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Parallax Video & Audio Podcast Unique Self 2.0–Year 2 Portal 2: Beyond Shame–Identifying Your Unique Wound of Desire

Watch the YouTube Video Here or Scroll Down to Listen to the Spotify Audio Below

Beyond Shame: Identifying Your Unique Wound of Desire

The Ontology of Touch and Wound (Nega)

In his pre-course podcast with Andrew Sweeny, Dr. Gafni begins by pointing to a core realization in the interior sciences: the original Hebrew word for touch is also the word for wound: Nega.

This is not a coincidence; it is an ontological truth. The wound is where your connection to the real has been broken.

“My wound is, I haven’t been able to touch… I haven’t been touched… The wound is the wound of desire. When my desire has been wounded, when I can’t access and trust my desire, I literally begin to deaden.”

The deepest desire of every particle of existence is to prehend (to touch) all prior experience. Your fundamental desire is to touch that which is real—significance, value, and aliveness. When this unique capacity to touch is rejected or thwarted, a unique wound is created. To heal, you must engage this wound directly.

The Divine Nature of Desire (Nachash/Messiah)

We live in a world where desire is often demonized, shamed, or hijacked by advertising. This course offers a radical re-reading of our most foundational myths.

Dr. Gafni explains that a deeper reading of the Garden of Eden story reveals it as a tantric text—a trickster story where non-rejection is key. The snake (Nachash) is not the voice of evil, but a disguise for the new human (Messiah).

  • Desire is the Name of God: The realization is that desire itself is the animating force of reality. The clarification of your unique desire is, therefore, a divine process.
  • Cosmic Eros: Reality is not a mechanical system but an erotic process unfolding every second. From the precise “rates” of chemistry that lead to life (abiogenesis) to the movement between two beloveds, it is all an unfolding of unique eros. Your life is literally a product of reality’s unique erotic intention.

The course is about engaging this truth. You must clarify your unique desire, which means engaging the fundamental ways in which your desire has been wounded.

Clarification: The Path to Wholeness

Dr. Gafni emphasizes that we must stop mistaking impulsivity for desire. Like the monk who “brackets” mechanical desire to access his deepest heart’s desire, we need the tools to clarify our own unique configuration of longing.

You cannot achieve mental health, fulfillment, or joy without desire. The transformation of your unique wound is what literally births you into reality, turning devastation into a deeper capacity for wonder.

We live in a world that is “always already home” and yet is ripped apart by war and suffering. This course holds that tension—the unbearable joy of Eros and the unbearable intensity of suffering—as the only way to become whole.

A new Parallax course with Dr. Marc Gafni in Collaboration with the Unique Self Institute

Starting Sunday, November 16th, 2025

Course Description: The Essence of the Wound

In this three-week journey, participants confront the wounds that shape their lives—the unique ruptures that call us from despair into wonder, from alienation into intimacy, from devastation into divinity. Each person’s wound is singular, tied to their shadow, their desire, and their unique self. This course guides students to trace the root of their wound, recognize the false core it may have created, and begin the heroic work of transforming pain into power, shame into insight, and contraction into love. We explore personal, familial, and cultural wounding, and the path of the wounded hero, learning to step into authentic presence and the intimate communion between hero and the wounded God.

This 3-week course will guide you to:

  1. Confront the wounds that shape your life.
  2. Trace your wounds back to their root.
  3. Recognize the false core sense of self your wounds have created.
  4. Begin the heroic work of transforming pain into power, shame into insight, and contraction into love.

>Read more about the course here<

The Rapture of the Wounded Hero

“There is no human being who is not wounded. The wound is not an accident. The wound is the intention of Cosmos to be wounded and to transform the wound into wonder—the rupture into rapture, the alienation into allurement, the collapse into covenant, the pathology into power, the devastation into divinity. Evil comes always from the untransformed wound. What is a wound? How do we understand that? What is my unique wound? A wound is not generic. A human being has a unique self—my unique gift, my unique quality of intimacy, my unique perspective, my unique beauty, my unique presence. And a person also has a unique shadow, and a related but not the same unique wound. The path to unique self is through unique shadow and unique wound.

Our focus in this course is your unique wound. You cannot be alive without identifying your unique wound and beginning to walk the path of its transformation. There is nothing more tragic than to die with your wound unrecognized and untransformed. To look away from your wound is to ignore the call of the infinite, the divine calling. If I do not engage the wound in this lifetime, the wound festers and emerges, replaying itself in the next lifetime again and again. To identify my unique wound, I need to trace it back to its root and heal it there. There are ten major approaches to wounding; some address my unique wound, others address different forms of wounding that are not my own. I cannot heal my unique wound without taking my unique risk. My unique risk is essential; really, the only risk is not to take it.

