the way of the evolutionary mystic.

Read more about Sacred Text Study here.

Barbara Marx Hubbard and Marc Gafni in Video Dialogue: Becoming the New Human by Joining Genius as Unique Selves2023-06-19T10:10:32-07:00

Center for Integral Wisdom – Public Statement

In response to the current attacks on Dr. Marc Gafni, The Center for Integral Wisdom has released the following statement:

Dr. Marc Gafni is under attack from certain quarters of the religious and spirituality worlds. Based on our careful review of extensive documentary evidence, numerous professional evaluations, and our collective experiences with Dr. Gafni, we fully trust that the claims of sexual harassment and abuse are false, and that other claims against him are maliciously distorted.

The Center for Integral Wisdom takes the strongest possible stance against all forms of sexual harassment and abuse. Before any of us became formally affiliated with the Center, we, collectively, carefully reviewed these allegations. We concluded, and reaffirm now, that the claims against Dr. Gafni are either untrue or significantly distorted. Furthermore, all of us have extensive professional and personal experiences of the most positive nature with Dr. Gafni, regularly observing his goodness, integrity and kindness.

Over the years, Dr. Gafni has offered many times to engage in a professionally facilitated dialogue with the parties involved in making and disseminating these claims.  However, these parties have not been willing to meet for mediated resolution. Instead, over many years they have aligned with each other, coordinating their stories and efforts, avoiding forums which would allow for discerning fact checking and mutual responsibility. Given our common desire for peace in the world, it is unfortunate that there has not been the opportunity to engage in a productive process of resolution. The agenda of the parties has been to create public campaigns of character assassination intended to discredit Dr. Gafni in his professional and personal life.

If you would like a deeper sense of Marc, his collaborative work and character, the Center’s work, as well as a substantive refutation of the core negative stories on the web, you might want to read some of the posts below, as well as the Facts section on Marc Gafni’s personal website. You might also want to peruse the extensive material on the Center for Integral Wisdom website, or just read one of Marc’s books. In the next few weeks and months, Marc and other leaders at the Center will be sharing more specific information, as well as reflections on the larger issues at stake in this conversation.

Please be aware that Dr. Gafni’s legal team has advised him to not comment further at this time given the defamatory nature of the false accusations against him and the distorted narrative that has ensued.

Editor’s Note:

The people who have commented on this page below work closely with and support Marc and the Center for Integral Wisdom. Most have been working with him for many years. This group includes professors, successful business people, book editors, writers, clergymen and clergywomen, therapists, psychologists, and heads of departments at schools and therapy centers. Most of them have advanced degrees. Several have written successful books.

You will notice that several of these people have posted under initials or pseudonyms. During the weeks since the campaign against Marc began, many of these people were being ‘targeted’ or pressured by some of the organizers who are attacking Marc’s reputation. They and others associated with the Center have received letters demanding that they disassociate from Marc. Their employers, neighbors and families have been called. Their websites and Facebook pages have received negative comments. So in order to avoid more of this, some of them have not posted under their professional names.

Center for Integral Wisdom – Public Statement2022-05-18T07:17:22-07:00

Essays from the Journal of Integral Theory and Practice – Volume 6 Number 1

GUEST EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION from the Journal of Integral Theory & Practice 6.1 (Dr. Marc Gafni)

In his keynote at the Integral Spiritual Experience, Wilber described Unique Self as ‘something that is extraordinary, and historic, and not to be denied.’ I want to share some of what I see as historic about the Unique Self teaching, and why its birthing has been one of my primary commitments over the last two decades. Unique Self is vitally important because it reclaims the centrality of the personal as a primary category in discourse about the realization of enlightened consciousness. Enlightened consciousness itself is a fundamental category in the integral spiritual discourse because it is the implicit or explicit goal of virtually all of the great spiritual traditions that inform Integral Spirituality. … The myth of a community shapes the norms of a community, even if only partially realized.

