No, we are not asking anyone to change their religious or spiritual identities. Our aim is to create space for each of us, however we currently identify (whether we have a particular religious heritage or none at all), to discover how the contemplative, mystical streams of other wisdom traditions and religions might serve each of us in the process of deepening our compassionate interconnection with our deepest selves, others, the cosmos, and Source / Consciousness / the Divine. Other heritages can be sources of wisdom and insight in addition to whatever tradition we may identify with.

• The contemplative practices of different traditions offer wisdom for cultivating a compassionate and connected life, and can be of benefit even when we do not  embrace any particular belief system. 
  
  
• Table Collective sees spirituality as an essential element of our humanity: when we seek to be attentive to the moment, when we seek to make sense of suffering, when we care for others, when we experience creative flow, when we send love and compassion, and we seek to make sense of what matters in this life. These are all spiritual practices. Whether we have extensive history with any particular religious tradition or not, all of us are spiritual.

There are many reasons not to like organized religion! Some of us grew up with first-hand experience of ways it goes awry. But even for those whose experiences are more positive, it is not difficult to see the ways religion can and has functioned negatively in the world. Thus we seek to draw from the good and the beautiful in the various religious and spiritual expressions of the world, without advocating specific beliefs, or policing personal morality, or forcing decisions about which path may be the right one, etc.

• Interspirituality is not a religious tradition in itself. We are not seeking to “blend” religions into one, or reduce them down to a few elements they might all agree upon. It is an approach to exploring ways that even the very real differences among religious heritages have value and need to be received.
• It is different than interfaith dialogue, which is respectful of different heritages, and seeks to understand them from a doctrinal perspective (and thus can result in doctrinal impasses), but does not learn from other heritages with an aim of exploring how they might help us in our own spiritual journey.
• Interspirituality is not focused on belief statements, but on finding ways to share in the practices of different heritages which have served adherents of those religious traditions in the cultivation of their spiritual experience and wisdom.
• Our approach then is to explore how different practices might enable us to continue to be formed towards letting go of ourselves to live compassionately, creatively, and freely. In this way, it may contribute toward deeper ways of discovering for ourselves “the shared mystic heart beating in the center of the world’s deepest spiritual traditions” (Teasdale, The Mystic Heart).

• A core element in Table Collective’s way of seeing humanity is that all of us are inherently creative, not only those that we have come to refer to as “artists.” We may have different ways or areas of life where that is most clearly seen, because creativity can be expressed in any walk of life. 
• Although creativity is inherent to our nature as human beings, we may have to take steps to intentionally rediscover our creativity, imagination, and the ability to trust our intuition. You may not be ready yet to share something at an art share, but we offer many ways to find fresh inspiration and get started.

• Table Collective in no way encourages or condones cultural appropriation. We understand appropriation to mean the superficial adoption of aspects of one culture or identity by members of another culture or identity in a manner that serves our own agendas without allowing ourselves to be transformed. This includes religious aspects of other cultures.
• Therefore, our approach to other heritages aims to ensure that we do not simply skim the surface and strip practices and ways of seeing from their historically rooted traditions and ways of seeing. 
• No one should engage in learning other practices in ways that serve our egos or prop up shallow images of our own spiritual sophistication.
• However, we also do not think it honors other heritages if we do not seek to learn from them, and to not only respect but also experience what other traditions have to offer. There are deep, true, valuable, beautiful practices and ways of seeing the world in every heritage, things valuable not only for some people, but for all people. They may emerge in specific cultural contexts, which we honor, but what they reveal about humanity, the cosmos, the Real, is for everyone.
• Thus, our aim is not appropriation, nor is it mere appreciation, but instead our aim is to foster a respectful desire to learn and experience what other heritages have to offer the world, so that we can grow and be transformed, all of us.