42: Raffaello Manacorda on Tantra, Daoism, alternative community living, and ISTA

Raffaello
ISTA

MDMA
Hakim Bay: T.A.Z
Bolo’Bolo
The Ethical Slut: A Guide to Infinite Sexual Possibilities
Monogamish
Christopher Ryan
Estado Impuro
The Man Who Fell in Love with the Moon
The Muti-Orgasmic Man
Vipassana
Samadhi
Raffaello – Blog
Aldous Huxley – Reducing Valve
Dark Night of the Soul

Giancarlo: [00:00:00] Hello, hi, welcome to this new episode of the Mango TV podcast. Today, I’m very excited and very grateful to have Raffaello Manacorda. Raffaello is an international tantra teacher and practitioner. He has been practicing tantra for more than 15 years and has undergone intensive training in several styles of yoga.

After completing an Raffaello decided to spend more than 12 years living in alternative communities and experimenting with radically alternative [00:01:00] lifestyles. It was in these wild years that he first encountered Tantra, the rebel way to spirit. This encounter developed into a lifelong practice, first on a solo journey, then studying Tantra and Yoga in some of the best worldwide schools.

Raffaello serves as lead faculty in ISTA, the International School of Temple Arts. And teachers and lecturer worldwide is currently enrolled in a PhD program in wisdom studies with ubiquity university, California. Raffaello is the co creator of the ISTA practitioner training, ISTA’s program for coaches and practitioners in the field of conscious sexuality.

Welcome Raffaello. 

Raffaello: Thank you. I’m great to be here with you. 

Giancarlo: I’m very excited to have Rafael here at the podcast because, um, he was the lead facilitator at, um, my first, um, Easter level one, which was, um, very transformative for me. And, uh, I had the pleasure to appreciate Rafael’s both embodiment [00:02:00] presence and empathy, but also the intellectual wisdom is a rare combination.

Raffaello: Thank you. 

Giancarlo: So let’s, as usual, you know, mango tv, just to give a bit of context. Um, Mango TV is a podcast that is a spin off, if you want, of Mangusta production, which, uh, was, um, is a small production company interested in personal transformation. We started 20 years ago with a documentary called 2012 Time for Change.

Uh, based on the work of Daniel Pinchbeck, where we try to make the argument that global transformation comes from personal transformation. So we are interested in, uh, in, in, in people that, you know, went through radical transformation, and I think you are a good candidate. So let’s, let’s start from the beginning.

So you were born in Rome Very close to where I lived also, 10 years. And then how did your, um, you know, interest and, and, [00:03:00] and, and belief. Start forming and evolving. 

Raffaello: So a small biographical fun fact. I was actually born in a little town about 80 kilometers away from Rome because my mother, I was born in July in the summer and my mother was on holiday and I had this, this rush to come into the world.

So I was born one month in advance. So she was like, okay, take me to the nearest hospital. And there I was born in a town that I, you know, I never Pretty much. So again, where, where aqua been then? Yeah. Near Viterbo. So near where my family house was. So they were just vacationing there. And so I came, you know, ahead of time with some kind of feeling of perhaps a soul that was in a rush to come somehow.

And I think that has somehow, um, informed all my years. And also that Maybe put a seed in me that, you know, I loved [00:04:00] Rome. I grew up in Rome, et cetera, et cetera, until I was 24, but I was always, always, always looking outside, looking for something else, looking for, uh, both geographically. Like, you know, what is there besides this city and this country?

And also in a deeper sense, I was very soon, I would say when I was 15, started to be interested in what in the, in the biography we call alternative. Lifestyles. So the first one for me was the rave techno rave movement that I embraced very, very young with 14, 14, 15, I was already DJing at raves and things like that.

And then many more political involvement. And then finally, um, you know, embodied spirituality and tantra. So I was always kind of with one foot there, but one foot out. I 

Giancarlo: can ask you during the, um, your rave years, that was also an environment very rich in psychedelics. 

Raffaello: Yeah. So, okay. Let me, you know, go back to [00:05:00] that time.

I was maybe 14, you know, me and a bunch of friends, uh, All of them, older than me, went to Switzerland, to Zurich, to what was then the Street Parade, like one of the big techno parades in Europe, in Central Europe. And then basically, as we came back, the illegal rave movement in Rome was born. I was 15 at the time, but I already, you know, bought my decks and started DJing.

So the one component was the craziness of the music and, you know, entering into abandoned factories and creating these events, these parties, the other component was. As you say, psychedelic substances. Now there is a lot I could say about this, but in the very, very first years, I would say that mainly, if not only, there was one substance that we used.

No, MDMA. MDMA was the substance that was somehow perfectly attuned to what we were doing. Like, it was a, you know, more of an [00:06:00] emotional Rather than a mental, uh, exploration, exploration of universal love, exploration of feeling connected to everybody and to the music, such as MDMA, you know, good quality MDMA can definitely provide.

Because it was not the sixties anymore. It was not the sixties. That was the early nineties. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. 

Giancarlo: But so MDMA, not ecstasy. Pure MDMA. Well, 

Raffaello: yeah. Ecstasy, you know, which was. somehow a low grade quality MDMA mixed with some amphetamine and stuff, but some more 

Giancarlo: for dancing 

Raffaello: for dancing. But the, the emotional impact, you know, I think in those years in the rave parties, it’s the first time that I had spiritual experiences of connection with everything facilitated by the music, by the company.

and at times by MDMA as well. So that, that substance really works well for, for that purpose. Then of course, with the years, you know, the scene change and also other substances came into play. [00:07:00] But at the beginning it was like that. 

Giancarlo: So you felt, you felt a sense of belonging, a sense of tribe, a sense of, uh, how can you describe the effect of the music, the group and the MDMA?

Raffaello: So there’s definitely, yeah, definitely there was a sense of belonging. But in those moments, you know, just imagine. Surrounded by 1000 people, the techno music starts building up. The MDMA starts kicking in. For me, it was a sense of universal connection, not just, Oh, I am with cool people that I love, but I am connected to everything galactic, galactic family and just connection.

And of course, then we had to deal with the coming down of that and the sensations and the emotions that that brought. 

Giancarlo: So that started in the 15th. So for nine years until you left Rome, he was, you were DJing. That was your reality. 

Raffaello: Yeah, more or less. So the, for the first five years, I would say I was very, very into the illegal rave movement.[00:08:00] 

Then things started to change and shift for me. I was also very, very young, you know, so at that age, just, uh, being exposed to. Uh, harder forms of, of, um, substances and also situations and contexts that became darker and a bit more rough. I, at some point I said, I think I have enough for now. But what happened in parallel is that I started being very, very involved with political activism, with anarchist movements, and eventually with the squatter movement.

So by the time I reached 24, I was still very interested in electronic music, but I would say my main thing was. Radical political activism and that’s the path that I followed to leave Italy and move to Spain 

Giancarlo: But that was an interest that was nurtured and create an in within the techno movement. Or it was, is this movement of techno you described in the nineties was politically charged or was more a form of [00:09:00] escapism?

Raffaello: It definitely was politically charged, especially at the beginning. Uh, yes, it was, you know, cooked in the social centers of Rome. which you surely know, like the Forte Prenestino and others. And I remember very clearly that in the first, uh, raves that we did, uh, we would distribute flyers to, you know, everyone who, who attended with our ideological position.

Why are we doing this? You know, and a lot of it was rooted in Hiccum Bay’s Taz, you know, the Temporary Autonomous Zones is a very influential book that this, um, American philosopher wrote. I think it was in the late eighties. So we were basically subscribing to the idea that you can create a temporary zone, which means a place, a temporary place, temporary in time where the normal laws are suspended.

And it’s an autonomous experiment of a micro autonomous society [00:10:00] where things can be done in a different way. So it was very politically charged that got diluted with the years for sure. 

Giancarlo: So the, the, the, the belief of this, uh, idea is that is this idea of direct democracy of, uh, self representation, how it was like anarchy.

I mean, is there, is there like a leader you had to vote for, for someone? 

Raffaello: Absolutely not. You know, like it was definitely an experimentation leaning on the anarchy side of things. Of course. Hierarchies emerge, you know, in, in humans, and this was, you know, it took me a long time to realize that I’m saying it now is an obvious thing, but our ideals were definitely egalitarian.

To give you an example, the DJ. The way we did it is that the DJ would play pretty much hidden, you know, behind the speakers. Or at least there would be no big name, you know, no, let’s say [00:11:00] mythical figure as a DJ. The DJ was just there to serve. So the whole thing of constructing an identity, becoming popular, having your following, we were completely against that.

Doing the opposite, doing the radical opposite experiment doesn’t matter who the DJ is. Just come and be. We’re all the same. One of us is behind the decks. A thousands of us are in front of the decks dancing. Doesn’t matter. It’s just the same thing. 

Giancarlo: But what was the evolution of this idea? The larger idea, you know, you would start with autonomous zone in within an established system and then they would grow to a point that they would take over.

Raffaello: So I don’t think the hacking Bay ever developed it. To that point, but other people did like there is, for example, a very interesting book called Bolo Bolo that was very influential for us. I don’t remember the name of the author now, but yes, the idea was to start some kind of autonomous cells that, you know, just like in an organism that would replicate.

And [00:12:00] then, and these ideas still alive today with different experiments like Tamara with the bio tropes idea and so on. 

Giancarlo: Yeah. Because, because it’s still very contemporary. We’re still looking for an alternative system to neoliberal capitalism, but so let’s continue with the biography. 24. What make you leave Rome and for where?

For Barcelona? 

Raffaello: Yes. 24. I finished my, um, university path in philosophy. I took my MA and then I was free, so to speak. 

Giancarlo: Sorry, let me ask you. So how are you studying philosophy were integrated in your anarchic ideology? 

Raffaello: That was kind of easy enough, because at least in Italy in those times, you know, philosophy was a very, very broad field of my cruise.

Yeah, we would study all kinds of things from Greek philosophy and pre Socratic philosophy to the modern times. And we had a lot of freedom. So actually, one of the most influential Thinkers for me at that time was a philosopher, Max Stirner, he’s, uh, [00:13:00] was a German, uh, philosopher that wrote the Bible of anarcho individualism.

And that was very, you know, easy to integrate, very easy to integrate, very important for me. And so I, Concluded the studies, you know, with lots of ease and with stellar votes, with not too much effort and traveling around having a great time really. And then a chapter was closed and there was an opening for taking this path or that path and so I had to to decide and my decision was to pack everything I had on a van on a pretty old, uh, you know, Iveco daily van that was Uh, pretty battered and I drove all the way to Barcelona and the reason I did that is because I had discovered in the previous year that at that time, Barcelona had the most alive and for me, most appealing squatter scene in Europe.

So I went there with the intention of spending a few months in the squats. [00:14:00] It ended up being a. 11 years experience. 

Giancarlo: What attracted you from the squatter lifestyle? 

Raffaello: So when I was in Rome, I was already for maybe four or five years before leaving, I was part of an anarchist circle and it was great. I loved it.

And also we were very ideological. We were debating, you know, having ideological debates and criticizing other. components of the anarchist movement because they were to this or to that and to this or to that. And somehow that was good for my intellect. But my heart and my emotions were not feeling super aligned with this continuous criticism of the of the neighbor, so to speak.

Then I went to Barcelona just for 

Giancarlo: the me against them mentality. 

Raffaello: Exactly. I went to Barcelona just for a month. And of course, I joined the demonstrations and you know, the activism that was happening there. And I noticed Or that was my impression that in Barcelona, they didn’t care. You know, like everyone was [00:15:00] together from my perspective, at least anarchists, autonomous communists, of course, within the spectrum of you could say the radical left wing.

And I remember this image of going to one of the demonstrations and seeing Someone, you know, clad in black with a spray, uh, right on the wall. Some kind of phrase that I don’t remember, but then write a star, which was the symbol of autonomy. Um, I, I dunno what is, what’s it called in English? The communist symbol, you know, of the, the hammer and, yeah, and then the A of anarchism.

And just to see those three things together was impossible in my, sorry, what 

Giancarlo: was the third one? 

Raffaello: The anarchy. The A of anarchist. So the autonomous star Uhhuh , the classical communist symbol, yeah. Of, of the, uh, sickle and the, and the hammer and the a. In a circle Yeah. Of anarchism and, and least, but not last, but not least, the thunderbolt.

That is the symbol of squatters. [00:16:00] Yeah. So I said, I wanna be here. I wanna be here. The power of symbols, eh, the power of symbols. All of them together. I wanna be here. I, that’s why I came. 

Giancarlo: Amazing. And so you arrived and so you joined this. Um, and so what, what, what, what, what is the typical day in the life of a squatter in Barcelona in the nineties?

Raffaello: Well, that was already the early two thousands when I moved, uh, to Barcelona, that was 2002. Yeah. And the typical day would be waking up. First of all, A lot of the time, you wouldn’t know whether you would wake up to an eviction, meaning you would wake up to, uh, you know, riot police pretty much storming into the building and kicking you out.

Giancarlo: So there was a sense of precarity in a way. 

Raffaello: Definitely. You know, with some ups and downs, like at times there was a little more security because maybe we had a court case that was stalling or whatever kind of thing. Uh, but with that [00:17:00] precarity came an incursion. Incredible vitality of vitality. So we would actually like, you know, people have this image that in the squats you do nothing.

It just we would work like crazy because the buildings that we would live in were pretty run down and it was a do it yourself culture to the extreme. You need an electricity installment. Do it yourself. You need a water. piping, do it yourself. You need some, um, you know, to, to repair a wall and the roof.

Do it yourself. There was a lot to do. Very empowering. Of course, we would also spend time not just in our little place, but creating structures and activities for the movement. And then Many times in the night, we would party and have fun. So it was an extremely vital lifestyle. That for me was a real school of life.

I cannot be more grateful for the years that I spent in the squats. I learned so much and the quality, the caliber [00:18:00] of the individuals that were part was so high. So for me, just to be surrounded, you know, by people that came from different walks of life, but we’re together united by more than an ideal, just by a felt sense of what humanity can be basking in that was an accelerator for my growth that I can’t be thankful enough.

I’m so jealous. 

Giancarlo: I had the completely opposite upbringing. So, you know, uh, prisoner of the, of the, of the, um, you know, status quo of the rules and, but so let’s touch the other big topic. So what about love and romance? 

Raffaello: That’s good one. 

Giancarlo: So what was, did you, when did you fall in love first and how, what was your position towards love, sex, monogamy?

Raffaello: So first of all, you know, briefly before I moved to Barcelona and entered into the squats, [00:19:00] my love life in my early twenties and late teens, of course, was a disaster, you know, like, so the way and you know, because you’re from Rome as well, the way that We, like general society does love and relationships in southern European countries, at least at that time was terrifying for me, very, very difficult because of the jealousy, because of the competition, because of the roles of man, transactional.

Yeah, but also just the seduction codes that I was struggling to. So basically, you know, it was 

Giancarlo: because objectification of woman, 

Raffaello: I could summarize it like this, like either I was longing to be with a beautiful, attractive woman that I felt I could never reach and that was tough. Or when I had, you know, that kind of partner, I was terrified.

by the idea of losing them. So I was jealous, I was [00:20:00] controlling, I was vulnerable, but I didn’t know how to express that. It was 

Giancarlo: so suffering other way. Yeah, it 

Raffaello: was actually that I think was the main point of suffering, you know, inside everything that It’s pushed me to change. 

Giancarlo: That’s so interesting. So either is the impossible woman that I suffer, I can have all the woman I have.

I’m suffering because I’m scared to lose. Absolutely. But where was that coming from? It’s not just from outside. This is something in you in childhood. 

Raffaello: It’s a good question. You know, like I never actually explored it this way because I took it at face value. And for me at that time, I gave myself the explanation that the problem was outside, which is a convenient way of explaining things.

I’ll give you that. But the good thing about it is that then I said, Okay, I need to change. I need to live in a different world. And in that sense, the world of the squats was very, very different. But Yes, I mean, even astrologically, you could trace it to my [00:21:00] astrological makeup. I am a Cancerian and, but I am a man, right?

So I kind of grew up as a living contradiction in Rome between having to toughen up on the outside as a man and be, you know, independent and tough and having a very, very soft, squishy core. Now I know, you know, now almost 46, I know that I am absolutely not only capable, but I need to deeply love a partner and be devoted to them and committed to them.

But it took me 40 years to realize that. So at that time I was just very, very confused. And of course I made it about the environment around me, but truthfully also the environment around me wasn’t very healthy emotionally. It was impossible, unthinkable for a man, a young man like me to cry, you know, and express feelings of vulnerability.

Like just. was not what was going to happen. I had to be smart. I had to be tough. I had to be self [00:22:00] reliant and compete, et cetera, et cetera. Be 

Giancarlo: a man. But, but, but, but can I, if you don’t mind me asking, how was your household? Were you like emotionally supported? Your parents were loving and present. 

Raffaello: So I, you know, for many, many years, I thought that I had like the ideal household, the ideal childhood.

you know, of course, examining it with more tools, I discovered that nothing is ideal. But the one thing I can tell you is I was very protected and respected as a child in my household. I would, you know, I would have things happening to me at school and later on on the street, you know, as a kid. But the moment I opened the door of my The family house, it was safe.

It was safe. I was supported. I was respected. I was valued What was missing though, is that I never saw a transmission of how? passionate romantic physical love can be between To adults, because my parents would [00:23:00] not express that in front of me 

Giancarlo: is not in our culture. Yeah, they don’t teach our kids how to do love and romance.

Raffaello: Exactly. 

Speaker 4: Okay, 

Raffaello: so I got the impression, you know, that love the way I, I drank in As a child was like being very good teammates, you know, and respecting each other because my mother, my father respected each other and worked well together. But I didn’t know how passion worked, how romance, how physical attraction.

I didn’t even know if they were attracted to each other. There was no way to know. So I had to figure that out by myself with lots of mistakes. 

Giancarlo: And so, so how did you transition from? You know, suffering for not having the ideal woman, suffering not to lose the current woman. How did you get out of this mental prison?

Raffaello: When I moved to Barcelona and I moved to the squats, we were living in groups of Between 30, in my case, between 30 people [00:24:00] and 12, something like that. So a lot of things were different. First of all, the women were different and the men were different. The women were way, behaving in a way more autonomous way, including sexually and including romantically.

So it was, it started to be a possibility for me to be approached by a woman. That was initiating a connection with me. I never had experienced that in Italy, you know, I never not saying that it doesn’t happen, but in the circles that I was involved in, I didn’t experience that. So that was already a shift and the women that I was with, they were, you know, teaching me at times how to do certain manual works, you know, how to fix this, how to do that.

So there was a lot of fluidity that way. And then. It took me a couple of years to realize this, but there was a different attitude towards jealousy and what we would call, with a word that I don’t like at all, cheating. So when I [00:25:00] was in Italy, for me to be cheated on was a nightmare. Not just because of the suffering, but because of the loss of social status.

You know, we have all this terrible way exactly to describe a man that has allowed that to happen. And what will you do? How will you repair your honor? All this kind of, you know, cultural 

Giancarlo: memes in Italy. We had the lead to the Nore. We had them. We, you know, if you find we had this, it was allowed for a man to kill another man.

If you find him in bed with your wife, they can tell you the type of culture. 

Raffaello: And nowadays, you know, although I didn’t, I never, you know, saw anyone kill anybody, but there was a lot of fistfights because of that reason, just because you looked at my girl and what did you mean and this and that and 

Giancarlo: yeah, very low chakra behavior.

Raffaello: Absolutely. 

Giancarlo: Very primitive. 

Raffaello: So when I got into that other. society or temporary autonomous zone of the squats, things were different. You know, if I was with a girl and [00:26:00] she had an adventure with someone else, yes, I would suffer. The other man in my group wouldn’t look at me like I’m a failure. They would be like, yeah, I know it happens.

Do you need, you know, do you need a hug?

And, and, you know, and that led to some very, very, um, You know, special situations for me that repattern my inside. You know, there was this time when I was away and one of my best friends had a little adventure with my then girlfriend. And when I came back, I found out and, you know, I suffered, but pretty much after an hour or so, me and this very good friend of mine, we were looking at each other’s eyes, almost crying and hugging.

That was it. You know, so wow, what a change, what a change, what a change of paradigm. So of course, then I enter into the whole open relating, you know, um, field and started to read [00:27:00] and discover that there were books about that and went into a long journey experimenting with open relating and, uh, with polyamory and all kinds of things like that.

Giancarlo: Which book would you recommend on that, um, topic of open relating? One of the, that you might remember. 

Raffaello: I think, you know, that was 20 years ago, but still for me, the one that really sort of like open my eyes is the ethical slut. And I don’t know, maybe, you know, nowadays in polyamory movements that’s considered surpassed like these things evolve.

I know that there are other books that people nowadays are really, really, you know, into and I can remember the 

Giancarlo: author. We’ll, we’ll figure it out. We’ll put it on the show notes. 

Raffaello: It’s two, uh, two author, two women. Yeah. And, um, don’t worry. We’ll, we’ll find it in the comments. And it’s a great book. It’s just an eye opening book.

Um, so that opened a door for me for sure in that field of sexuality and relating. 

Giancarlo: So this, this, this idea [00:28:00] that, you know, if you are ethical about it, you can be promiscuous. 

Raffaello: Yeah, that’s one of the core ideas there. And also, you know, there is a lot of important information about jealousy and, and particularly sexual jealousy, which was my issue, my problem and what that is really and how we can observe it and kind of make sense of it without succumbing to it, without having it rule our, our existence.

So that for me was very, very important. 

Giancarlo: What is it? It’s insecurity. I 

Raffaello: think my discovery at that time was that what I was calling jealousy with this label of jealousy was actually really a cocktail of many different emotions and I would experience different forms of jealousy depending on the situation.

So I was putting this word on top of a complex mixture of feelings, fear, sadness. [00:29:00] A sense of sometimes anger, not always my jealousy was not always angry. And so just by unpacking it and looking at the different feelings that were composing it, I was able to observe it and breathe it and realize that, you know what?

Yes, I can feel jealous, but I’m, I survive. It’s not killing me. I don’t need to, you know, stop the whole world from spinning because I’m feeling jealous. So it was a complex, you know, I’m, I’m summing it up very much. Of course, I will also say upfront that, and this is maybe my, uh, temperament. I also went all the way to the other.

side of the pendulum and started feeling very critical of couples in general or being in a couple. Definitely very, very, very critical of marriage, you know, with, with the brushness, this is like, you know, the person that quit smoking and then become such a radical non smoker that they can’t even tolerate looking [00:30:00] at someone smoking a cigarette.

So I went, I went to the other extreme and then it took me some time also to come to a form of more balance and acceptance. 

Giancarlo: Yeah, this is an important topic for Mangusta production. You know, we, um, we produce a documentary called Monogamish, um, with a series of experts, including the lady from Ethical Slut and Esther Perel and Dan Savage and Christopher Ryan.

And uh, you know, we explore this idea that, you know, monogamy is a very recent concept in evolutionary term. You know, it’s just like 50, 60 years old. Um, it’s, it’s very recent. He’s not really working in America. More than 60 percent of marriage ended up in divorce. And it’s not natural. You know, Christopher Ryan explains that very, uh, he says zero animals are monogamous.

Some mates for life, but they have sex outside the couple. And even the Napalong penguin that the congregation was hiring. Um, you know, cinema to screen. They were monogamous for one season. They leave until the [00:31:00] 30. So there was not really a good example. So we explored that. We have another documentary, another fiction on the website called Estado in Puro about, um, Life of Spanish swingers.

Um, another, uh, concept. I love to add this idea that jealousy doesn’t kill you. Also, if you look from, you know, the point of view of the partner that is doing the cheating, even if it’s a thing we don’t like, uh, the non monogamy people, they call it compersion, which is the opposite of jealousy. So not only you feel that you’re not gonna die, not only you can do some work on yourself to understand this cocktail of emotion, where they’re coming from, but you can be part of it.

I’m happy for the person who has the experience because she has this possibility of growth and maybe this growth can be then brought back to the couple as a form of, um, of, uh, of improvement if you want. But so is there was this some, is there a [00:32:00] heartbreak already there? Now we’re like age, uh, you’ve been, uh, when I close to 30 

Raffaello: age, 24, 25, 26.

So I, you know. Pretty in the first half of my life in the squats, I ended up having a relatively long term relationship of four, something like that years, non monogamous, non monogamous, non monogamous, so open with all the ups and downs and the breakthroughs and breakdowns that that, but overall, I would say a very beautiful and nourishing relationship and, uh, that ended when It’s a bit of a simplification, but just from my perspective, when my partner, so until that moment, we, we had sexual explorations with others, but then she fell in love with someone else, you know, and of course now with the wisdom of now, I know that you can’t.

Cage anyone’s heart. You know, you can’t, you can’t put this kind of limits of like, yes, [00:33:00] sex, but not emotions and blah, but at that time that was too much for me to digest and to handle. So I basically broke down and backed out. So it was a terrible heartbreak. And also I think a realization that, you know, it’s one thing to understand things ideologically because ideologically I was supportive of that.

But my emotional body that I had very, very little capacity Of understanding at that time was not able to support to, to, to withstand that experience. So it was for, 

Giancarlo: for her, it would have been fine to be, to go from a non monogamous to a polyamorous. So she was okay in loving two different people, but you, it was too much for 

Raffaello: not only it was okay for her.

She was very clear that she didn’t want to break up with me. She wanted to continue with me. And also, you know, the second. Person was not living in our countries. It was on a different country. So it was a love experience that she wanted to pursue, that she wanted to allow [00:34:00] herself to to live. Uh, but I couldn’t.

I didn’t. I didn’t manage to open my heart big enough for that. 

Giancarlo: But so it was just what was the practical difference between Another situation where he was maybe non emotional involved, she would still see this other person. So just for you, the knowledge that she was a little bit more in love, just that knowledge was too much because practically she would spend time with this person like she would have spent time with a lover and non loving lover if you want.

Raffaello: Yeah, of course. If we boil it down to time and you know, sort of like scheduling, it wouldn’t have been Made any difference, but the emotions, you know, that, that was my big discovery that there exists an emotional world and an emotional body that has its own logic. So for my emotional body, it was the world of difference, uh, to hear from my partner.

Oh, you know, I want to have some sexy experience with such and such, [00:35:00] or I’m feeling my heart opening and I’m feeling. You know that I’m falling in love with this person. That was a complete, completely different Playground for me. That’s so interesting. 

Giancarlo: But so because then there is a sense of loss is a trigger of When, when, you know, when, because we are so used by our culture to maybe involve our identity in this loving relationship, that when the person leaves, it’s not just, Oh, okay, she’s probably something else.

It’s like, I’m not worthy. 

Raffaello: I’m not worthy. And also there is an underlying or there was for me, maybe there still is, but an underlying assumption that love is finite. You know, that if you open your heart. To them, 

Giancarlo: it’s going to take away 

Raffaello: from me. But this is, you know, we can, we can kind of laugh at this, but this is beating, this is still ingrained in us by pretty much every pop [00:36:00] song and pop movie that you can come across.

The messages that we get are. You know, you open your heart to him. Where am I going to go now? You know, how can you give your heart to the other person? It belongs to me. Like all of this, it’s a very, very strong cultural indoctrination that we are part of. 

Giancarlo: Yeah. But it’s so strange because it’s very recent, you know, like for a million of years, when we were in the Savannah, there was not pair bonding.

All this indigenous culture was very much non monogamous patriarchal. Um, but so I guess he came with the Judeo Christian morality, right? Religious as imposed this idea of keeping desire under two persons, the, you know, Victorian age, the also private property. Yeah. Okay. So, um, I’m curious to see how we’re going to get into Tantra.

Raffaello: That’s very connected. 

Giancarlo: Of course. Of course. So you had this, you know, this, [00:37:00] um, you, you’re the, you realize your emotional body was saying no to this polyamorous situation and then what happened? 

Raffaello: And then, you know, that was one of the experiences that showed me. That while I was in the squats doing a lot of experimentation, but mainly focused on external problems, like, you know, we wanted to change the world and we did, we did, uh, in terms of, you know, equality and, uh, as you say, like direct action, like, you know, we did a lot of amazing things, but they were mostly externally focused, like focused on the external world.

And gradually I started to realize that. Yes, but my internal world hadn’t gotten the attention that it deserved. And that goes for my emotional state that was clearly not so healthy, you know, if, if, you know, if I was going through the experiences that I was going to through, but [00:38:00] also the, my own relationship with my body, with my own body was pretty much limited to sexuality.

And even then my sexuality, although I was enjoying it. Way more than in my early 20s, but it was still a bit of a, not a bit of a mystery to me. Something that I didn’t understand. I didn’t understand why sometimes I would get aroused, sometimes I wouldn’t. I didn’t understand the whole process of ejaculation.

It was something that happened to me. outside of my, not just control, but outside of my sphere of consciousness. So I realized very, very instinctively that I had to give time and attention to my own sexuality, to my own emotional states. And I started looking, you know, what can I do to, to, to understand better this dynamics to understand better and to be honest, to be a better lover and a better partner.

Because I still wasn’t satisfied with the way that I [00:39:00] was showing up in my connections and in my relationships. And that, you know, led to me basically making a request to the universe, if you will, like, please teach me, you know, what, what can, what is out there. And that was the bridge to Tantra and 

Giancarlo: the universe send you that book on the moon.

Raffaello: It’s great that you remember. Wow. Wow. I’m impressed. Yeah. So, um, a friend of mine. totally out of the blue from the squads friend from the squads, um, gifted me a novel and the novel is called, uh, the man who fell in love with the moon by Tom Spanbauer, American author. It’s, it’s a, just a, you know, a great novel, very surrealistic novel.

But the thing is that one of the main characters, if not the main character, first of all, uh, the main character is what? You could call, with today’s language, a non binary character. That’s already very interesting. As well as a mixed race character, many things. But then, [00:40:00] he, she, they practices with ejaculation retention.

In the novel. It’s a fictional character. But that spoke to me. Like, it was really? One can do that? And I wanted to learn. 

Giancarlo: But can you, can you elaborate on why you resonate with this concept? Why you thought that’s a good idea to retain your ejaculation? 

Raffaello: I think part of it was honestly just a feeling of inadequacy.

You know, when my, uh, sexual Intercourses were unpredictable, you know, sometimes it would last this long or this short and the whole thing will like, I am like my body is doing something that I can’t control that I can’t even see coming sometimes, you know, it’s like, but what happened? Yes. And so that was that element of wanting to just improve myself and also definitely like an [00:41:00] egotistic part in that, you know, I want to be a better lover.

I want to impress. It’s my lovers and partners, but I think it spoke also to a deeper part of me that was maybe I didn’t have the words back then, but that character showed, even if it was a fiction, that if you put will and intelligence and heart into yourself, you can master yourself. So this, this feeling and this idea of mastery over one’s body.

Was very, very appealing to me, of course. And so I went on, you know, I, then I grabbed a Mantak Chia book because it’s what I found, the Multiorgasmic Man, I’m sure you know about. So that’s more the Taoist perspective on sexual energy and sexual power. And that helped. And that led to me doing some experiments by myself.

Giancarlo: Samantha chair was about the Kundalini rising the circle. There was breathing exercise, more than PC muscle, all 

Raffaello: [00:42:00] of it, all of it. Yeah. In Taoism, they would more call it like the microcosmic orbit. And so like circulating sexual energy, uh, from the, the genitals from the penis back. up the spine and then down through the front of the body.

So that was very interesting for me and I started practicing. I was with this woman that I told you about, so that was right before the heartbreak, right before the separation. So I started practicing with her in our own sexual connection. I started practicing the Taoist ways and that led to some spectacular experiences and results, but also very chaotic.

So I would start laughing, crying, holding my breath and contracting all of my body and, and, and like, you know, doing tantrums on the bed. And it was great, but I understood that I needed more guidance. I needed a school. I needed a teacher. 

Giancarlo: And she was confused by that, probably. 

Raffaello: She was cool. She was [00:43:00] amused.

And she said, Hey, if it’s important for you to do this, it’s fine. You know, so she went along with it, but yeah, she was a bit puzzled, but not, not opposed to that in any way. 

Giancarlo: Yeah. That’s so interesting. This is for me, you know, this idea of, um, Because this process of controlling the ejaculation, it’s a way to sacralize and transcend this energy, which is a little bit the idea of Tantra.

But so, okay. Um, so you say I need a teacher and then you went to Bali. 

Raffaello: No, no, no, no. Bali didn’t appear on my scene until very, very, very much later. No, then I. Uh, went to, you know, a Tantra course in, in Barcelona where I was living, which was useful, informative, but not exactly what I was looking. 

Giancarlo: It was like more like the, from the Indian perspective or the Dao.

It was more 

Raffaello: for, you could say more from the neotentric perspective, neotentric. Yeah. So, and if you want, we can briefly speak about what the differences are, but just to say that that was, you know, like, Oh, [00:44:00] that’s interesting. I want to know more. And then I plunged into a spiritual crisis. You know, I was already feeling that I wanted to leave the squads, like something else was cooking for me.

I didn’t know exactly what it was. 

Giancarlo: But you see, that was the beginning of the exercise that stirred that energy. 

Raffaello: Now I can connect those two things, but at that time I didn’t know, of course, but you’re right. It had opened my emotional body. My antennas were more open. So crisis, it 

Giancarlo: was an awakening. You know, that’s what I was trying to explore with our talk of arrows and spirit.

Yes. Anyhow, I’ll let you finish. Sorry. 

Raffaello: And so, you know, I had maybe a year of deep spiritual crisis, not knowing very well what I wanted to do. I tried to look for Tantra schools online, didn’t find anything that really called me. But there was just a voice in my head that kept repeating, go to Thailand, go to Thailand, go to Thailand.

And at the end, I surrendered. I said, okay, you know, just, just go to Thailand because you 

Giancarlo: saw [00:45:00] literature magazine. You thought that that was one of the center of, no, 

Raffaello: there was nothing of that research going on for me. There was just a voice saying, go to Thailand. And I didn’t know what for. And so. you know, since I was in such a deep crisis, I just said, okay, let me go to Thailand.

Let me explore. And I’ll spend two months in Thailand just as a vacation. Pretty much. I didn’t have much to do at that time. Had some savings and, um, 

Giancarlo: so the so you lost a little bit the interest for the for the political activity. Yes, 

Raffaello: I was starting to lose it. It was. It was not like a a clear break. It was more like taking your foot off the, you know, the pedal.

Um, so I went to Thailand and everything happened there. 

Giancarlo: Yeah. This is just thinking that I don’t think we should go there now because it’s, I want to finish with your biography and talk more about Tantra, but this idea of, um, You know, the, to what extent the spiritual awakening might reduce the interest on the political activism is interesting.

Raffaello: It’s an [00:46:00] interesting one. 

Giancarlo: Okay. For next podcast, . 

Raffaello: Next, I would love to do a podcast on that because I feel that, or, 

Giancarlo: or, or a, or a token or talk or, or a pun side token. The base. ’cause I feel 

Raffaello: that for a human being, you know, we need both anyway. We can talk about that. Yeah. 

Giancarlo: Okay. So you, you, you left the squad, you, you went to, how did you find, um, where in Thailand did you go?

Raffaello: I went to Thailand and I went to Bangkok and in Bangkok, I already started having some pretty strong spiritual experiences in this case connected to, to, no, I wouldn’t say to Buddhism, but to the figure of the Buddha, historical archetypal figure, there is a, uh, a temple in Bangkok where there is an amazing, beautiful statue of the reclining Buddha with that, that is the Buddha at the moment of death.

And, um, kind of like represented in a deep, deep, deep moment of contemplation and serenity. And that just opened something in me that I had never ever, of course, I knew about Buddhism, but for me, it was just a name, you know, and I was pretty much anti religion. And I thought that [00:47:00] Buddhism was just another religion, but being there in front of this golden statue and receiving somehow the transmission of that, of that frequency.

Boom, you know, it already sent me into a different state of consciousness, which wasn’t stable, but it was an experience. So from there I joined my first Vipassana retreat, you know, as many people will do. And then I started wandering around Thailand, you know, having some experiences here and there, but not knowing really well what to do until a series of circumstances brought me by chance or by synchronicity to Vipassana.

A specific island that is Copenhagen, where through a fortuitous encounter with a woman that I had a very brief chat with, I ended up in a tantra school, but. Not, not a tantra school that I had, you know, asked for or, uh, seen on the internet, just [00:48:00] like that. And so that for me was the sign that, okay, I get it.

There are forces at play that are bigger than me. My call has been answered. I will, I will dedicate my life to this right now. And so that started a seven, eight year journey for me where everything, all I did was tantra and yoga. 

Giancarlo: Well, well, and so how was the milestone of your tantra practice? Where was the moment where, because you would say the beginning was, um, you know, self taught through the book.

It was a little bit, uh, you needed some guidance. Did you find the guidance? I did. And, and what can you describe that realization that now I understand how these things work. 

Raffaello: So the beautiful thing about the Tantra yoga system is that it is a progressive system. So you go through stages and stages of realization as well.

And eventually, you know, there is a, there is a state of consciousness in Tantra and yoga called Samadhi. [00:49:00] You know, you could maybe very imperfect, imperfectly translate as fusion, union with everything. It’s a loss of, of ego. And then there are also different kinds of, of that state. And, you know, uh, I don’t want to go too much into that.

And also I’m not approaching this, um, as a scholar, but if you practice and if you’re consistent and if you are, you know, disciplined and you have the time and the energy to do it, eventually. You know, Tantra is a very practical system of spirituality. It’s not teaching you concepts. It’s teaching you techniques and you just have to use the techniques, end of the story.

So if you do that, eventually I would say pretty much everybody or anyway it happened to me, you’re going to experience states of Samadhi, states of, we could say states of, uh, opening of the crown chakra. I’m sure a lot of people listening to this podcast have experience. It’s not, you [00:50:00] know, it’s not some kind of unique thing.

It’s a very different thing to abide in that state permanently, of course. Um, so that, and also, which is a little bit of a lower spiritual state, but still extremely powerful, uh, states of opening of the third eye of the Ajna chakra, which means not so much a state of union with everything, but a state of understanding of everything, a state of seeing the texture of reality as it is, uh, beyond any illusion of separation.

So those states started happening for me. And, and that was. Something that, you know, while I’m not claiming to abide in those states right now, as I’m talking to you at all, but those, those states, those experiences change a human being forever. There is no going back from that. 

Giancarlo: So one is the state of Samadhi of.

transcendence, ego dissolution, like a mystical experience. And the other one, it’s a third eye opening. 

Raffaello: Yeah. A third eye opening. That was a very powerful one for me because it happened [00:51:00] through sexuality. How, what would you say is the 

Giancarlo: difference between Samadhi and third eye opening? 

Raffaello: For me, I experienced them as quite different.

So the, the crown chakra opening or Samadhi or however we want to call it is a state of mystical union where You know, the presence of the eye, the individual eye is forgotten and dissolved and abandoned into a stream of, I wouldn’t even say a stream of consciousness, but a stream of life. It’s just being one with life.

That’s it. 

Giancarlo: With source, with nothingness. 

Raffaello: Yeah. But to me it didn’t, I wouldn’t use nothingness, like for me it felt like everythingness, you know, just in, but it’s, it’s one and the same thing. But um, Third eyeopening, or with third eyeopening. What I felt was that I was an observer. So there was definitely, you know, still an element of separation between I as an observer and reality outside, or uh, external reality, let’s say, [00:52:00] or the object that’s more accurate actually, or the object of my observation.

But I was seeing the object of my observation, which was everything and anything around me. as true reality. So as patterns of light, as patterns of vibration, as patterns of sound, not as distinct objects labeled by the mind, but as a network, as a very intricate network of reflections and resonances and vibrations and light spinning and bouncing from here to there.

And so, you know, that’s still a separate, a slightly separated experience. There is a subject and an object, but it is an extremely profound experience of observing. And, you know, mind you, this is, as you can imagine, without any substances other than what the body naturally produces. And that wasn’t like a moment of a minute or two.

That was a state for that lasted for hours. Actually have an article on on my blog about that that I can put in the comments. [00:53:00] So that that can happen just through breathing. The conscious use of sexual energy because this state that I’m telling you about happened after some extended love making session with a friend.

Um, the third eye or the somad? The third eye. The third eye. 

Giancarlo: So, so just to see if I understand correctly, the somad is very clear. The third eye opening is like. The, the understanding and the physical experience of a different type of reality of a reality of interconnect, interconnect, necessary thing. 

Raffaello: I would say more it’s as it feels like to me, it’s not, you’re not feeling I’m experiencing a different kind of reality.

It’s the feeling of finally I see. reality. What’s around me as it is, you know, and I know, you know, sometimes with psychedelics is similar. Like there is this this idea that psychedelic substances are not making you see something different. They’re just opening the gates that [00:54:00] the filters that are normally filtering perceptions.

So similar to that in some way. 

Giancarlo: I was actually called the reduction, reduction value valves. 

Raffaello: Exactly. Exactly. But, but in this case with the third, I would also say that it’s clearly a physical experience of an eye. That’s why it’s called third eye quite clearly located in the middle of the forehead, somewhere halfway between the eyebrows and the, and the hairline, you know, and in the middle that opens and that I sees.

In a different way than the two eyes that are below. 

Giancarlo: In a non-dual way, in a non-dualistic way. The, 

Raffaello: well, the dualism of subject and object is still present to my, this is my experience. Yeah. So others might see it differently, but for example, the dual, the, the pairs of opposites that we are usually categorizing reality in like hot and cold.

Mm-hmm . Light and dark. Mm-hmm . Tall. And, and short. Short. 

Giancarlo: No, 

Raffaello: definitely [00:55:00] not. 

