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- Herausgeber: IVP Formatio
- Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019
The Enneagram opens a remarkable window into the truth about us, enabling us to see how image, wounds, lies, triggers, and default responses shape us every bit as much as our faith. But simply diagnosing our number doesn't do justice to who we are. Nor does it necessarily change us or our relationships. Transformation happens as we grow in awareness and learn how to engage and reflect God's image. And relational repair then results as we apply Enneagram insights to the rhythms and grooves of our ordinary daily lives.For those who have learned about the Enneagram and wonder "What's next?"—this handbook is the answer. Filled with exercises to engage, challenge, encourage, and sustain, Spiritual Rhythms for the Enneagram will help us grow in greater awareness and lead us to spiritual and relational transformation.Including new insight on the Enneagram and the Harmony Triads, and offering helpful "Soul Resources" in the appendix, this handbook can be used by individuals or groups.
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Thank you to the Enneagram teachers who have mentored us and generously shared their wisdom with us, and to the courageous souls who attend our workshops and then do the work that brings harmony to their lives and this world.
This book is our response to the question, “I know my number. What do I do now?”
CONTENTS
Foreword
Jerome Wagner
WHEN I FIRST LEARNED THE ENNEAGRAM from Father Robert Ochs, SJ, while studying theology in the early ’70s, there was nothing written about the Enneagram. We only had mimeographed handouts. When I did my dissertation research in psychology on the Enneagram, there was still nothing written about it. Because it was passed on through oral tradition, I suggested to my dissertation committee that I list phone numbers in place of a bibliography. Surprisingly, they failed to see the humor in that suggestion. Now, in 2018, there are a plethora of Enneagram books and resources available in the market and through the internet. Apparently, there have been no thoughts about the Enneagram that have not been transcribed or recorded.
And so you ask: Do we really need another Enneagram book on our bookshelves? And I would answer, Yes—this one! It adds material and insights that other books don’t have. Is the Enneagram a fossilized framework etched in stone to be passed on dogmatically as is? Or is it a living system that can grow and develop with additional accretions and insights? I think the latter is the case.
For example, in my early courses on the Enneagram, we didn’t consider the Harmony Triads. While not unique to this book, these thoughtful connections are elaborated and vividly presented here. Combined with the three centers—physical or gut (GQ), emotional (EQ), and intellectual (IQ)—the Harmony Triads are quite useful additions for understanding our own style, favored center, and connection to styles in other centers. It’s a very helpful integrative approach.
Also, people ask: Now that I know my type, what do I do with it (or myself)? After reading Spiritual Rhythms for the Enneagram, you will know. There are numerous reflection questions to help you further your knowledge of yourself and your style, along with suggestions about how to apply this knowledge to your personal transformation.
I’ve had the honor of having Adele and Doug Calhoun and Clare and Scott Loughrige as participants in my Enneagram Spectrum Training and Certification Program. These authors, ministers, and spiritual directors take their place in a long line of spiritual guides. They incorporate the insights and practices of Evagrius Ponticus, the fourth-century desert father and spiritual director; Ramon Llull, the twelfth-century Franciscan theologian who endeavored to integrate Christianity, Judaism, and Islam in a comprehensive Enneagram-like figure; and Ignatius of Loyola, the fifteenth-century founder of the Society of Jesus and a renowned retreat director.
Spiritual Rhythms for the Enneagram is a very creative and comprehensive presentation of this system with an easy blending of psychology and spirituality. Karl Popper, the philosopher of science, said the highest status that a scientific theory can attain is not yet disconfirmed. So the latest theories about the Enneagram will be replaced by more adequate theories. Apparently science (and the Enneagram) require humility. That’s what a community of knowers is all about. We share our insights with the community; they reflect on them and test them against their experience, contributing their reflections and conclusions; and thus wisdom grows. Adele, Doug, Clare, and Scott have given us much to think about and profit from. We will all benefit from their diligent work.
Introduction
You’ve Got Harmony
With God’s help, I shall become myself.
SOREN KIERKEGAARD
THE ENNEAGRAM OPENS YOU to an extraordinary view to the truth about you. It can help you recognize your unique melody as well as where you are off-key internally and relationally. The Enneagram reveals your tempos, soloist agendas, and dedication to your “playlist.” Still, discovering the truth of your number can never encompass who you are. Nor does it automatically change you or your relationships. Relational repairs and healthy interactions take intention and attention. Enneagram insights have to be applied to the rhythms and grooves of ordinary daily lives to bring transformation and harmony.
The Enneagram comforts and discomforts. It names how we default and defend ourselves from truth—especially truth about ourselves! Jesus continually struggled with people who were closed to new truth about God and themselves. During his last hours with his followers, Jesus said, “I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear” (John 16:12). Jesus’ friends just weren’t prepared to hear truth that contradicted their agendas and self-understanding. Two thousand years later, we are no more prepared to bear and practice truth than Jesus’ disciples were.