The unique wound can be personal, tribal, collective—the unique wound of the tribe, the family, the couple. Identifying, articulating, and telling the story of the unique wound is the beginning of its transformation. One cannot be a hero without transforming one’s unique wound. There are no heroes who are not wounded heroes. When the hero bypasses the wound, the hero explodes and often becomes the villain. To be a hero is to be a wounded hero; to be a king is to be a wounded king; to be a queen is to be a wounded queen. And the context of all of this is a wounded God. Who is the wounded God? What’s the story of the wounded God? What does it mean to trust the wounded God? What is the encounter between the wounded hero and the wounded God? Who is the hero and who is God? What is the nature of their intimate communion?

The essence of the false core, both individual and collective, is the unrecognized wound. The unrecognized wound becomes the false core. It is only by recognizing the false core that it is brought into the light. The false self built upon the false core can begin to be deconstructed, and the authentic, unique self can emerge, allowing me to play my instrument in the unique self symphony, to take my place, to take the armor off, and for homo armor to become homo amor. This is the path from contraction to love, from pettiness to power, from hate to healing. Every insult is actually a wound of love.

The wound of culture today is the failure of value, and the recognition of that failure was shame—shame itself as a unique wound. Your unique shame is your unique wound, your unique distortion of your unique configuration of desire.”

– Dr. Marc Gafni

>Read more about the course here<

Parallax Video & Audio Podcast Unique Self 2.0–Year 2 Portal 2: Beyond Shame–Identifying Your Unique Wound of Desire2025-11-16T06:02:59-08:00

Parallax Video & Audio Podcast: Unique Self 2.0. with Marc Gafni

Portal 1: Intimacy, Eros, and Evolutionary Love

Unique Self 2.0?

What is Unique?

What is Self?

What is 2.0?

Dr. Marc Gafni argues that the Enlightenment traditions made the big mistake of denying identity and selfhood. He attempts to rectify this mistake and celebrate human uniqueness as the only way to survive the meta-crisis.

Parallax Video & Audio Podcast: Unique Self 2.0. with Marc Gafni2024-12-04T03:16:06-08:00

DR. MARC GAFNI: Changing the Story of Humanity at a Pivotal Time in History // EP. 246 Video

Enjoy this podcast with Dr. Marc Gafni featured on the The Medicin Podcast with Mimi and Chase Lindquist

About:

In Dr. Gafni and his colleague, Dr. Stein’s language: “We stand at a pivotal moment in history – a time between worlds and a time between stories – poised between dystopia and utopia.” To bridge the gap between our external technologies and internal narratives of identity and purpose, every human and every epoch of humanity must evolve responses to three essential questions, what we refer to as the three great questions of CosmoErotic Humanism: “Who? Where? And What?”

  • Who am I? and Who are we?
  • Where am I? and Where are we?
  • What ought I do? and What ought we do?

In the new book, “First Principles and First Values,” written under the pseudonym David J. Temple, a roadmap for humanity is laid before the reader answering the common question, “What can we do to shift the future of humanity towards higher consciousness and shared common goals?” We discuss the roadmap in this episode.

GET THE BOOK HERE // Download first 5 chapters FREE

FIRST PRINCIPLES AND FIRST VALUES

Forty-Two Propositions on CosmoErotic Humanism, the Meta-Crisis, and the World to Come

by David J. Temple

AS THE META-CRISIS DEEPENS, THE FATE OF CIVILIZATION AND HUMANITY HANGS IN THE BALANCE.

First Principles and First Values is the tip of the spear in the fight for a humane future. Establishing frameworks for a new school of thought called CosmoErotic Humanism, the book is built around forty-two propositions that provide new source code for the future of planetary culture.

Like Europe in the early Renaissance, humanity is in a time between worlds, at a time between stories. First Principles and First Values contains blueprints for the bridge needed to cross from this world to the next.

“The position argued for in this book is of vital importance . . . it needs urgently to be read.”
IAIN McGILCHRIST, author of The Master and His Emissary

Order Here

DR. MARC GAFNI: Changing the Story of Humanity at a Pivotal Time in History // EP. 246 Video2024-07-09T06:46:43-07:00

Intimate Conversations: A New Story of Value for Humanity with Dr. Marc Gafni Pt. 2 – Allana Pratt

Enjoy Part 2 of this podcast, “A New Story of Value for Humanity with Dr. Marc Gafni” featured on the Intimate Conversations Podcast with Allana Pratt

Join Allana Pratt in conversation with Dr. Marc Gafni.

In Allana’s voice:

I’m always left spellbound by the breathtaking honor of connecting with Dr. Marc Gafni.

