I have a new toy!
I just discovered my Enneagram type last night, and can't get enough of it now. I'm watching all these videos and stunned how deeply it "sees" me. Kind of creepy, but also very ego gratifying, 'cause what ego doesn't want to hear all about itself? (from the privacy of anonymously watching a video alone in one's living room, of course)
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A Little Basics
Now obviously I'm nothing remotely in the vicinity of an Enneagram expert, not now or ever. But if you know absolutely nothing about it, I at least know more than you. In that spirit, let me share the basics with you.
The genesis seems to be among spiritual devotees long ago. The types were created to better understand the obstacles different people faced when trying to achieve spiritual progress. Turns out there are 27 different habitual patterns of how humans resist allowing their true self to shine through. These are sometimes thought of as trance states.
The basic idea behind these trances is that even if we realize we're doing it and that it is having less than desirable effects, we find it hard/impossible to break out of the pattern. These are habitual ways of relating to life that prevent us from being present with what is real in the moment, both real outside us and also real within our authentic, healthy response that is inaccessible.
So once you know your type, you know how to catch yourself relating from the trance rather than being authentic and free. This knowledge creates an opening in which growth has a chance to happen.
You learn your primary type (your core personality), your wing (the flavor from neighboring personalities), how your personality manifests when you're under extreme stress, and how your personality manifests when you're fully at ease and feeling good.
Once you now the primary type, the others follow automatically from there. So you only need to learn one and then figure out which of the 2 wings of it better fits you. It's possible that both wings fit you equally, hence 9 primary types offer 27 possible personality makeups.
The Good and The Bad
I'm not going to give away my type in this post, but suffice to say that when I got it the impact on me was pretty intense. Watching these videos, some parts actually made me cry. I could see patterns that I hadn't quite been conscious of previously, and also the suffering those patterns cause me. I could also see how powerless I'd always felt in being free of those patterns.
There is a lot of suffering we all cause ourselves, no matter what our type is. Though there are elements of many types that will resonate for a given person, when you find your core type, it hits hard when you hear the downside, and feels like a "finally someone said it!" when you hear the upside. The upside sounds like someone who accurately gets reality (your experience of reality at least), whereas the downside sounds like all your pains spoken clearly.
All of us have upsides and downsides to our personalities. The key is to become self-aware, so that we can begin to neutralize the downside and benefit more from the upside.
Those of you who have followed me for a while know that a few times I've spoken about a time when I had this satori experience (temporary spiritual enlightenment) in which I could heal people by looking at them. This went on for several weeks!
It took me many years to understand what had happened (and to stop trying to regain it), but finally what I understood was that I embodied the knowing of their perfection so powerfully that my knowing of their perfection "overwrote" their belief in their illness. They instantly then became "perfect." Their belief in their imperfection was like an aura around them that then disappeared, leaving only perfection behind.
Well turns out, that pretty much is the enlightened aspect of my Enneagram type! That's why my enlightenment looks like that. My core issue is feeling like the world is unacceptably fucked up. Knowing it as perfect is the completely healed state for me. That knowing pretty much solves all the problems I create for myself, and apparently makes me a healing force in the lives of others too.
(Those who already know the Enneagram, probably know my type by now, but I appreciate your not sharing it in the comments if you do.)
Mis-Typing
As a side note, I heard of the Ennegram many years ago when I was in grad school. I say I only just got my type last night because I mis-identified my type back then.
Remember that type we go to when under extreme stress? Well my entire life was lived in that traumatized state back then. As such, I identified with that "disintegrated" type as my primary type.
I think that's why the Enneagram never interested me as having something valuable for me. Whenever I'd come across it over the years, I would pay attention to the info for that type, but it wasn't helping me because it wasn't my type.
Now that I have a happy life, I can see what my type really is quite clearly. My baseline that I most effortlessly gravitate to from day to day is definitely my newly identified type. And I can clearly see how my life during the bad times was very much like the point of disintegration for this type. I also see that when I am absolutely at my best my personality becomes just like it says my type would move to in that situation. It really fits me to a T.
So yeah, now fascinated by this!
If you've heard of the Enneagram over the years, but never really jibed with it, consider that you too may have simply not found your core type yet.
Or maybe you just aren't that introspective, so really don't care about this personality stuff regardless. 😁
(All text and images (except the AT logo) are by the author, unless otherwise credited. This is original content, created expressly for HIVE.)