Download the PDF Version of the Paper

The Unique Self and Nondual Humanism (Dr. Marc Gafni)

A Study in the Enlightened Teaching of Mordechai Lainer of Izbica

This essay outlines one of the key sources in the great traditions for the integral teaching of Unique Self. The Unique Self is rooted in what is termed as nondual or acosmic humanism of a particular strain in Hebrew mysticism, as expressed in the teachings of Hasidic master Mordechai Lainer of Izbica. After examining and challenging previous scholarships on Lanier, the article reconstructs a theory of individuality from Lainer’s writings, which becomes the lodestone of his nondual humanism. In unpacking Lainer’s metaphysics of individuality, his ontological understanding of will, Torah, name, and uniqueness, the framework of the Unique Self teaching become clear. The article then reconstructs two matrices of sources from the intellectual history of Kabbalah, which serve as possible precedents to Lainer’s Unique Self teaching in the older traditions of Kabbalah. The article then outlines the seven core principles of acosmic humanism that are incarnate in the typology of Unique Self that appears in Lainer’s writing (in what is termed the Judah archetype). Finally, Lainer’s view is places in a larger context even as it is distinguished from the intellectual zeitgeist of its time.

Download the PDF Version of the Paper

THE EVOLUTIONARY EMERGENT OF UNIQUE SELF: A New Chapter in Integral Theory (Dr. Marc Gafni)

This article outlines the basic teachings of a new chapter in Integral Theory: the postmetaphysical evolutionary emergence of Unique Self. The article begins by contextualizing the Unique Self conversation within a larger discussion on individuality and traces the emergence of the Unique Self teachings through the life and writings of the author. The core Western understanding of individuality and its affirmation of the dignity of the separate self is contrasted with the Eastern teaching of dissolution of the small self, before both are integrated into a higher integral embrace through a new understanding of Unique Self. This article elucidates how the teachings of Unique Self fundamentally change the classical enlightenment paradigm through the assertion that enlightenment has a unique perspective, which might be termed the “personal face of essence.” Perspective taking, which emerges from enlightened consciousness, is rooted in the ontological pluralism that lies at the core of the Hebrew textual tradition. The new enlightenment teaching of Unique Self therefore rests on a series of integral discernments between separateness and uniqueness, ego and Unique Self, and personal and impersonal man. The Unique Self teaching suggests a new understanding of enlightenment through intersubjective love; the Unique Self perception is then set within an evolutionary context of being and becoming, in which it is seen to express one’s response to the personal address of the evolutionary God impulse itself. In this sense, Unique Self is understood to be an essential chapter in the emergence of a truly evolutionary mysticism.

Download the PDF Version of the Paper

UNIQUE SELF AS IT UNFOLDS OVER THE ARC OF DEVELOPMENT from the Journal of Integral Theory & Practice 6.1

A Dialogue with Susanne Cook­ Greuter and Dr. Marc Gafni

How Unique Self shows up in the developmental spectrum is, from an integral perspective, a critical di­mension of the Unique Self inquiry. In addition to addressing this issue in depth in “The Evolutionary Emergent of Unique Self” (pp. 1­36 in this issue), Marc Gafni engaged in four dialogues with two prominent developmental theorists involved in integral discourse. In two dialogues with Don Beck and two dialogues with Susanne Cook­Greuter, an initial exploration of Unique Self as seen through their respective devel­opmental models was explored. Below is a transcript of the second dialogue with Cook­Greuter, in which Susanne and Marc explore the references to uniqueness in Susanne’s writings. What emerges is that Susanne’s empirical research confirms uniqueness as a central emergent property of awareness at higher levels of consciousness.