For us personally, God graciously used the Enneagram in our lives to get around our defenses and blind spots so we could practice truth. The Enneagram revealed the reality of our inner discord and its effect on others. Knowing our Enneagram number gave us eyes to see how image, wounds, lies, triggers, and default responses shaped us every bit as much as our faith. Yet, recognizing our number was just the beginning of a journey that is changing us and our ability to love God and neighbor as we love ourselves.
At Enneagram training events, people often ask, “What do I do now that I know my number?” Spiritual Rhythms for the Enneagram is our answer to that question. Each chapter invites you to search through the stories of every number to find yourself and learn empathy for others. We offer spiritual practices that create space to develop new patterns of relating with God, yourself, and others. Our desire is for you to partner with the Spirit of Truth in doing the work that helps you live into the glorious person God created you to be. Dig in and grapple with the beautiful and uncomfortable truth that can set you free. You are more than your Enneagram type.
HOW WE LEARNED THE TRUTH ABOUT OURSELVES
Jalaluddin Rumi asked, “Why do you stay in prison when the door is so wide open?” Truth can be hard to bear. It can take time . . . especially if it is about you! Each of us can vouch for our own resistance to truth.
Authors Doug and Adele have served together in ministry for decades. They have read their Bibles, prayed, counseled, mentored, preached, and taught others “truth.” Yet for years, Adele couldn’t get Doug to see how his clenched jaw, harsh tone, and steely eyes leaked anger. And he couldn’t convince her that she interrupted a lot. They both resisted the other’s perspective. Even though Doug knows and loves Adele better than anyone else, she discounted what he said with three easily accessed defenses: “I do not interrupt (denial). I like to jump into conversations and take part (rationalization). You can speak up if you want to (blame).” Adele simply didn’t want to change the fantasy in her mind that she was a great listener. Doug also patently denied that anger was part of his story. After all, he never raised his voice or hit anyone! How could he be angry? We both recognized the disharmony in our relationship, but we were oblivious and unwilling to bear inconvenient truths that could bring harmony.
More than twenty-five years ago, authors Clare and Scott planted a nondenominational, charismatic church. As young senior pastors, they dedicated themselves to teaching people how to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind” (Luke 10:27). Clare was definitely driven and all in. She recalls her rationale at the time this way: “I am wired to move, motivate, and activate. I’d automatically seize the day, move things forward, and ask questions later. I’d say, ‘We’re made for this!,’ and ‘Let’s just do it.’ I was blind to how my passion fueled overwork and impatience.”
Scott, on the other hand, was wired to slow things (and Clare) down. He could moderate, regulate, calculate, and frustrate Clare. He would say, “Hang on, let’s not rush into anything; let’s make this work for everybody.” This slow-it-down energy could default into peace-at-any-price or I-will-not-be-moved leadership. Running on automatic, we each lived our own version of sheer youthful enthusiasm, which kept fantasies intact and uncomfortable truths at bay.
For the four of us, the Enneagram opened a new way to live. Writing together allowed us to blend four voices of varied timbre, experience, and expertise. We let go of soloing on our Enneagram number and synchronized the intelligence of Adele’s Four, Scott’s Nine, Doug’s One, and Clare’s Three. This led to a creative, mediating, reforming, and effective four-part harmony—which, as it happens, is at the heart of the Enneagram approach we want to share with you.
Clare is the visionary who recognized the connections between theologians Ignatius of Loyola, Evagrius Ponticus, and Ramon Llull, and articulated this expression of the Harmony Triads with Ignatian spirituality (more on that later). She and Scott offer an accredited, certification training for learning the Enneagram with Harmony. Doug and Adele are experienced pastors and spiritual directors who offer training in spiritual practices, the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises, the Enneagram, and the Enneagram with Harmony. They are thought partners in developing and cowriting the material in this book. Scott, Clare, Doug, and Adele employ Harmony Triad principles in their work with individuals, organizations, and in leadership development.
HEAD, HEART, AND GUT INTELLIGENCE
Intriguing current research suggests human beings are created with head, heart, and gut intelligence. Your gut and heart each have a vast neural network just like your brain. In fact, your gut and your heart can “know” things before your brain does. We call the three intelligences IQ (Head Intelligence), EQ (Emotional/Heart Intelligence), and GQ (Gut Intelligence). In the therapeutic community the term Emotional Intelligence (EQ) generally includes the capacity to notice, control, and express your emotions in judicious and empathetic ways. Here, we use EQ to describe the intelligence of the Heart Triad as the capacity to feel and take cues for relating from the responses of others.
We believe the intelligences of IQ, EQ, and GQ line up with the way you were designed. You were created to love God, neighbor, and self with all your heart effect, gut strength, and mind thoughts. Loving is the most difficult spiritual work any of us have to do. Loving is intensely practical work that ripples out and affects neighbors near and far.