Yeeeesssss we all know haha - just kidding. But it's fine. Everyone is beutiful and powerful the ways it is.
I think it is a very useful tool to start or reinforce the path of self-knowledge.
Like many other tools, it is not a question of fixed rules but rather of general brushstrokes that allow us to represent outside what happens to us inside and in that sense to understand ourselves a little more.
It is also a very beautiful way of understanding others. If we can identify - without judging or tagging, the enneatype of the people around us, we will be able to communicate more effectively and harmoniously. Because - as you have probably already discovered, not all proposed personalities react equally to the same triggers.
This is a subject I am deeply passionate about because it not only allows me to get to know myself, but also my environment and thus to be more receptive, compassionate and tolerant.
(It even works for the creation of characters and stories!)
This is super interesting!!! I've been studying it for a while and I'm still not sure on what my enneatype is haha. But I've never thought that maybe it is because I'm identifing myself with my disconected form. It's a good point though, from there I can do the work "in reverse" haha.
Thank you for bring this amazing topic! And good luck in your journey ❤️
!ENGAGE 50
Appreciate this comment so much. To think that people don't bother or care! I love this perspective. To know yourself is to know others too, right? We are all interconnected, so it makes sense that by diving feel into this realm, we can have a better relationship with ourselves and world.
Yeeees!!! You're right. We must use every tool we find handy! ♥️ Thankssssssssss
Wow, thanks so much for your thoughtful comment. You clearly know much more about it than me. Glad to hear my post offered you something valuable as well.
ENGAGEtokens.@tipu curate
Upvoted 👌 (Mana: 0/32)
Thank you! And great to see your name pop up, old friend.
You're welcome. Thanks. ☺
In some ways that feels like Chiron to me, not that I'm an expert, just my intuitive reaction..like our deepest wound is our deepest potential strength.
I LOVE personality stuff - self study helps me heal in so many ways. Those bloody patterns! Once you understand them they are easier to break. Yet, we have GOOD patterns too. Been working a little with @drrune and his rune and astral chart readings if you are interested. He s very good!
Going to check out this 'gram.. Looks amazing!
I'll have to check @drrune out. I've heard of Chiron before, but am not familiar with his content. He's channeled I think, like Bashar and Abraham?
Yes, I think so often the deepest wound shows the path to where our greatest strength lies. We have to really take good care of ourselves so that we have access to that part of who we can be. Otherwise we tend to move to our area of disintegration, where I lived too much of my life.
Oh!!! I was commenting to my hubby @Acurewa about your most recent posts - the Buddha as a Community and This one! - and he asked if you, perhaps, have studied The Fourth Way by Ouspensky and Gurdjief? (I had to Google the latter name 😅)
You got me excited and this is synchronicity as its finest as I had been thinking, the past few weeks, about that "Asleep" state of mind that just gets me OUT of this plane. And how could I remain HERE. And if I'm trying to run away or if it REALLY is some kind of wall or veil that prevents me from living. Mindblowing.
I have already opened some tabs on my Browser to find out some information about MY Eneagram type. It kind of reminded me about the Kin Maya - have you read about that?
I'm not familiar with the people/schools of thought you mentioned. Have only the slightest knowledge of enneagram at this point, but very interested in learning more. I'm so glad to read your thoughtful comment though. Glad to follow you.
Hello, hello! Well, according to Wikipedia: "The Enneagram of Personality originates from the mapping of nine "ego fixations" on the enneagram by Oscar Ichazo. A book published in 2017, "The Enneagram: Living and Dead" by Plavan N. Go, attempts to verify it from the viewpoint of Gurdjieff's theories, showing the relevance of the nine personality types and their mapping on the enneagram based on the interpretation of the enneagram according to the Law of Three, the logic of three into four (O+C+N > H), and the Law of Seven."
Gurdjieff and later his disciple Ouspenski spoke about three main ways in the path of knowledge: The Fakir, the path of the body. The Monk, the path of faith and the feelings. And finally the Yogi, the path of the mind. The say that to peruse these ways one has to retire from the world, being impractical and mostly impossible for the common person.
But they also say this: that human evolution is not a natural process, that immortality is not something granted we get automatically. To evolve from this human state forward we have to work simultaneously on the mind, the feelings and the body. And thus the Fourth way, in which one work on oneself simultaneously on the mind, the feelings and the body with guidance from a master. With no retirement from society required, this way is apt for the common people.
!ENGAGE 25
TYVM!
ENGAGEtokens.Fascinating! Thanks so much.