When he speaks every cell of my body comes alive, my soul feels ignited, I’m able to literally feel Eros in, as and through me. It brought me to tears. ‪@MarcGafni

We spoke of his new book that I invite you to purchase, First Principles and First Values. Not only did we speak of Eros and Pseudo Eros, but a new word, Erosvalue in response to the meta-crisis. And yet what does this mean to your life and intimate relationships? In this inspiring conversation you will discover…

  • The importance of being able to feel the whole of life, not to bypass the hurt or disassociate …but to feel it all, move beyond identity and embrace unique values to experience a never known before possibility.
  • How First Principles and First Values allow us to tell a new Story of Value… And how we need to stay in the field of value to create synergies and end the meta-crisis.
  • How indeed we live in an intimate universe and yet the intimate universe also lives in us, thus intimacy is literally what we need to survive and embody thriving.
  • How we can evolve the story that animates society when we support our evolution reading this book of first principles and first values, a shared grammar… so we are no longer lonely, non intimate, cut off from the interior of each other, isolated in surface existence.
  • How, quoting the book, we can create a new story with a plot line that plays out desire that moves toward intrinsic values where we have will, choice, possibilities and freedom, dealing with the crisis of value, (a birth) and a resolution of a new structure of value.

FIRST PRINCIPLES AND FIRST VALUES

Forty-Two Propositions on CosmoErotic Humanism, the Meta-Crisis, and the World to Come

by David J. Temple

AS THE META-CRISIS DEEPENS, THE FATE OF CIVILIZATION AND HUMANITY HANGS IN THE BALANCE.

First Principles and First Values is the tip of the spear in the fight for a humane future. Establishing frameworks for a new school of thought called CosmoErotic Humanism, the book is built around forty-two propositions that provide new source code for the future of planetary culture.

Like Europe in the early Renaissance, humanity is in a time between worlds, at a time between stories. First Principles and First Values contains blueprints for the bridge needed to cross from this world to the next.

“The position argued for in this book is of vital importance . . . it needs urgently to be read.”
IAIN McGILCHRIST, author of The Master and His Emissary

Order Here

Intimate Conversations: A New Story of Value for Humanity with Dr. Marc Gafni Pt. 2 – Allana Pratt2024-07-25T06:48:00-07:00

Intimate Conversations: A New Story of Value for Humanity with Dr. Marc Gafni Pt. 1 – Allana Pratt

Enjoy this podcast with Dr. Marc Gafni featured on the Intimate Conversations Podcast with Allana Pratt

Join Allana Pratt in conversation with Dr. Marc Gafni.

In Allana’s voice:

I’m always left spellbound by the breathtaking honor of connecting with Dr. Marc Gafni.

When he speaks every cell of my body comes alive, my soul feels ignited, I’m able to literally feel Eros in, as and through me. It brought me to tears. ‪@MarcGafni

We spoke of his new book that I invite you to purchase, First Principles and First Values. Not only did we speak of Eros and Pseudo Eros, but a new word, Erosvalue in response to the meta-crisis. And yet what does this mean to your life and intimate relationships? In this inspiring conversation you will discover…

  • The importance of being able to feel the whole of life, not to bypass the hurt or disassociate …but to feel it all, move beyond identity and embrace unique values to experience a never known before possibility.
  • How First Principles and First Values allow us to tell a new Story of Value… And how we need to stay in the field of value to create synergies and end the meta-crisis.
  • How indeed we live in an intimate universe and yet the intimate universe also lives in us, thus intimacy is literally what we need to survive and embody thriving.
  • How we can evolve the story that animates society when we support our evolution reading this book of first principles and first values, a shared grammar… so we are no longer lonely, non intimate, cut off from the interior of each other, isolated in surface existence.
  • How, quoting the book, we can create a new story with a plot line that plays out desire that moves toward intrinsic values where we have will, choice, possibilities and freedom, dealing with the crisis of value, (a birth) and a resolution of a new structure of value.

FIRST PRINCIPLES AND FIRST VALUES

Forty-Two Propositions on CosmoErotic Humanism, the Meta-Crisis, and the World to Come

by David J. Temple

AS THE META-CRISIS DEEPENS, THE FATE OF CIVILIZATION AND HUMANITY HANGS IN THE BALANCE.

First Principles and First Values is the tip of the spear in the fight for a humane future. Establishing frameworks for a new school of thought called CosmoErotic Humanism, the book is built around forty-two propositions that provide new source code for the future of planetary culture.

Like Europe in the early Renaissance, humanity is in a time between worlds, at a time between stories. First Principles and First Values contains blueprints for the bridge needed to cross from this world to the next.

“The position argued for in this book is of vital importance . . . it needs urgently to be read.”
IAIN McGILCHRIST, author of The Master and His Emissary

Order Here

Intimate Conversations: A New Story of Value for Humanity with Dr. Marc Gafni Pt. 1 – Allana Pratt2024-07-09T06:47:09-07:00

First Principles and First Values (Interview with David J. Temple)

Enjoy this three-part podcast with Dr. Marc Gafni and Dr. Zak Stein (David J. Temple) featured on The Integral Stage Podcast on the new book: First Principles and First Values.

