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Welcome to the Center for World Spirituality

December 2, 2010 8 Comments

Welcome to the Center for World Spirituality website. Take off your coat, find your seat and get ready to plunge into the depths of some of the most cutting-edge spiritual teachings available on the planet today! On Tuesday, September 21st we launched the new website and we are very excited to share with you the new look and feel of CWS – clean, fresh, and super easy to navigate.

Let us show you around the new site, share with you our new and improved community website features, and look forward to some new CWS website features planned to launch in January 2012. Exciting times!

What’s New at Center for World Spirituality

1. Complimentary CWS Membership

Want to receive a full-access pass to all of our World Spirituality content? Now it’s even easier to start your CWS membership. Just create your free member account here and enjoy all of our World Spirituality audios, videos, blogs, community, and more! Want to go even deeper? Don’t forget to sign-up for our Practitioner Newsletter to receive our latest news, updates, and practice events, all conveniently delivered to your inbox.

2. World Spirituality Weekly Podcast

We are officially announcing our new weekly CWS podcast. If you aren’t subscribed yet, you’ll see several subscription options on the right-hand side of the home page, at the bottom. Subscribing to the podcast ensures that you’ll receive the most recent CWS podcast automatically through your preferred service. We suggest the iTunes program as the best way to receive our weekly CWS podcast. You can also find our CWS podcast in the iTunes Store.

3. World Spirituality Guest Bloggers

Another great community feature is that we now have the capacity to accept and publish guest blogs from our World Spirituality Community Members. As a guest blogger, your post will be featured in our World Spirituality blog. We plan on publishing several new articles each week. Want to contribute to CWS? Do you have a unique perspective on a relevant issue? Submit your posts here to contribute to the Integral Evolutionary community.

4. Powerful Comment System

Another feature that we’ve included on the site is a new powerful commenting system that is all about changing the way people think about discussion on the web and we are very excited to bring this new feature to the CWS community. These new features include comment logins through your Twitter, Facebook, OpenID, and Yahoo accounts, threaded commenting, the ability for users to track comment threads via e-mail, and a powerful moderation system so that we can keep the conversation on track and evolving.

Our hope is that this feature creates the ability to have deep, intelligent, insightful and multi-perspectival dialogues around the content presented on iEvolve. We will be doing our best to moderate this new space, so that an environment of mutual respect can be upheld. CWS is a troll-free environment. Help us keep our streets safe. Volunteer as a CWS Community Moderator today!

5. Related Posts

Another feature that we’re psyched to share with our community, appears on the bottom of each post—for our blogs, podcast, audios, and videos—and that is the “Related Posts” feature. Just as the name suggests, this feature analyzes various aspects of a content piece and generates a list of posts that have similar content for you to explore. If you find that you really enjoy a particular piece of content, then check out the Related Posts list and explore our content suggestions on CWS.

Future Features

Looking forward, we’ll be implementing new ways to make the CWS website meet the ever growing demand of our online World Spirituality Community. In January 2011 we will launch our online CWS store, full of in-depth media programs to help support people’s individual spiritual practices. Stay tuned for that!

We also want to hear from you, what features you’d most be interested in seeing. What would help make CWS a leading resource of 21st century spiritual practice both on and offline? If you have feedback, or want to give CWS a Tip of the Hat, visit our Contact Page.

I hope you enjoy our new CWS website. And I want to thank all of you for your dedication, heart, and practice with CWS since we first launched in the Fall of 2008. This is truly a privilege.

Warmly,

Kelly Sosan Bearer
Executive Producer
Center for World Spirituality

Filed Under: Blog, Kelly Sosan Bearer Tagged With: iEvolve, Website

What is the Separate Self?

October 20, 2010 Leave a Comment

In this video teaching, Dr. Marc Gafni defines with his students during his annual five-day Urban Retreat in the Summer of 2010, the notion of Separate Self. What is the Separate Self? How do we know our True Self? Marc Gafni introduces and explains that each person is a skin encapsulated ego (to borrow the phrase) and needs to move beyond one’s Separate Self towards one’s True Self, ultimately realizing one’s Unique Self.
[box style="rounded" border="full"]Dr. Marc Gafni holds his doctorate from Oxford University. He is a rabbi and an iconoclastic teacher of Kabbalah and World Spirituality. He is the co-director of the Integral Life Spiritual Center and Integral Spiritual Experience. He is a core founder and faculty member of iEvolve: Global Practice Community. [/box]

Filed Under: Marc Gafni, Marc Gafni Teachings, Video Tagged With: Integral, Marc Gafni, Separate Self, Spirituality, True Self, Unique Self

Kneel and Kiss the Ground: Devotion as the Path of Love

October 2, 2010 4 Comments

Not many people have walked the path of devotional spiritual practice as deeply as Sofia Diaz. For over the past 28 years, she has given herself fully to her spiritual teachers, her students, and her practice such that her life is the very expression of devotion. But what is the role of devotion in spiritual awakening? What does a Western, post-modern devotion look like and is it necessary? How can women practice devotion in our time, free of the inequality and subjugation of the past? What is the relationship of masculine to feminine energy in spiritual practice? These are some of the questions that we will explore with this gifted teacher of Hatha yoga, sacred movement, and feminine spiritual practice.