Download the PDF Version of the Paper

ON SPIRITUAL TEACHERS AND TEACHINGS from the Journal of Integral Theory & Practice 6.1 (Dr. Zachary Stein)

This article examines the dynamics of authority in educational contexts where teachers and students engage with religious or spiritual subject matter. My aim is to offer a framework that can be used to sort “good” educational relationships of this type from “bad” ones. After positioning the spiritual teacher in the context of eclectic traditions in American moral education, I look into the structure of teacherly authority and into the dynamics of this authority when it is exercised in reli- gious contexts. In the process I tease apart two types of teacherly authority for heuristic purposes, the Classic and the Modern. I discuss their respective liabilities, affordances, and most typical spiri- tual teachings. Finally, I suggest that some contemporary spiritual teachers and teachings may be harbingers of new emerging configurations of religious authority—configurations dubbed Integral. This rough triadic typology—Classic, Modern, and Integral—allows us to critically discuss the kinds of authority assumed by different types of spiritual teachers. Specifically, I use EnlightenNext (An- drew Cohen) and the Center for World Spirituality (Marc Gafni) as case studies, demonstrating how to use the framework I have developed as a way to explore preferable possibilities for the future of religion and the spiritual marketplace.

Download the PDF Version of the Paper
Essays from the Journal of Integral Theory and Practice – Volume 6 Number 12023-09-12T10:07:14-07:00

Archives of Articles, Papers, & Podcasts

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Story, Religion, and Mormonism | True North Project #57 with Christian Dokstader

Enjoy this podcast with Dr. Marc Gafni featured on the True North Podcast with Christian Dokstader Join Christian Dokstader in conversation with Dr. Marc Gafni. Marc Gafni is a writer, philosopher, and co-president of the Center for World Philosophy and Religion. His written dozens of books, including: A Return to Eros, Soul Prints, Your Unique Self, and The Erotic and the Holy. This episode is the beginning of a deep conversation into a radically new story for humanity. If you come from a Mormon story, this episode is especially for you. Connect with Marc: https://www.marcgafni.com/books-produ...) https://worldphilosophyandreligion.org/ Stay Curious, [...]

Updates August 2024: Summer Symphonies, Book Review, Upcoming Courses, and New Podcasts

Below we link to everything that has been posted on this site in this past month. As the summer is nearing its end, so are our Summer Symphonies at One Mountain, Many Paths (see below), and there is so much to celebrate: Launch of New Podcasts: Introducing great new video and audio podcasts New Book Review by David Nicol New Essays: Available on our website, Substack, and Academia.edu The Upcoming Parallax Course: Value is Real Why Saying This Clearly May Save Civilization [and our Souls] - (with Marc Gafni and Zak Stein) takes place on Saturdays, September 7/14/21/28 - 2024. [...]

Value in the Metacrisis with Zak Stein

Enjoy this podcast with Dr. Zak Stein featured on the Life from Plato's Cave podcast.  Dr. Zachary Stein is the co-president of the Center for World Philosophy and Religion. He was trained at the interface of philosophy, psychology, and education, and now works in fields related to the mitigation of global catastrophic risk. He is a widely sought after and award winning speaker, and a leading authority on the future of education and contemporary issues in human development. Zak is the author of several books, such as Education in a Time Between Worlds. In this conversation we primarily [...]

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Archives of Articles, Papers, & Podcasts2023-06-21T12:37:52-07:00

Dr. Zak Stein on the Global Crises of Measurement

Whose Measures, Whose Future?

By Dr. Zak Stein

The post-modern world is overrun with measures and standards. And although we may not realize it, much of the anomie and injustice of the post-modern lifeworld is a result of the proliferation of measures and standards. Today we do not face the pathology of the “one-dimensional man” who is distorted to fit into one or a few abstract standards (although in some places and institutions, we still face that). The post-modern condition involves the fragmentation humanity, a multi-perspectival personality, refracted through a prism of standardized differentiations and mass-customizations…. Here is more footage from the ITC. The whole video can be purchased through the Meta-Integral Foundation.