The Enneagram reveals that each Enneagram Triad has a preferred way of relating in the world. Numbers Five, Six, and Seven trust their head intelligence. Numbers Two, Three, and Four trust their heart intuitions. Numbers Eight, Nine, and One trust their gut instincts. Yet nature, nurture, and trauma can shut down one or more of these intelligences, so we continually solo on one default intelligence. When that happens, we undernourish or dismiss parts of ourselves that can bring harmony.
THE TRIADS
Figure 1. The Harmony Triads, detailing the three Enneagram intelligences and their numbers
When each Enneagram number learns to integrate head curiosity, heart emotions, and gut instincts, we respond to love and work in richer, healthier, and more harmonious ways. The Enneagram invites you to investigate the discord that puts you out of tune. It suggests that to experience the music of life in its fullness, you need to trust something besides your solo part.
Harmonious relationships aren’t a result of everyone seeing things “my way” or doing things “my way.” Harmony comes from trusting that the head and the gut enrich what the heart brings. Still, some of you trust one of these intelligences more than the others. As you look at the head, heart, and gut triads (fig. 1), which one do you favor?
A humble knowledge of thyself is a surer way to God than a deep search after learning.
THOMAS À KEMPIS
Head Triad
IQ people protect themselves from the vulnerability of heart feelings by moving into their heads. They engage the world through mental activity, knowledge, and planning for contingencies. They trust reason and brain power, dismissing heart people as lightweights and gut people as reactionary.
Heart Triad
EQ people trust heart connection more than anything else. They rely on feelings and relationships to guide them. When connection breaks, they feel distressed and do things to regain affection and approval. They may also dismiss gut reactions as too judgmental and find head people unfeeling.
Gut Triad
GQ people react instinctively. They know in their gut whether they like someone or if something is good or bad. Trusting their gut more than anything or anyone else makes it easy to jump in or pull away without a second thought. In the heat of the moment, gut people can judge head people for their slow deliberations and heart people as too concerned about what people think.
Harmony in relationships depends on integrating and appreciating our head, heart, and gut.
TRADITIONAL ENNEAGRAM THEORY
While traditional Enneagram theory is built on these three centers of intelligence, it doesn’t provide ways for every number to access them. Looking at the traditional Enneagram diagram (fig. 2), with arrows indicating directions of disintegration and integration, you’ll notice that the arrows do not connect every number to head, heart, and gut. Numbers Two, Four, Five, and Seven access only two types of triad intelligence rather than three. Five and Seven are two-headed and without a heart. Two and Four are two-hearted and without a head.
Figure 2. The Traditional Enneagram
THE HARMONY ENNEAGRAM
To address this issue, the Harmony Enneagram (fig. 3) reimagines the connecting lines to create three balanced triangles: Eight, Two, and Five; Nine, Three, and Six; and One, Four, and Seven. The Harmony Enneagram takes the music of your automatic intelligence—be it head intelligence (numbers Five, Six, Seven), heart intelligence (numbers Two, Three, Four), or gut intelligence (numbers Eight, Nine, One)—and integrates the voices of the other two intelligences.
Figure 3. The Harmony Enneagram
Every number is connected to two other intelligences, even if you have dismissed or don’t trust one or both of them. Integrating gut, heart, and head creates capacity to see and respond with more than your single center of intelligence.
Drawing on the harmonies of your head, heart, and gut triad can create new, life-giving neural pathways that override habitual default reactions. In the face of decisions and interactions, take a moment to notice:
▶ What does your head (IQ) think?
▶ What does your heart (EQ) feel?
▶ What does your gut instinct (GQ) know?
▶ What harmony comes from these three ways of knowing?
Practicing awareness of your IQ, EQ, and GQ can develop new patterns of knowing and loving. When you are stuck in a single number and default way of knowing, you push your way of seeing the world onto others. If they resist your view, you get triggered and try to control and coerce reality to fit your agenda. When you do that, you end up on your edge—you quite literally fall away from your God-given center to the edginess of your ego.
Figure 4. Virtues and Vices
The virtues and vices diagram (fig. 4) shows that when you are centered, you have access to nine virtues—virtues found in God. Out on the edge, you are stuck in a single type and are far away from the center and every other number. Harmony Triads move you from your edgy addiction to a single way of knowing and being toward integration and the ability to receive reality as it is. It offers each number a way to return to your true, centered self by accessing head, heart, and gut intelligences. As you integrate your harmony numbers, you learn to love God, self, and others with all your head, heart, and gut strength.
David Daniels, a Stanford psychiatrist and founding member of the International Enneagram Association, states, “Just ‘studying’ the Enneagram is not enough to create transformative personal change. . . . In order for us to actually experience personal growth, it’s necessary to interweave consistent and dedicated ‘practice’—process—with the study of great content. . . . The Enneagram of Harmony Triads are the key to development.”