[box style="rounded" border="full"]Sofia Diaz is a hatha yoga master, a lineage holder in the Balasaraswati lineage of the South Indian temple arts and a recipient of numerous meditation empowerments in both Tibetan and Shakta Tantric traditions. Being an inspired woman practitioner, the rigors of her practice have resulted in great clarity and expertise in the domain of Feminine Spiritual practice, which she has been generously teaching for 28 years.
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[box style="rounded" border="full"]Dr. Marc Gafni holds his doctorate from Oxford University. He is a rabbi and an iconoclastic teacher of Kabbalah and World Spirituality. He is the co-director of the Integral Life Spiritual Center and Integral Spiritual Experience. He is a core founder and faculty member of iEvolve: Global Practice Community. [/box]

Filed Under: Blog, Marc Gafni, Sofia Diaz Tagged With: Devotion, Future of Love, Integral, Spirituality, Yoga

Surrender to Your Beloved

September 28, 2010 Leave a Comment

Surrender to your beloved in this lively dialogue with Terry Patten and Dr. Marc Gafni as they discuss The 2nd Face of God. There are innumerable ways to conceptualize God, Spirit, or the Divine. These can be broken down into three basic perspectives – first-person, second-person, and third-person views of God, Spirit, or the Divine. The recognition that manifest reality is fundamentally comprised of perspectives, or different lenses from which to view reality, does a great deal to transform our relationship to religion and spirituality. Here, Terry and Dr. Marc focus on the second-person perspective of God as they discuss intimacy with your own beloved. Tune in and share your perspectives. How do you surrender? How do you surrender to your beloved? And how do you discern when it is appropriate to surrender?

[button style="download" color="silver" link="/audiofiles/Gafni-SurrenderToYourBeloved.mp3"]Download MP3[/button]

[box style="rounded" border="full"]
Terry Patten is a Certified Integral Coach and a co-author of the book Integral Life Practice. He has worked for many years with Ken Wilber and Integral Institute. He is committed to serving the emergence of Integral consciousness—by writing and educating, and by helping conscious individuals and organizations negotiate extraordinary transitions.[/box]

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Filed Under: Audio, Marc Gafni, Marc Gafni Teachings, Terry Patten Tagged With: Three Faces of Spirit

A Big Question: How Have I Loved?

September 25, 2010 11 Comments

Lama Surya Das, Dzogchen meditation master and one of Buddhism’s true pioneers in the West, will share with us the unique contribution of Buddhism to the evolution of love. Surya has often expressed the importance of asking probing and intelligent questions as necessary to spiritual unfolding. He says that if we want entrance into the Pearly Gates, a fundamental question that all seekers need to ask is: “How have I loved?” Learning how to love is the goal and the purpose of all spiritual life, even though it is expressed differently between traditions. Some of the ideas we will explore in this conversation is the difference between personal and impersonal love in spiritual practice, developing love for the master, for the teachings, and—maybe hardest of all—for the sangha of other practitioners. Join us for the conversation!

How have you loved?

Lama Surya Das is one of the foremost Western Buddhist meditation teachers and scholars. Surya Das teaches and lectures around the world, conducting dozens of meditation retreats and workshops each year. Based on his relationship with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Surya Das founded the Western Buddhist Teachers Network and has organized three week-long conferences of Western Buddhist Meditation Teachers with the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala, India.

Dr. Marc Gafni holds his doctorate from Oxford University. He is a rabbi and an iconoclastic teacher of Kabbalah and World Spirituality. He is the director with Ken Wilber, Sally Kempton and Diane Hamilton of the Integral Life Spiritual Center and core founder and faculty member of iEvolve: Global Practice Community. He has written seven books, including the national bestseller Soul Prints, and The Mystery of Love, an exploration of the relationship between the sexual, the erotic, and the sacred. Gafni is considered by many to be a visionary voice in the founding of a new World Spirituality.

Join us on the Future of Love Facebook Page

Filed Under: Blog, Lama Surya Das, Marc Gafni Tagged With: Integral, Spirituality, The Future of Love Teleseries

A New Model of the Student-Teacher Relationship

September 22, 2010 9 Comments

I think those of us on the spiritual path could agree that the student-teacher relationship deserves an upgrade, not only for the 21st century practitioner-student, but also for the 21st century spiritual teacher. In this video, Dr. Marc Gafni shares with us the possibility of a new model of the student-teacher relationship. What characteristics do you think should be included in a new model of the student-teacher relationship for the 21st century?

Filed Under: Marc Gafni Teachings, Video Tagged With: Evolutionary, Guru, Integral, Relationships, Spirituality, Student

Turning the Bitter into the Sweet: Following the Darkness to the Light

September 18, 2010 2 Comments

In this three-part audio series, Lama Surya Das, Sally Kempton, and Dr. Marc Gafni engage in an exciting and cutting-edge dialogue on Turning the Bitter into the Sweet. In part three, Dr. Marc Gafni explores with us Following the Darkness to the Light.

Sally Kempton, formerly known as Swami Durgananda, is recognized as a powerful meditation guide and as a spiritual teacher who integrates yogic philosophy with daily life. She is the author of The Heart ofMeditation, and writes the popular Wisdom column for Yoga Journal. A teacher in the tantric tradition of Kashmir Shaivism Sally conducts conducts workshops and retreats on applied philosophy and meditation. She is also a core founder and faculty of iEvolve: Global Practice Community.

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Right-click to download MP3.

Filed Under: Audio, Lama Surya Das, Marc Gafni, Marc Gafni Teachings, Sally Kempton Tagged With: Gafni, iEvolve, Kabbalah, Kempton, Spirituality

Turning the Bitter into the Sweet: The Path of Hindu Tantra