I’ve placed the relevant excerpts from the paper below: Stein, Z. (in review). Desperate measures: the global crises of measurement and their meta-theoretical solutions. Paper prepared for the 4th Biannual Integral Theory Conference, Sonoma, CA. July 2015. [pdf] [pdf_slides]

Global Crises of Measurement: Whose Measures, Whose Future?

To help gain an overview the situation with regards to post-modern planetary measurement infrastructures, I’ll follow a common trope in critical meta-theory, from Habermas (1973) and Bhaskar (1993) to Harvey (2014), and talk in terms of a series of crises. What follow are best understood as crisis because they are systemic, endemic, and signal a need for deep structural transformation (in the strictly Wilberian (1995; 1999; 2006) sense of the term, as a need for vertical structural transcendence and reorganization). All of these crises are interconnected, ricocheting between the system and the lifeworld, and around the quadrants and planes of social being. I cannot detail each of the six crises here due to limitations of space, so I offer only overviews and allusions.

Economic crisis: poverty, inequality, and econometrics

It has been known for some time that GDP (Gross Domestic Product) is a simplistic misrepresentation of the health of any national economy; it is also a poor index of cultural modernity, human rights violations, and democracy (Sen, 1982). Yet GDP continues to be discussed in a serious manner and continues to drive national economic agendas. Similarly, most representations of profit, the so-called bottom line, are also gross simplifications of what makes a company valuable. In both cases a simplistic quantitative index is use in summary, and in place of richer qualitative analysis, or even just a more complex quantitative analysis with multiple parameters.

Zak Stein

Read More on Zak’s Blog
Dr. Zak Stein on the Global Crises of Measurement2023-06-19T10:14:30-07:00

Conscious Evolution Meets Integral Unique Self & the Evolution of Love

When Barbara Marx Hubbard, the Grande Dame of Conscious Evolution, and Marc Gafni met, it was truly a meeting of hearts, minds, souls, and Evolutionary Unique Selves.

Since then Barbara has joined the executive board of the center and Marc, Barbara, and Daniel Schmachtenberger have joined forces to work on a ground breaking new book The Conscious Universe: Participating in the Evolution of Love. You can track their collaboration in our new CIW Portal on the Foundation for Conscious Evolution.

“The next stage in evolution is ‘Unique Selves’ joining Genius.”

~ Barbara Marx Hubbard

Enjoy the dialogue here:

Conscious Evolution Meets Integral Unique Self & the Evolution of Love2023-09-12T09:57:47-07:00

Wisdom for Your Week: Success 3.0 Dialogue with John Mackey & Marc Gafni

Watch and listen to John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods and author of Conscious Capitalism (together with Raj Sisodia), and Marc Gafni, Director of the Center for Integral Wisdom and author of many books including Your Unique Self, talk about a new vision of Success for the new millennium.

They track back the many meanings of the word Success and its literature to the beginning of mankind until they conclude that, in the words of Marc Gafni from the dialogue, “it has to be inclusive and at the same time have a hierarchy, meaning it’s got to include the best of traditional, the best of modern, the best of postmodern, the best of 0, 1.0 and 2.0, and yet it’s got to offer something larger.”

Marc Gafni in the dialogue:

“So that’s where we are, success 3.0, an Integral view that’s got to be compelling. It’s got to be an evolutionary attractor. … It’s got to be powerful. It’s got to have alluring quality. It’s got to be an invitation. It’s got to be a myth that’s worthy. It’s got to be a new vision of what the Jedi Knight is. So, Integral 3.0, what might that look like?”

Visit our Conscious Entrepreneur Portal here

Stream the video here and read the transcript below:

Transcript:

Marc:  John, good to see you.

John:  Good to see you too, Marc.

Marc:  Success 3.0. So we’re here to kind of map what success might look like, and I was thinking about it this morning as I got up. Do you remember Citizen Kane, that movie, Orson Welles?

John:  Yeah.

