The Nine Lamps

The Nine Lamps is not a doctrine but a living, evolving framework. It is designed to be both generative and iterative — a model that grows alongside those who engage with it. Rooted in universal principles, it honors the vast diversity of human spirituality while remaining open to new wisdom, new traditions, and new voices.

Spirituality, like ecology, is dynamic and relational. Each of us encounters it through our own histories, cultures, and lived experience. To honor that truth, the Nine Lamps integrates feedback loops — ongoing dialogue, reflection, and adaptation — so that it remains responsive rather than rigid, expansive rather than exclusive.

This model is not about prescribing belief. It is about creating shared ground where curiosity, connection, and transformation can flourish.

Each Lamp illuminates a principle that shows up across cultures and spiritual traditions. They are not meant as absolutes but as guiding lights — open to interpretation, woven into each person’s journey in unique ways.

• Self-Discovery: Invites us to turn inward with compassion, to know ourselves more deeply, and to align with our values. 
• Connection: Celebrates our interdependence, honoring community, relationships, and the sacred bonds with all of life.
• Growth: Reminds us that transformation is cyclical — every challenge contains the possibility of renewal.
• Inclusivity: Holds diversity within unity, honoring difference while fostering respect, equity, and belonging.
• Healing: Points to restoration, resilience, and the return to wholeness — for individuals and for communities.
• Learning: Keeps curiosity alive, reminding us that wisdom is gathered not only through study but through experience and reflection.
• Fun: Lifts up play, laughter, and delight as vital spiritual practices that nourish the soul.
• Organization: Illuminates harmony, structure, and collective balance, helping us create systems that support thriving.
• Safety: Offers refuge, cultivating spaces of trust where authenticity and vulnerability can take root.
   

The Nine Lamps is a shared framework, but it is never finished. It evolves with every story, every insight, and every cultural wisdom that is brought into its light. In this way, it reflects the truth that spirituality is not static — it is relational, iterative, and alive.

We invite you to step into this conversation, to share your reflections, and to help us expand the Lamps into an even more vibrant tapestry of human wisdom.

I’m Sher Griffin, a co-founder of The Compassion Collective and architect of the Nine Lamps. This work emerges from my own journey of transformation and from years of exploring how diverse spiritual perspectives can weave together without erasure. My hope is that the Nine Lamps offers not just a model, but a meeting place — one where your voice and lived experience become part of the whole.