In this episode, Layman Pascal sits down with Dr. Marc Gafni and Dr. Zak Stein to discuss their jointly authored book, First Principles and First Values. They are publishing the book pseudonymously under the name, David J. Temple.

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In this episode, Layman sits down again with Marc Gafni and Zak Stein to talk further about their jointly authored book, First Principles and First Values, this time focusing on some of the core philosophical arguments. They are publishing the book pseudonymously under the name, David J. Temple.

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In this third and final episode in this series, Layman sits down again with Marc Gafni and Zak Stein to talk further about their jointly authored book, First Principles and First Values, this time focusing on some of the core philosophical arguments. They are publishing the book pseudonymously under the name, David J. Temple.

For privacy reasons YouTube needs your permission to be loaded.
I Accept

Our new book can be pre-ordered from the US and Canada (we are working on creating direct ordering from Europe and other countries – please stand by!):

FIRST PRINCIPLES AND FIRST VALUES

Forty-Two Propositions on CosmoErotic Humanism, the Meta-Crisis, and the World to Come

by David J. Temple

AS THE META-CRISIS DEEPENS, THE FATE OF CIVILIZATION AND HUMANITY HANGS IN THE BALANCE.

First Principles and First Values is the tip of the spear in the fight for a humane future. Establishing frameworks for a new school of thought called CosmoErotic Humanism, the book is built around forty-two propositions that provide new source code for the future of planetary culture.

Like Europe in the early Renaissance, humanity is in a time between worlds, at a time between stories. First Principles and First Values contains blueprints for the bridge needed to cross from this world to the next.

“The position argued for in this book is of vital importance . . . it needs urgently to be read.”
IAIN McGILCHRIST, author of The Master and His Emissary

Order Here

First Principles and First Values (Interview with David J. Temple)2025-11-06T04:19:33-08:00

From Barbie to Hamas: The Failed Love Story at the Root of All Evil w/ Aubrey Marcus & Dr. Marc Gafni

We are absolutely delighted to share with you this new, incredible podcast with Aubrey Marcus and Dr. Marc Gafni, in which they talk about one of the most complex issues in philosophy and religion: the root cause of evil.

The thesis that Dr. Marc and Aubrey present is that the evil we see in the world is rooted in failed love stories. Our own love stories—personally and collectively—are, in Marc’s words, “chapter and verse in the Universe: a Love Story.” Evil therefore—the opposite of “live”—is at its root the failure of the love story, which is the very plot line of the real.

Marc and Aubrey unpack the potent and poignant realization, that when you lose the plot line of the real you act against Reality. This sacred hermeneutic—lense of sensemaking—allows us to begin to approach so much of what we see in the world today.

The fundamentalist distortions of Jihad, the hidden power agenda’s of military industrial complexes, and the AI driven “digital dictatorships in the making”, all share a common root: their dissociation from the plot line of “Reality is a love story.”

This frame will help bring understanding to much of what we are seeing in today’s culture, from AI to the war in the Middle East.

The surprise reveal is how the box office hit Barbie, actually points to the reality of our failed love story in Western culture.

We encourage you to slowly listen to every sentence of this deep and nuanced podcast. Marc and Aubrey speak with broken hearts, with clarity, but always in the unknowing. Always in devotion to the Mystery. Yet every sentence and literally every phrase in every sentence, offers new insight and whispers love in every distinction, opening hearts and minds with every breath.

This stunning conversation is not an ordinary podcast. It can’t just be listened to—it must be studied, meditated on and engaged deeply.

It is only that level of deep listening that both allows us to integrate the new Gnosis, even as it generates our own unique contribution, addition and even challenge to this new Dharma.

So that we can together birth “the new human and the new humanity.”

It is our prayer that this deep conversation begins to evoke what we call “a new story of value” that has the power and poignancy to respond to the meta-crisis.

From Barbie to Hamas: The Failed Love Story at the Root of All Evil w/ Aubrey Marcus & Dr. Marc Gafni2024-08-30T09:05:15-07:00

Exploring the Self with Dr. Marc Gafni and Paul Chek

The state of our world is in such a fragile place right now, which means it’s up to all of us to step up to the plate and do our part to make it better. You can’t be that agent of change, however, if you don’t know your self…

Explore the concept of self and be prepared to tackle the three most important questions any human being has to answer as Dr. Marc Gafni returns for another deep dive into cosmo-erotic humanism in this Living 4D conversation with Paul Chek. 

Paul Chek is a world-renowned expert in the fields of corrective and high-performance exercise kinesiology, stress management and holistic wellness.