Figure 5. Balanced Intelligence
Our Harmony Triad (fig. 5) gives each Enneagram type a name that integrates their three centers of intelligence. It is a vision of what wholeness and freedom can look like for you.
HISTORICAL HARMONIZERS
Where did the Harmony Enneagram come from? Our Enneagram teachers, mentors, and friends span sacred, secular, and psychological approaches. We are deeply grateful for their wisdom and insights. We root our understanding of Harmony intelligence in Evagrius Ponticus (AD 345-399), Ramon Llull (1232-1315), and Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556). These men wrote of spiritual solutions that address our blindness and addiction to self. They cared that people discern their call and purpose. To do that meant learning to distinguish when they were following God’s Spirit and when their actions were ego driven. We believe their combined insights are useful to all who seek self-awareness and desire to love with all of who they are.
TRANSFORMATION AND HARMONY
God is the original harmony of three in one. This divine chorus of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit exists in an eternal concert of giving and receiving, honoring and loving. And you are designed for harmony in this concert too! The breathtaking good news is that your vulnerabilities, brokenness, mistakes, and addiction-to-self are real-time opportunities to practice harmony.
We all say things we wish we hadn’t said. We don’t do things we intend to do. We sow discord when we want to create harmony. Dallas Willard wrote, “Projects of personal transformation rarely if ever succeed by accident, drift, or imposition.” Transformation depends on attention and intention. We have to make space in our lives for the Spirit of Truth to transform us through our sin.
How do we do this? How do we know if we are beautiful, competent, successful, or strong? Are we the story we tell ourselves? Are we who others say we are? Does our best or worst day determine the truth of us? Few of us wake up in the morning and decide to torpedo our relationships and spread disharmony. But who are we when we do that? Are we who we think we are? Are we who our hearts feel we are? Are we who our gut instincts shout we are?
How do we keep becoming ourselves as God intended and harmonize internal voices and outer relationships? Jesus might answer, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ . . . [And] ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:30-31).
What matters most is being open, vulnerable, and able to connect with others using your IQ, EQ, and GQ. Jesus knew how to do this. He practiced loving God, friends, and enemies with every fiber of his being using his head, heart, and gut. His emotional intelligence (EQ) overflowed with compassion and love. His wisdom (IQ) confounded and brought truth. His deep gut strength (GQ) wasn’t afraid to feel pain and sacrifice for love. Jesus gave his life to create harmony and love between us all.
Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.
MAHATMA GANDHI
We who are made in the image of God are meant to use our three intelligences just as Jesus did. Sometimes we are nurtured in ways that naturally help us unfold, open, and love with heart, mind, and gut strength. When this happens, our brains create neural pathways to our prefrontal cortex where love, joy, gentleness, connection, and more originate. Sometimes the opposite happens: we are turned out of people’s hearts and betrayed in ways that trigger our amygdala (the brain’s seat of emotional reactions). The amygdala protects us by downloading a slew of chemicals, creating neural pathways that automatically defend. We pack our vulnerability away. We close rather than open. We fight, we flee, or we freeze. The neural pathways we need to give and receive love don’t develop.
HISTORICAL CONNECTIONS
EVAGRIUS PONTICUS
This early church father provided guidance on how to move from the old sin nature to the new Christ-in-me nature. Evagrius was a theologian, philosopher, contemplative, and scientist. He believed the spiritual life could be advanced by understanding Pythagorean mathematics and astronomy. He used numbers to express the orderliness of creation. Evagrius recognized patterns that sabotage the ability to love God and neighbor. These patterns include eight or nine signature sin motivations or energies, such as intemperance, pride, deceit, envy, avarice, fear, gluttony, lust, and sloth. You will recognize these “vices” in the Enneagram.
RAMON LLULL
This twelfth-century Franciscan theologian developed diagrams of three overlapping triangles to explain how to move from vice to virtue (see fig. 6). His diagrams are prototypes for our Harmony Triads. They align with Evagrius’s understanding of signature sins as well as Ignatius’s Exercises for Spiritual Discernment.
IGNATIUS OF LOYOLA
This priest and theologian was a soldier and man of the world before he became a man of faith. While in his mid-forties he founded the Society of Jesus, also known as the Jesuits. Their mission was to take faith, hope, and love wherever the need was greatest. Ignatius developed his Spiritual Exercises to help his followers discern what God was calling them to do. Ignatius taught that wise discernment depended on the Holy Spirit’s motions of the soul. This movement registered in the intelligences of head thoughts, heart feelings, and gut instincts.
Figure 6. Ramon Llull’s Diagram
Evagrius, Llull, and Ignatius all focused on how to bring God’s own harmony out of scattered, compartmentalized, discordant, and ego-driven selves. Their intent was to help us love God, neighbor, and self with all our heart, mind, and gut strength. They are the chords in our harmonizing history—#kindredspiritsall.
Think of neural pathways like this: when we walk through the same forest day after day, we wear down a path in the ground. In the same way, habitual thought patterns wear a path in the brain. Under stress, we don’t think about which path to take. We automatically follow habit. Spiritual practices are one way the Spirit of Truth creates new neural pathways that renew our minds (see Romans 12:2). Old defensive paths and habits give way to loving with our entire being.
Doug, a One on the Enneagram, has learned to move from gut anger to an easy goodness. Adele, an Enneagram Four, can access her dismissed gut intelligence, show up with conviction, and not be cowed by what people think. Clare, a classic Three, can retrieve her head harmonizer and put loyalty before striving and driving. And Scott, our peaceful Nine, can tap into his EQ and wade into the messy work of negotiating harmony rather than defaulting to a duck-and-cover strategy. Yes, we fail at loving God, neighbor, spouse, boss, and enemies. But we keep on practicing because we know God wants us to embody divine harmony. God wants us to be the harmony we want to see in the world.
Most of the divisions, fractures, and disharmony in systems and relationships are rooted in the defensive reactions of our false self. We are eager for you to learn how to turn off your default, autopilot false self and become the unique person God had in mind before time began. Spiritual Rhythms for the Enneagram is our attempt to help you reclaim the harmony of your beloved, multifaceted, made-in-the-image-of-God self.
HARMONY AND SPIRITUAL RHYTHMS
A healthy psyche that can give and receive love doesn’t happen automatically. Without spiritual rhythms that integrate broken and dismissed parts of ourselves, we play one string of the instrument that is us, instead of the full chord. The spiritual rhythms in this book are ways we pay attention to what Ignatius of Loyola calls the Spirit’s motions of the soul. Ignatius believed direction, growth, and presence came through noticing the Holy Spirit’s movement in your head thinking, heart feeling, and gut instincts.
If you are making a decision, a pros and cons list might be part of the Spirit’s motion in your IQ. God-given desire and delight might register in your EQ. And God’s passion and vision might manifest as deep GQ knowing. The point is to pay attention to what Ignatius terms desolations and consolations in your head, heart, and gut. True consolations lead toward God and love of neighbor. False consolations lead away from God and love. Desolations can be signs you are headed in the wrong direction, but they might also nudge you to turn to God.
Ignatius taught that both desolations and consolations could reveal blindness, triggers, fragility, and habitual sin patterns. They could alert you to inner harmony and/or discord, shame, and judgment. Noticing the Spirit’s motions in your soul was part of divine guidance that could lead to inner freedom to love well God, neighbor, and self.
The glory of God is man [and woman] fully alive.
SAINT IRENAEUSOF LYONS (WITH OUR ADDITION)
God’s purpose is for you to be fully alive to loving God, neighbor, and self. To be awake to God’s purpose takes awareness. Awareness doesn’t require equipment, money, or a PhD. Awareness takes a body that is awake and alert to what is happening—even if feels awful. Noticing takes a mind willing to see how the best and worst of times can hand us truth.
SECTIONS IN THIS BOOK
Each chapter offers questions and spiritual practices to help you reflect on the Holy Spirit’s movement in your head, heart, and gut. As you do these exercises, dig in and participate with what the Good Spirit is doing in your life. No matter what you see, the Spirit is ready to guide you through the beauty and grime of your life and transform you “from one degree of glory to another” (2 Corinthians 3:18 ESV).
Resist the urge to hurry through the chapters. Your soul needs time and space to feel safe in order to come out of hiding. The point is not to “finish” a chapter but to partner with the Holy Spirit for growth and transformation.
Each chapter is divided into sections that build on one another.
Section 1:Who Am I and Who Am I Not. This section asks you to identify the words that shape the narrative you tell yourself about you.
Section 2: True Self and False Self (see Key Terms for further definition of these terms). This section will help you recognize compulsive and impulsive reactions that stem from your ego, as well as responses that arise from love of God, others, and self. When you can recognize that you have fallen into your false self, you can choose transformation. You can learn and practice another way of responding.
Section 3:Harmony. This section provides ways to integrate IQ, EQ, and GQ responses and intelligences into your default patterns of interaction. Harmony creates a vision of who you can be in FLOW (see Key Terms for further definition), when you love God, self, and others from all your gut strength, all your heart feelings, and all your mind. This is the gift of your Harmony Triad.
Section 4: Healing Childhood Hurts. Richard Rohr says, “If we do not transform our pain, we will most assuredly transmit it.” This section is intended to help you process past pain, defense structures, dismissed parts of yourself, and childhood lies. Processing is not navel gazing. It is not introspection. The Holy Spirit is your guide as you journey through your past. Partnering with God’s healing Spirit might give you compassion for where the child inside you is still acting out and making important decisions today. With the Spirit’s help, you can engage with the traumatized places inside you and reclaim lost ground that brings inner freedom.
Section 5: Discernment: Desolations and Consolations. Jeremiah 6:16 states, “This is what the LORD says: ‘Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.’” This section will help you listen to the movement of the Holy Spirit in your heart feelings EQ, mental thoughts IQ, and gut instincts GQ. It will help you learn to discern your purpose and make life-giving choices.
Section 6: Spiritual Rhythms. Spiritual transformation is a two-part invention. You intentionally and attentionally partner with and notice the Holy Spirit’s motions in your soul. Spiritual practices don’t work like a drug—“Here, take this; it will make you better.” Spiritual practices fit your particular circumstances and season. They make space for God in the reality of what is. This section provides spiritual rhythms that address the compulsions, vices, and wounds of each number that hijack our journey of growing into the likeness of Jesus. Paul says, “Speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body . . . grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work” (Ephesians 4:15-16). God’s Spirit partners with us for growth but we have work to do. The Spiritual Rhythms section provides practices, relationships, and experiences that can make space for God and grow you into healthy maturity. Explore exercises that act like mental floss to clear out the crud in your neural pathways and default reactions. Work on triggers that Enneagram expert Jerry Wagner calls “blind spots and hot spots.”
Section 7: Empathy. This section is designed to help you grow in empathy for each number. It aims to help you understand your personal biases and provides stories and practices that help you see others from God’s perspective. When you resonate with how the divine compassion of God looks at others, you can bring empathy into your interactions with them.
Every chapter introduces you to a host of ordinary people who are learning how to create harmonious relationships out of their inner discord and pain. Their stories are raw and real. Reading their stories may tap into your own triggers and pain. Notice your responses. When do you numb, avoid, or judge? Can you give your full attention to the pain that is present and let it lead you to truth? These narratives can give you hope as you watch people move from
▶ blocked and defended to open and receptive;
▶ judgment to empathy;
▶ false self to true self;
▶ distraction to present to God, self, and others; and
▶ disintegration to integration.
Were it not for the guidance of the Spirit of Truth, the four of us would still be blind to how our giftings and passion can wound us as well as others. We assure you, the journey out of shame, guilt, and default triggers into your true, beautiful, created-in-the-image-of-God self is worth all the time, discomfort, and inconvenient truth. This is your path to freedom. (See Soul Resource 12.)
Soul Resources. These helpful resources are found at the back of the book. Think of them as hidden treasure that can bring harmony to your work and love. You don’t need to finish the book before you comb through these resources. In fact, we suggest you begin with the first Soul Resource, “STOP for Harmony,” right away. Then ask the Holy Spirit to guide you to the other Soul Resources as you work your way through the chapters. If a particular resource feels inviting or challenging, that may be the one for you. Notice both resonance and dissonance. Don’t work through the resources as a to-do list. A Soul Resource that is flat for you now could be what you need next month! Let the Holy Spirit lead you. You can use these resources alone with God or process with a spiritual friend or spiritual director.
HOW TO USE THIS BOOK
Who Is This Book For?
This is not a basic introductory text for the Enneagram. It is for those who want to grow, transform, and bring health into their loving and life. The sections in each chapter are distilled Enneagram wisdom around the specific topics mentioned above. The book can be used by the following:
▶ Individuals interested in reading and engaging in practices around their three harmony numbers and finding ways to integrate them. We hope you will read all the numbers and then work with the empathy sections for each type.
▶ Groups interested in processing the Harmony Triad journey together. You will find tips on how to use this resource with a group in Soul Resource 12 at the end of the book.
▶ Spiritual directors, healthcare professionals, coaches, and pastors seeking to help their clients integrate and grow in awareness, healing, and love of God, others, and self through practices, questions, and exercises; those seeking to bring God’s presence and empathy to disharmonious people and systems.
Where to Begin
The first chapter begins with the Gut/Body Triad because the body gives so many signals about our heart and head. For instance, simply slowing your breath can help you think with a clearer IQ and make you more present to God and others while using your EQ. Still, there may be good reasons to begin with another Triad. If there is trauma in your body, you may want to get grounded in your heart space first and begin with the Heart Triad. If you feel safest to begin with your own number and its harmonies, that’s okay. If you sense a resistance to one of your three intelligences, you may want to begin there. However, if your head and heart are disconnected, you may want to begin with the Gut/Body Triad as it will ground you in exploring your disconnect. When in doubt, begin with the chapter that calls to you.
What If I Don’t Know My Number?
If you have picked up this book as an Enneagram newbie and don’t know or aren’t sure of your Enneagram number, you have options. We have put them in the order we most recommend.
1. Since the Enneagram began as an oral tradition, we believe the best way to find your number is take time to explore each number with a spiritual director, soul friend(s), coach, or other trusted companion. Start with one of the centers (head, heart, or gut) and spend a week to a month with each of the three numbers. Where does the number resonate with you? What do you resist or judge in the number? How does your understanding of this number change as you sit with it? As you try on each number, invite the Spirit to reveal truth through the spiritual rhythms you engage.
2. Choose a number and work through its chapter. When you are finished, re-read the description of that number on its chapter title page. On a scale of one to ten, how does it fit you? Write that number on the side. Continue through other numbers doing the same.
3. Read through the descriptions of all the numbers on their chapter title pages. Notice which numbers resonate with you. Don’t automatically choose one number. Focus on at least three numbers and then take your time trying on each one. Soul Resource 11 has some more helpful tips.
4. There are many online Enneagram assessments. While these can be useful, they do not guarantee a correct diagnosis since the results depend on how you answered the questions (e.g., Were you able to respond beyond what is expected of you in your family of origin, work place, or culture?). If you are determined to take an online assessment, we recommend Dr. Jerome Wagner’s Enneagram Assessment available at www.wepss.com. The test is available for a fee and provides information about your ability to access your head, heart, and gut intelligences. It is well worth your investment.
Read All of the Chapters
Each of us has experience with the sins and virtues, as well as the strengths and weaknesses, of every number. They are common to all humanity. Thus every chapter offers you a way to understand yourself and your relationships. Chapters not in your Harmony Triad are designed to help you find empathy for people in that space and also recognize where that number shows up in you.
Each chapter is divided into bite-sized readings that include motions of the soul exercises (indicated by ▶▶▶), Scripture engagement, and prayer practices. People have different capacities and paces for inner work. Experiment. Do what works best to keep you aware and engaged in reflection and spiritual rhythms. Try working through one section a day or a couple of chapter sections in a week. The number of exercises you do at one time depends on you. The point is to notice how the Spirit moves in your soul to give you truth about who you are—not simply to finish the book.
You may not fit perfectly into one of the harmony triangles. You can be very strong in a number and not in your Harmony Triad. Don’t worry. Try on your Harmony Triad numbers. Maybe you have undernourished or dismissed a center of intelligence because of past experiences. See if you can get to know what you don’t know.
If you are tempted to skip over chapters that don’t apply to you, we encourage you to engage your IQ, EQ, and GQ to help you pursue God’s empathy for every number. If you don’t have the patience to tackle all the questions in every chapter, read all the stories that apply to a number. Then move to the Empathy section where the questions are designed to help you make space for God so you can notice your judgment of others and where you are being invited to view others through God’s eyes.
Harmony Triads invite you to savor the goodness of your created being. Our hope is that as you integrate loving God, self, and others with all your head, heart, and gut that your relationships and your world will shift toward harmony. We celebrate how the Holy Spirit will help you release old patterns of reacting and decision making so you become all you were meant to be.
Key Terms
These words are deliberately used throughout this book. These terms help you access harmony, help bring intention to your awareness, and help you replace default practices with new responses. Practice makes permanent.
Consolations: Ignatius of Loyola used the word consolation to refer to the Holy Spirit’s motions in our head, heart, and gut intelligences. Discerning the Spirit’s motions of our soul through head thoughts, heart feelings, or gut inspirations creates an inner environment where guidance and discernment are possible. Ignatius urged believers to follow John’s advice: “Do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God” (1 John 4:1). We move in the right direction when our choices lead toward God and bear the fruit and consolations of love, joy, peace, patience, presence, and union with God. God’s Good Spirit leads people to “interior freedom from sin and disordered loves so that we can respond more generously to God’s call in our life.”
Desolations: Ignatius used the word desolation to refer to how the Holy Spirit reveals sin, distress, vice, and disharmony through head thoughts, heart feelings, and gut instincts. Desolations are a useful part of discernment. Desolations can lead us toward our need for God. Ignatius suggests that desolations can act like “spoiled children” or a “false lover.” Desolations can sow doubts, confusion, and insecurity, as well as willfulness or will-lessness. It is important to notice that desolations that feel bad may actually be an invitation to depend on God.
Dismissed childlike self: As children, many of us learned to depend mostly on one of our three intelligences. We may have been rewarded for thinking (IQ) and penalized when we got emotional (EQ). So we learned to dismiss the heart’s way of knowing. Or we may have been punished for big gut reactions (GQ) such as anger and encouraged to be quiet and read, so we dismissed GQ instincts as bad. Or it wasn’t okay to have fun or ask questions, so we dismissed our IQ and tried to please people with EQ. Integrating the dismissed parts of our childlike selves is part of learning to love with all our head, heart, and gut strength.
False self: Our false self is the compulsive, ego-driven, old nature. It is the deeply entrenched, externalized identity comprised of roles, personas, masks, and achievements. This automatic self is deeply egoistic and addicted to itself. The false self bases its worth almost entirely on thoughts about our body, job, education, clothes, money, car, performance, success, and more. The false self is competitive, fabricated, and grandiose. When triggered, it poses, postures, spins, hides, defends, judges, deflects, pretends, manipulates, and fears. Vices such as anger, envy, sloth, deceit, gluttony, pride, avarice, fear, and lust describe the false self behavior.
FLOW: This acronym and word captures the inner rapport and practices that weave head, heart, and gut intelligences together with love of God and neighbor. When you are in FLOW, you are:
Free—able to let go of false self reactions
Loving
Open to your head, heart, and gut
With God and reality as it is
Jesus talked about rivers of living water flowing out of those who trust him (John 7:38), and living water opens you to flow with God’s presence. FLOW is being awake to God and self, being open and aware. When you say a wiser word than you know, when you are more loving than you feel, when you are triggered and still kind, and when you move from discord to harmony, you are in FLOW with God the Father, Son, and Spirit. When you constrict and tighten around default patterns of anxiety, fear, shame, anger, sloth, or envy, you close the FLOW to virtue and presence. Noticing where you are open or closed brings discernment and is foundational for transformation.
Harmony Triads: Each Enneagram number has an automatic center of intelligence that is found in the head, heart, or gut.
▶ Gut/Body Intelligence (GQ) includes Eights, Nines, and Ones.
▶ Heart Intelligence (EQ) includes Twos, Threes, and Fours.
▶ Head Intelligence (IQ) includes Fives, Sixes, and Sevens.
Harmony Triads connect your automatic intelligence with your other two centers of intelligence, even if you have undernourished or dismissed them. They create head, heart, and gut connections between numbers Eight, Two, and Five; Nine, Three, and Six; and One, Four, and Seven. Integrating gut (GQ), heart (EQ), and head (IQ) creates capacity to interact with multiple centers of intelligence. It also reflects the trinitarian and harmonic nature of God. Harmony takes you from compulsive to centered, from automatic to adept, and from fixation to freedom.
IQ, EQ, and GQ: These are the three intelligences and ways of knowing. They are shorthand for the intelligence quotients of head thoughts (IQ), heart emotions (EQ), and gut instincts (GQ). Head, heart, and gut all have neural receptors that respond to outside stimuli. Each of us tends to prefer or trust one or two of these intelligences more than the other(s). Harmony Triads provide pathways to integrating IQ, EQ, and GQ so that you grow in empathy and love for God and neighbor.
Motions of the soul: Ignatius uses the term motions of the soul to refer to God’s movement in the head, heart, and gut. The Spirit’s interior movement gives you the ability to love God and neighbor with your entire being: heart, mind, and gut strength. Integrating the trinity of head, heart, and gut intelligence leads to what Ignatius calls “discernment of spirits” (see 1 John 4:1). When you pay attention to gut wisdom and perspective, heart emotions and affect, and head cognition and imagination, you open yourself to more than one way of knowing and choosing. Integrating head, heart, and gut intelligence helps us “choose life so that we and future generations may truly live” (Deuteronomy 30:19, our paraphrase).
Presence: When we use the word presence we are referring to your ability to be present to God, self, and others with your IQ, EQ, and GQ. Who you are and what you present shapes your story with its reactions, emotions, thoughts, motives, and actions. To change these default settings you need to be present to and aware of them. You cannot change what is outside your awareness. To explore how practicing the presence of God can move you from edgy addiction to harmony with God and neighbor, see Soul Resource 8.
STOP: STOP is an acronym that can give you awareness of default reactions. STOP can return you to presence with God and others so you have freedom in the moment to make a different choice. STOP is a sign in the moment to:
See—Ask the Spirit of God to give you eyes to see and ears to hear more than what your particular number automatically sees and hears.
Trigger—Notice without judgment. What just happened in you?
Open—Open your head, heart, and gut. Breathe into your harmony and loosen the constriction around your false self and its need to automatically react.
Presence—Intentionally return to being present to God, yourself, and others.
This practice is core to your use of the Enneagram. We encourage you to use Soul Resource 1 in conjunction with every chapter as it gives STOP practices for each number.
True self: Your true self is your true, Christ-in-me self. It is the beautiful person that has existed in the mind of God from the beginning. You cannot earn your true self, for the reality of it emerges from union with God. It has nothing to do with performance or roles. It is not an image you construct or acquire. Your true self is humble, restful, open, and vulnerable. It is present to God and reflects God. It is present to others and receives others. Your true self knows its belovedness. It can give and receive love, and it expresses itself in a life of freedom and virtue.
WE START THIS BOOK with the Gut Triad because presence, awareness, and spiritual practices all begin in the body. You not only have a body; you are a body. Your body is your soul’s address. Your subconscious and unconscious manifest in your body. Your body constantly signals what is going on in your heart and even your mind. In fact, there are more neurons sending information from your body (GQ) to your brain than vice versa. We believe starting in the body can give access to head and heart. However, if you have experienced body trauma, it can be difficult and painful to begin with and integrate body GQ. Take your time and feel free to begin your exploration of the Harmony Triads with head IQ or heart EQ if that feels safer to you.
THE GUT TRIAD HAS INSTINCTUAL OR GUT INTELLIGENCE (GQ)
Eights, