Core Principles


  • Our primary need is to find meaning and purpose in our lives. We are all already doing that, though not always consciously. The search for meaning and purpose is fundamental to humanity, more so than even the biological drive.

  • This drive is implanted so deeply within us because life is genuinely meaningful. There are real answers to our most challenging questions, as well as ways of fulfilling our deepest needs, and they can be found primarily through spiritual pursuits and practices. In this sense, everyone is on a spiritual path.

  • The world’s major religions all share a deep core of truth. There is a transcendent unity to all religious belief. While religions may appear to disagree with one another on the surface, at their deepest level, they are in complete harmony.

  • There is a difference between religion and spirituality; one can be spiritual without being religious.

  • Every religion or philosophy is a vehicle that can help take us towards (or sometimes away from) truth, but is not that truth itself. No religion, philosophy, or creed is complete. Each is only a partial expression of a reality far beyond the ability of our language to describe and our symbols to represent.

  • Religious, philosophical, political, and social tolerance is essential because of this and because tolerance is the only solution to humanity’s problems. The true guardians of any path are its mystics, saints, and sages—not its priests, ministers, or organizational leaders.

  • Truth can only be discovered through practice. We cannot reason our way to truth or comprehend it merely through the intellect. The only way to discover spiritual truth is to practice it yourself. Others cannot do your spiritual work for you.

  • There is no disharmony between science and religion. Religion at its best is scientific in the sense that we can test any spiritual claims in the laboratory of our own hearts.

  • “Belief” is unnecessary. Truth can be experienced and known directly.

  • Spiritual teachers are important in that they can help you learn, understand, and experience spiritual truth more quickly. None of us go far without at least some help. True teachers, however, never claim that they can take your journey for you or try to make you dependent on them. A true teacher helps you to experience truth yourself.