In this conversation Paul Chek and Marc Gafni explore what Self really means. Discover the three most important questions a human being has to answer and the one thing we need to get right to not go extinct!

SHOW NOTES
  • The most important questions a human being has to answer. (4:14)
  • “If we don’t get this right, we’re going to go extinct.” (10:15)
  • The second simplicity. (18:41)
  • The separate self is a puzzle piece. (32:18)
  • Your unique self. (40:23)
  • Uniqueness: The currency of connection. (52:57)
  • “God is an ultimate wholeness…” (59:09)
  • Evolutionary unique self. (1:11:33)
  • “My unique self is my unique eros.” (1:33:11)
  • The self as an archetype. (1:53:26)
  • Your storyline. (2:10:44)
  • One of the mysteries of reality. (2:20:37)
  • Certainty and uncertainty: Values of the cosmos. (2:27:59)
  • The other door in the self. (2:35:28)
RESOURCES & FURTHER READING

Paul Chek on Marc Gafni: “His work is absolutely friggin’ phenomenal!”

Note: On this website link below, right underneath the one hour video version, you’ll find the longer audio-version: 

Listen to the full podcast here
Exploring the Self with Dr. Marc Gafni and Paul Chek2025-03-11T03:47:27-07:00

Barbie, Hamas, & Homo Amor: From Degraded Love Stories to “The Universe: A Love Story”

Looking at two seemingly unconnected events — the Barbie movie and the Hamas atrocities of October 7, 2023 — helps us clarify our perception and articulate a third possibility. Although there is zero moral equivalence between Barbie and Hamas, both are degraded love stories.

That’s what makes them so dangerous.

  • Hamas is a wildly destructive expression of fundamentalism; it degrades and demonizes the body and desire itself. Desire, perceived as evil, is projected outwards, onto ‘infidels,’ and then brutally destroyed.
  • Barbie is an expression of postmodernism: it disqualifies love, value, and desire as non-real, as mere social constructs.

In absence of real value, we lose capacity for moral distinctions; that’s why Hamas atrocities were celebrated on university campuses across the Western world. Postmodernism and fundamentalism are swelling movements in today’s world, and both will destroy us.

Our only chance is the third way, the third possibility — articulating a shared story of value rooted in the clarified realization that the Universe is a love story, Reality is desire, and no one is excluded from the love story.

This series below is from One Mountain, Many Paths, a weekly live broadcast of Evolutionary Sensemaking with Dr. Marc Gafni. Click here to register to participate live every Sunday at 10 am PT.

(more…)

Barbie, Hamas, & Homo Amor: From Degraded Love Stories to “The Universe: A Love Story”2024-06-05T09:57:45-07:00

The Hidden Wisdom of the Temple Solomon Recovered w/ Rabbi Dr. Marc Gafni and Aubrey Marcus

What is the wisdom of the Temple of Solomon that has been hidden for over 3000 years?

The Hebrew Wisdom sage, leading world philosopher, my teacher, Dr. Marc Gafni, has been on a quest to decipher these texts like the Da Vinci Code, and the evolution of the secrets revealed may be exactly what is necessary to deliver us from the existential threats we face today.  

For more on the wisdom from the Solomon lineage, and a deeper understanding of the CosmoErotic Universe, check out the book: ⁠A Return to Eros by Marc Gafni and Kristina Kincaid. 

Time Stamps:

00:00– Intro

2:00– The Lineage Of The Temple Of Solomon

17:00– Totalitarianism, Invisible Controllers, AI, Dystopia

41:12– Downloading The Temple Of Solomon

1:05:33– Understanding Eros More Deeply

1:17:50– Desire, Will, & The Name Of God

1:33:53– The Feminine Desire & Pleasure

1:40:55– Paganism, Eros And Ethics

1:53:34– What Actions Can We Take?

The Hidden Wisdom of the Temple Solomon Recovered w/ Rabbi Dr. Marc Gafni and Aubrey Marcus2023-12-06T05:29:26-08:00

Challenging the Purity Culture: All of Reality Is Driven by the EROTIC — with Dr. Marc Gafni and the Medicin Podcast

In this important conversation, we are challenging the ethos of Purity Culture and offering a new shared Story of Value.

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Timestamps

00:00 Intro + What Marc would gift to the world

08:28 Our upbringing in purity culture

15:17 Sex: Negative, Positive, Neutral + Sacred

28:50 New Narrative: Sex Erotic

35:20 Purity of F*ck

44:40 How GOD becomes more GOD

50:20 Many qualities of love-making

55:55 The “Holy of Holies” of the Bible

1:02:00 Collapsing under unbearable shame

1:10:23 The tragedy of Fundamentalism

1:16:04 How to start experiencing Eros

1:26:30 Accessing your unique script of desire

1:33:33 Boundary breaking in Eros

1:41:24 How to approach with our children

1:42:00 Free gifts from Marc

1:45:08 Where to find more from Marc

Challenging the Purity Culture: All of Reality Is Driven by the EROTIC — with Dr. Marc Gafni and the Medicin Podcast2023-12-06T05:40:46-08:00

Israel-Hamas: The Impossible Questions – Podcast Aubrey Marcus with Dr. Marc Gafni

Note to Listener from Aubrey Marcus and Dr. Marc Gafni:

We are at a time between worlds, at a time between stories.

We live in a world of outrageous pain. We live in a world of outrageous beauty. We live in a world of outrageous love.

In this time between stories, we step beyond the old stories of good and evil in its primitive forms. But that does not mean that we are moral relativists or that value is not real. Indeed all of reality, all of life is Value. We can feel the truth of this in our bodies. We may not be able to explain it perfectly, but when we feel we know. And this is what gives us courage to stand on the side of Life.

And to stand on the side of Life is to take a side. A stand for Life, is by nature a stand against anti-Life, or anti-Value. What that means about what should be done is a question of impossible complexity, pain and uncertainty.

We stand for a culture of Eros against a culture of death. We stand for intimacy against alienation. This requires us to be both tender and fierce, to stand for Life against the forces of anti-life.

It is not that there is no value in the universe and therefore naturally no battle between value and anti-value. Value is real. Good and Evil are real. But good and evil are not split along racial or national, or ethnic or religious grounds. This is a seductively simple conception, that in and of itself is the cause of so much horror.

In our formulation, Good and Evil is discerned simply: To be Good is to be ALL IN FOR ALL LIFE.

No one is outside of the circle of Life. To be All in for All Life requires the cultivation of radical discernment within a broken information ecology, and full blown 5th generational warfare in the form of attention hijacking and propaganda. To stand for Life means to make love to the tender sensuality of sensemaking.

Feeling our way slowly and carefully, but not with timidity masking as humility.

Evil is evil.

As much as we might be tempted, we cannot be afraid to call it what it is. Within that is a rejection of universal moral relativism. It is a solemn vow to protect the innocent, all of the innocent, and to protect the world from being held hostage by the forces of anti-life – wherever they are found.

We speak with broken hearts, with clarity, but always in the unknowing. Always in devotion to the Mystery, while always whispering love in every distinction with every breath. It is our prayer that this inspires a story that is unifying rather than dividing. Clarifying rather than confusing. It is a prayer for all Life. Comments will be off on this video, so that everyone can watch it and feel with their own hearts and minds.

Israel-Hamas: The Impossible Questions – Podcast Aubrey Marcus with Dr. Marc Gafni2023-11-01T05:05:16-07:00

The Journey to CosmoErotic Humanism: Mini-Series with Layman Pascal and Dr. Marc Gafni Part 3: The Mystery of Love & Eros

In this new mini-series, Layman Pascal talks with Marc Gafni about an emerging model he is developing together with Zak Stein and others, which they call CosmoErotic Humanism.

Episode 3: The Mystery of Love & Eros

For episode three, Layman and Marc discuss the concept of Eros, its understanding and role in esoteric Judaism, its connections to evolutionary spirituality, the uniqueness and irreducibility of desire, and much more.

The Journey to CosmoErotic Humanism: Mini-Series with Layman Pascal and Dr. Marc Gafni Part 3: The Mystery of Love & Eros2025-11-06T05:11:45-08:00

The Journey to CosmoErotic Humanism: Mini-Series with Layman Pascal and Dr. Marc Gafni Part 2: Soul Prints

In this new mini-series, Layman Pascal talks with Marc Gafni about an emerging model he is developing together with Zak Stein and others, which they call CosmoErotic Humanism.

Episode 2: Soul Prints

For episode two, Layman and Marc discuss the concept of Soul Prints, the origin of the notion of the Unique Self; the importance of story and spiritual autobiography; the issue of working appropriately with boundaries; and towards the end of the conversation they begin to open up the question of evil and shadow in relation to the Unique Self.

The Journey to CosmoErotic Humanism: Mini-Series with Layman Pascal and Dr. Marc Gafni Part 2: Soul Prints2025-11-06T05:09:03-08:00

The God Pod: Spiritual Evolution & A Vision of Value for Humanity with Dr. Marc Gafni and Luke Storey

This is what podcast host Luke Storey says about this episode:

Today, we’re going to find a way to navigate ourselves into a higher state of being, both individually and collectively, during this conversation with Dr. Marc Gafni.

Dr. Marc is an incredible human, to say the least. He’s a visionary, thinker, social activist, and passionate philosopher known for his source code teachings, including unique self theory, the five selves, the amorous cosmos, a politics of evolutionary love, a return to eros, and digital intimacy.

I was introduced to Marc and his teachings through our mutual friend Aubrey Marcus, with whom he’s been doing some incredible work toward a better future for all.

This is one of the deepest conversations on love, spirituality, conscious evolution, collective healing, and the human experience that I’ve had on the podcast, which says a lot because there have been many – and I am thrilled to share it with you.

If you find value in this conversation, which I suspect you will, please feel free to share it with someone you love. You can find links to Marc’s courses, books, and other offers at https://lukestorey.com/marc.

The God Pod: Spiritual Evolution & A Vision of Value for Humanity with Dr. Marc Gafni and Luke Storey2023-11-01T04:55:31-07:00

The Meaning of Life | Lost & Found Podcast with Dr. Marc Gafni

This is what Sabri Gazail, host of the Lost and Found Podcast, who has since become a valued contributor to the Center, says about this episode:

Wow! This conversation with Dr Marc Gafni blew my mind. I first heard Dr Marc on the @AubreyMarcusPod and felt so much truth in the explanation of self, God, love and life.

We dive into – dealing with trauma and how the western therapeutic approach doesn’t work, what is the self, what is desire, why we are here, what our purpose is, what God is, what our relationship to God is and our meaning of life!

The Meaning of Life | Lost & Found Podcast with Dr. Marc Gafni2023-11-01T04:55:32-07:00

Toward a New Story: Mini-Series with Aubrey Marcus & Dr. Marc Gafni

We are at a time in our world, where we need to birth a new story, and there is nobody that I know who has felt and thought through what this new story might look like, more than Rabbi Dr. Marc Gafni.

How do we respond to the meta crisis of compounding existential threats? The answer that Dr. Marc Gafni PHD gives is that the root cause of the meta-crisis is a global intimacy disorder.

As he puts it:

Global Challenges require global coordination which in turn requires global resonance, which in turn requires global intimacy, which can only be sourced in a shared global story of value.

For this very reason, we must articulate a shared global story of value.

This story, according to a set of compelling teachings by Dr. Gafni and his colleague Dr. Zak Stein, is the evolutionary love story of the intimate universe. This claim is not casual, but rather based on a profound integration of myriad wisdom streams in what they call the interior and exterior sciences across space and time.

But, and this is Gafni’s core point, not only must we be tellers of the new story, but we must also actually be the story. We must know that our personal story is chapter and verse in the Universe: A Love Story. And that story is a story of transformation.

And that therefore,

Y/our transformation is the transformation of the whole.

In other words, the change you are seeking in the world begins with changing the way you see yourself and your place in the world. You literally become the New Story.

You cross to the other side, awakening as the new human and the humanity.

This series of podcasts under the title “Toward a New Story” is about building what Gafni and Stein call CosmoErotic Humanism, a shared story of value as a context to celebrate our diversity.

While Dr. Gafni began his path as an ordained Rabbi intimately versed in the ancient Aramaic texts, we recognize together, that this new story must include and transcend the validated insights from all the great religions, philosophies, and cultures from premodern, modern, and postmodern times.

This is a historic moment, and for people who want to claim their seat at the table of history, this podcast is a resplendent invitation.

As Aubrey Marcus puts it:

I cannot imagine inviting you to a more important, heart opening, mind bending, and exciting journey than the conversations we are having in this podcast series.

Volume 1: A New Human for a New Humanity in Response to the Meta-Crisis

Volume 2: LoveIntelligence, LoveBeauty, & LoveDesire of All-That-Is

In Volume 2 of the series, we tackle the most fundamental question of our existence.

Who Am I?

Volume 3: The Path to Enlightenment Is Through Your Uniqueness

In Volume 3 of the series Toward A New Story with Dr. Marc Gafni PHD we continue with part 2 of the most fundamental question of our existence.

Who Am I?

Toward a New Story: Mini-Series with Aubrey Marcus & Dr. Marc Gafni2023-11-01T04:55:32-07:00

Healing the Wounds of Culture: Aubrey Marcus, Dr. Marc Gafni, and Dr. Kristina Kincaid

In this powerfully vulnerable podcast with host Aubrey Marcus, and Dr. Marc Gafni and his partner Dr. Kristina Kincaid as guests, they discuss the wounds of culture – meaning, the myriad wounds that culture can inflict – and their personal process of healing and resolution.

Healing the Wounds of Culture: Aubrey Marcus, Dr. Marc Gafni, and Dr. Kristina Kincaid2023-11-01T04:55:32-07:00

The Journey to CosmoErotic Humanism: Mini-Series with Layman Pascal and Dr. Marc Gafni Part 1: Certainty & Uncertainty

In this new mini-series, Layman Pascal talks with Marc Gafni about an emerging model he is developing together with Zak Stein and others, which they call CosmoErotic Humanism.