(more…)

Wisdom for Your Week: Success 3.0 Dialogue with John Mackey & Marc Gafni2023-06-19T10:47:14-07:00

In the Media: The Unique Self in a Contemplative School

In the Media: The Unique Self in a Contemplative School2023-06-22T07:43:42-07:00

Zak Stein on the What, How, and Why of Metrics

Zak Stein on the What, How, and Why of Metrics2023-06-22T07:43:42-07:00

The Center for Integral Wisdom in the Media

The Center for Integral Wisdom and our core Dharma of Unique Self, Outrageous Love, and the Evolution of Love have been featured and reviewed in the media. Here are some examples:

Mackey and Marc Gafni on Outrageous Love and the Center Featured in Science of Mind

ScienceOfMind-May2015-coverMGDr. Marc Gafni & John Mackey shared their innovative views in the May issue of Science of Mind magazine, on sale now at Barnes & Noble!

Kudos to Science of Mind for putting together such a great collection! The article on Marc is well done, highlighting his important new work and teachings on the dharma of Outrageous Pain and Outrageous Love.

Electronic versions at the moment are only available to subscribers of Science of Mind.

The Entrepreneur Fitness Podcast with Brandon Epstein “Discovering Your Unique Self”

Physical Fitness l Mental Fitness l Emotional Fitness | Spiritual Fitness

Marc Gafni and podcast host Brandon Epstein explored “Discovering Your Unique Self.” The conversation was a deep dive into Unique Self & Outrageous Love.

Check out the podcast here>>>

Brandon Epstein also featured Marc’s work in his new eBook Zen Dude Fitness.

Stevo’s Book Recommendations: Self in Integral Evolutionary Mysticism (2014) – by Marc Gafni

Marc Gafni’s book Self in Integral Evolutionary Mysticism: Two Models and Why They Matter was recommended by Stevo’s Book Reviews on the Internet in the May 2015 list. Steve Brock has been well-known in the book industry for over 30 years, and his recommendations are read by over 200,000 people a month.

Self in Integral Evolutionary Mysticism: Two Models and Why They Matter by Marc Gafni

Buy SELF on Amazon!

Another Review of Self in Integral Evolutionary Mysticism: Two Models and Why They Matter

Paul R. Smith, author of Integral Christianity: The Spirit’s Call to Evolve, wrote the following review:

When I look at the ten thousand books on spirituality, mysticism, and evolutionary religion in my library, I can tell, at a glance, without looking at titles, which ones were most helpful to me. They are the ones with Post-it notes sticking out from the top, marking pages that I found quite valuable. Self in Integral Evolutionary Mysticism by Marc Gafni is one of those few dozens with numerous colorful sticky notes flaming out from its top edge. Gafni’s previous book, Unique Self, was a breakthrough opening in understanding the Self in relation to union with God. This book continues by focusing on an opposing popular postmodern view of self and pointing out the crucial differences. With laser-like insight Gafni lets his view remain the only one I can joyfully endorse as an integrally-informed Christian mystic and scholar. This book shines with radiant luminosity and spiritual depth.

Buy SELF on Amazon
The Center for Integral Wisdom in the Media2023-06-19T11:02:53-07:00

Daniel Schmachtenberger on the Inability to Accept Unnecessary Suffering and the Unprecedented Universe

Daniel Schmachtenberger on the Inability to Accept Unnecessary Suffering and the Unprecedented Universe2023-06-22T07:58:09-07:00

Dr. Warren Farrell at CIW and Related Media

Dr. Warren Farrell at CIW and Related Media2023-06-22T07:58:09-07:00

Esalen 2014: An Outrageous Love Story in 4 Acts – Act 4

Esalen 2014: An Outrageous Love Story in 4 Acts – Act 42023-09-22T06:47:44-07:00

Esalen 2014: An Outrageous Love Story in 4 Acts – Act 3

Esalen 2014: An Outrageous Love Story in 4 Acts – Act 32023-06-22T07:56:59-07:00
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