Giancarlo: I see. I see. So you start having this incredible experience. So you decided to go deeper and deeper and deeper in this Tantra practice. 

Raffaello: Yes, but because in the same time as my, at the same time as my spiritual experiences were deepening.

And so basically the system was working, you know, the system, the tools were working yet at the same time, my humanness or. You know, the part, both my ethical values and my more like human relational self was being challenged by, by, um, the community I was in. 

Giancarlo: What do you mean? 

Raffaello: Basically, you know, one way I can say it is that, Oh, I’m here doing this amazing practice.

The teachings are great. I love them. However, when I look at my teachers or at many of my fellow students, I don’t feel inspired on a human level by how [00:56:00] they carry themselves. I don’t feel always inspired. It’s not, you know, so I was having this conflict between my spiritual practitioner that was like, yes, this is amazing.

Let’s continue. And my human self, community self, and also ethical self that were starting to feel dissonance. Yes. In 

Giancarlo: Copenhagen. 

Raffaello: Yes. In Copenhagen. And so that, uh, conflict, that tension was with me actually from day one of my time, um, in that school, but then eventually became too much to bear and I had to choose.

It’s one of those moments of choice. You know, what do I choose? Do I choose to silence my, um, relational, ethical, human, emotional self and continue down the path that I’ve, that I’ve been on? Yeah. The opposite or or do I choose to abandon this path, which is very very painful You know like to abandon a spiritual path that’s working that’s giving you incredible fruits [00:57:00] But but I choose to follow my human heart that tells me it’s not here.

We need to go somewhere else. So that was a huge You know, tearing apart kind of moment for me. It happened with a lot of grief and a lot of doubt and a lot of self doubt. And I did choose to leave, obviously, because I wasn’t, I wouldn’t be here otherwise. But that plunged me into my second dark night of the soul.

Giancarlo: But just quick question. When you said that the community were not, it was not inspiring for you, you didn’t fully resonate with the way that, you know, we’re behaving, is it because there was a lack of integrity? 

Raffaello: You could say that, although I’m very, very hesitant to use the word integrity, because I feel that it sets up a standard and not even myself, you know, it’s like, Hey, we’re all human.

So I wasn’t so much in a, in a place of judging, you know, individuals for not being, you know, in integrity was more that the dynamics at play in a group of humans, you know, that are [00:58:00] altogether doing spiritual embodied. and also sexual practice. Uh, the dynamics, the group dynamics, the, the, yeah, the community level, but also, for example, the way that the roles were embodied, the role of teacher, the role of student, the role of advisor were not aligned with my sensitivity, 

Giancarlo: like how it was in the squad, for example.

Raffaello: Absolutely. 

Giancarlo: I see. 

Raffaello: Yes. 

Giancarlo: Okay. So with a heartbreak you leave and you go for the second life crisis. 

Raffaello: Yes. With the second heartbreak, which in some ways so much worse, right? Because one thing is a heartbreak. With a partner, like the, the, the breakup with a partner is terri, terri, can be terribly painful. But I have to say, the breakup with the spiritual path is, wow, it’s like that plunged me into like a really, really dark place.

It’s like a, I had terrible sense [00:59:00] of guilt, of regret, of remorse. And yet. I had to break up. I had to go, but it wasn’t an easy decision. So that’s 

Giancarlo: But you were not breaking up with a spiritual path. You were breaking up with a specific community. But you didn’t know that at the time. 

Raffaello: No. At that time, that for me felt like I’m giving up my tantra practice, my path.

I got my chance. I wasted it or, you know, I squandered it. That’s it. You know, from now on, it’s just depressive, normal life for me. No, I wouldn’t always have these kind of, you know, depressing thoughts, but it felt just as when you break up with a person that you love, you’re not going to think, Oh, there’s going to be someone else down the line.

I’m going to fall in. It feels absolute, you know, it feels like that’s it, the end of it. So that felt like that for me. So it was really desperate. And with that desperation came. Uh, something that I had never experienced before in, with such power, [01:00:00] which was a total loss of identity. When I asked myself, who am I, I didn’t have any answer.

Because I had attached so much of my highness to being a tantra practitioner and then a tantra teacher, ’cause I was a teacher as well, and et cetera, et cetera. And a man and a man and a good lover now. And a Tantra lover. And a yogi and also, and all of that crumbled. So I didn’t, I didn’t have an answer for that and I kept asking, and I felt like Alice is in Wonderland from the Disney adaptation of the book.

I don’t know if you’ve seen that. There is. So she enters the rabbit hole following the white rabbit and then she starts falling and falling and that fall is endless and so that’s what happened to me I started falling and that fall never stopped and to be honest to you it hasn’t stopped yet really it hasn’t stopped but but in the falling [01:01:00] after a while it took it took a year I realized that okay, I can fall and continue living, you know, and, and as, as far as 

Giancarlo: there’s no bottom 

Raffaello: as far as there is no bottom.

And as I’m falling, here’s a teacup that’s falling with me. At more or less the same speed, I might as well grab a cup of tea, you know, and then so on and so forth. But that was a complete alation of Myness. I know now that that was an incredible gift of grace. I’m so thankful that it happened to me and I’m so thankful that it didn’t kill me because it almost nearly did, but it was grace, but it didn’t feel like it, it didn’t feel like it at all.

It felt like I lost everything and there was nothing that I could ever, ever, ever be able to latch onto or hold onto again because anything I grabbed was falling too. 

Giancarlo: So where are we now? Geographically and, uh, And time [01:02:00] space. So you left Copenhagen, you felt, okay, you felt you’re like eternal falling. And where did you go?

Raffaello: First of all, I went to a 21 day intense Vipassana retreat, which was great and just made the falling even worse and even more, you know, absolute. And, um, And then I had a series of. You could say, well, help or a series of allies started manifesting both in the form of books and in the form of individuals and eventually in the form of a group, which is Easter that somehow was able, was able, or I was able to continue falling, but In, in a context that had a vocabulary that had a capacity to understand what was happening to me.

They couldn’t do anything for me. You cannot do anything for any, for someone that is in that state, but you can tell them, I know what it feels like. [01:03:00] I’ve been there. I’ll wait for you on the other side. And that’s what happened to me. And somehow that trigger the beginning of me rebuilding, not an identity, but a functional.

Self and a functional enough personality that I can go out and about with and that marked in some way the start of my dissension journey from the top of the mountain coming down to the valley and I’m still in it, you know, and being in relationship and marriage is a big part of it. It’s like coming down to the ordinary world, if you wish, or the ordinary state of consciousness, but knowing and having experienced in my body and in the whole of my being that there is no self, that there is no I.

And you know what? It’s an illusion. And we don’t need it. Life still happens. Food is still eaten. Sleep is still slept. [01:04:00] Love is still made, you know, but, uh, There’s no, no need or actually no reality to a one single central identity that can hold all of that together. So you could say, so who am I speaking right now to?

And, you know, I can say, speaking to me, if you wish, you can say you’re speaking to Rafa, but Rafa doesn’t believe in Rafa anymore. The way that. What we could call past Rafa did in whatever we want to call the past. 

Giancarlo: Amazing. But so let’s cover a little bit. He’s starting. It’s an important movement. Um, um, so what was your entrance with?

Um, so you went, you left come again. You went 21 days. We pass an hour. And then what was your next place? You went 

Raffaello: So at the time I was, uh, actually right before that, those events, I was facilitating my own workshop around Europe. It was called the network of love and it was very much based on my explorations of open relating and stuff like that, uh, [01:05:00] and embodiment.

And I had, um, facilitated that, that event in London and I had met someone from East Island. London. 

Giancarlo: My network of love was, um, solo. Um, one man show. One man show. It was your own, uh, distillation of practice. Yeah. Yeah. So you met an ISTA members in London. He says, come and do, come and do level one. 

Raffaello: And I said, no, thank you.

Giancarlo: Of course. 

Raffaello: So that, but, but, you know, but that seed was planted. And so one year after when I was in the midst of this, uh, falling, 

Giancarlo: falling, 

Raffaello: you know, I said, why not? I don’t know really what to do next. I had been to the Vipassana course and et cetera, et cetera. Oh, by the way, I had. Done my first experience with ayahuasca also in that time, uh, four ceremonies together had had a, you know, and I wouldn’t say it necessarily near death experience, but a really bad accident with a motorbike on, on Copangan where I fell down a cliff and, you know, so kind of a nice [01:06:00] brush with death.

I said, let’s go, let’s go do that. And yeah, You know, I, I went, it was in Guatemala, I went to Guatemala, I met the lead teacher of that, um, event, which was Bruce Lyon. And I think one of the first things I said to him was like, Hey, I’m here. And, you know, I know that there’s even been a proposal on the table that maybe I might become an ISTA teacher because ISTA has already kind of scouted me out.

But I have to tell you. I have no identity right now. You know, if you ask me to write a bio, I don’t know what to write. I can, I can leave it blank because everything I write is just complete bullshit. And he said, welcome to the club. And so I was like, okay, you know, this is This is a place where I can relate, where I can be, where I can be in what I am right now, which is nothing covered by some clothing and still breathe.

And that was the beginning of my journey with ISTA. [01:07:00] 

Giancarlo: Amazing. Amazing. We passed the hour. I don’t want to keep you too. I want to be respectful of your time, but, um, Um, you know, I think it’s that is, um, I think it’s an important movement. I feel that it’s helping so many people to find, um, to get comfortable with the falling maybe.

Uh, and, um, you know, I feel that, uh, sexual energy has been mistreated and also not just mistreated but abandoned by many people, especially longterm couple, you know, like it’s a joke with my friends. When I ask. you know, long term couple, you know, my friend from childhood, how do you deal with monogamy?

They would say things like like everybody else with food. And and and I for me, of course, pleasure is important, but it’s something about vitality. That comes with sexuality that it’s I think very important to to to preserve in life But so, [01:08:00] you know people might have heard about Istha, but so How would you what you know now you’re becoming a?

part of the council of the facilitator of Istha 

Raffaello: I, I am already. Yes. Yeah. 

Giancarlo: And so what is, um, what is this stuff for you? What, what do you think is this, you know, um, objective and function in society? How do you, can you describe it today? Can you describe how would you like this to evolve? Do you have an idea of what ISTA can be in 10, 20 years?

Raffaello: It’s a big one. Um, you know, it’s really not my intention to promote ISTA over, you know, over other paths or schools. It definitely worked for me. I’m in it 100%. What’s exciting about ISTA is that it is so far. A very spontaneous creation that happens through a number of [01:09:00] individuals, not, not through one, you know, charismatic leader, guru, leader that is giving the roadmap and the plan.

And um, in that sense, I would say that is, it is a pretty successful. experiment in group consciousness. So it’s really not again, I will, I will repeat myself. It is not, you know, this, um, amazing spiritual download coming from a channel through someone or even through two or three beings. Although those kinds of beings exist in ISTA, you know, we have all kinds of personalities and people.

Some of them Great channels, but it is more an experiment of emergent group consciousness in the field of embodied spirituality. And so what it does, it attracts people like, you know, like yourself, like it happened for you when there is a resonance and it may be for You know, everybody or not, you know, [01:10:00] and I think we absolutely need a diversity of paths and schools and groups.

But it’s that has become through this emergence process. It has become one of the leading voices in the field of embodied spirituality and conscious sexuality and sacred sexuality, as you know, and therefore it has a voice now. If you ask me, what’s the, what’s the end game, you know, what’s the plan? There is no plan like that, but it doesn’t mean that it is a chaotic organism.

It is just an organism, an organization that is doing its best. It’s not always easy to listen to the mystery at the core of it. And when I say mystery, I don’t mean something mysterious or something, you know, kind of like strange, but just that whenever you allow group consciousness to emerge. No single individual can define it.

You know, no single individual within ISTA can say, this is what we are. This is what we’re doing. This is our mission statement, because by definition, it is the [01:11:00] emergence of. group consciousness. So if you wish, you could say that, you know, if me and the others are the ants, uh, you know, so is that, is the ant hive and what is the desire, the objective, the, the end game of the ant hive.

Well, you know, as an ant, I can tell you that I feel aligned with it, that I know that it’s, it’s, it’s definitely around, you know, helping humanity wake up, we can agree on that, but it’s not for me to detail the ant hives plan. It’s, it’s a, it’s an, it’s a collective process and emergence and everybody who is.

You know, reasonably aware will feel it the moment they come close to East and they will feel whether it’s for them or not. And East and the sense is very permeable, you know, people join, go away. And, you know, there’s no sense of like belonging in a strong sense, but it is exciting. And I don’t think it’s the only group at all in on [01:12:00] earth that is experimenting with group consciousness, uh, driving the process versus.

Powerful, charismatic individuals taking the decisions for, for everybody. 

Giancarlo: Great. Thank you very much. Thank you. And of course, the best way for people to understand what ISTA is, is just to do level one. 

Raffaello: Yeah, just come do level one. You know, there is no commitment after that, of course, or after any of the ISTA trainings, it’s an experience that people can bring back to their lives and never, you know, never open that book again.

Or for some, it can become more part of their everyday practice and community and So there is absolutely a lot of openness for that. And whoever is curious can just come. Yes. 

Giancarlo: So you can check online. He started life and, um, you know, people are concerned about sexuality and, and, and, and, you know, there is from my experience was that.

You know, there was like, what, six [01:13:00] days of, of, of, of classes. There was maybe three, four workshops, three, four exercise per day. I would say out of, you know, 25 exercise, one was dealing with sexual energy is most about, you know, boundaries and consent. And, and, and, and really it’s a, it’s a, it’s a group therapy.

It’s, it’s, it’s personal transformation. So, um, thank you very much. It was a pleasure to have you here today. And it was a pleasure to have you at our first Pondsight Token Debate that we will also publish on Mango TV. And I totally accept your offer to help me curating future Pondsight Token Debate. I love our idea that came out here to explore more politics and spirit.

Um, I hope you’re gonna come to Ibiza longer and longer. And, uh, thank you so much. 

Raffaello: Thank you Giancarlo. It’s always great to speak to you and I hope to see you [01:14:00] soon.