We will be adding to this post whenever new dialogues are being published. So, come back and scroll down for the most recent episode.

Episode 1: Certainty & Uncertainty

For episode one, Layman and Marc discuss the origins of this project, and Marc’s work on exploring and unfolding a model of Certainty and Uncertainty for addressing the meaning crisis, grounding moral value, and wrestling with perennial theodicies.

Episode 2: Soul Prints

For episode two, Layman and Marc discuss the concept of Soul Prints, the origin of the notion of the Unique Self; the importance of story and spiritual autobiography; the issue of working appropriately with boundaries; and towards the end of the conversation they begin to open up the question of evil and shadow in relation to the Unique Self.

Episode 3: Eros

For episode three, Layman and Marc discuss the concept of Eros, its understanding and role in esoteric Judaism, its connections to evolutionary spirituality, the uniqueness and irreducibility of desire, and much more.

The Journey to CosmoErotic Humanism: Mini-Series with Layman Pascal and Dr. Marc Gafni Part 1: Certainty & Uncertainty2025-11-06T05:03:56-08:00

Love or Die: A Conversation Series with Dr. Marc Gafni Hosted by Andrew Sweeny

This Series Is Hosted in Partnership with the Parallax Academy and the Unique Self Institute

We are adding to this post whenever there is a new dialogue. So come back and scroll down to the bottom of this post to see the most recent dialogue.

Also, if you sign up for our newsletter, you will be notified when there is a new dialogue coming up, and you can be there live.

Love or Die #1: The Global Intimacy Disorder and CosmoErotic Humanism

The first of a monthly series of discussions, Love or Die, in which Marc elaborates on what he has called the Global Intimacy Disorder and CosmoErotic Humanism. How can we rewrite the source code of the present epoch and create a New Story? The stakes are high. It’s Love or Die!

Love or Die #2: Radical Kabbalah

The stakes are high. It’s Love or Die! This week we delve into Hebrew Wisdom and Radical Kabbalah.

Love or Die #3: The Meta-Crisis, Hebrew Wisdom, and AI

The 3rd of a monthly series of discussions, Love or Die, in which Marc and Andrew discuss the meta-crisis, Hebrew Wisdom, and AI.

Love or Die #4: Sabbatai Sevi Part 1

In this passionate conversation, Marc speaks the unspeakable: about Sabbatai Sevi, the Hebrew Wisdom Messiah, and his wife Sara. Where sex and Eros meet religion and the clarification of desire.

Love or Die #5: Sabbatai Sevi Part 2

In part 2 of this passionate conversation, Marc speaks the unspeakable: about Sabbatai Sevi, the Hebrew Wisdom Messiah, and his wife Sara, where sex and Eros meet religion and the clarification of desire.

Love or Die #6: The Tree of Life Part 1

Andrew questions Marc about the famous Tree of Life and the ten Sephirot in Hebrew Kabbalah. An introduction and a radical interpretation. And a discussion on the first Sephirot, Keter, the crown.

Love or Die #7: The Tree of Life Part 2

Andrew questions Marc about the famous Tree of Life and the ten Sephirot in Hebrew Kabbalah. An introduction and a radical interpretation. And a discussion on the 2nd and 3rd Sephirot: Chokhmah and Binah.

Love or Die #8: The Tree of Life Part 3

Andrew questions Marc about the famous Tree of Life and the ten Sephirot in Hebrew Kabbalah. An introduction and a radical interpretation. And a discussion on the 4th and 5th Sephirot: Chesed and Gevurah.

Love or Die #9: The Tree of Life Part 4

Andrew questions Marc about the famous Tree of Life and the ten Sephirot in Hebrew Kabbalah. An introduction and a radical interpretation. And a discussion on the 6th Sephirot: Tiferet.

Love or Die #10: The Tree of Life Part 5

Andrew questions Marc about the famous Tree of Life and the ten Sephirot in Hebrew Kabbalah. An introduction and a radical interpretation. And a discussion on the 7th and 8th Sephirot: Hod and Nezach.

Love or Die #11: The Tree of Life Part 6 – Yesod

Andrew questions Marc about the famous Tree of Life and the ten Sephirot in Hebrew Kabbalah. An introduction and a radical interpretation. And a discussion on the 9th Sephirot: Yesod.

Love or Die #12: The Tree of Life Part 7 – Malkuth

Andrew questions Marc about the famous Tree of Life and the ten Sephirot in Hebrew Kabbalah. An introduction and a radical interpretation. And a discussion on the 10th Sephirot: Malkuth.

Love or Die: A Conversation Series with Dr. Marc Gafni Hosted by Andrew Sweeny2024-07-05T07:06:45-07:00
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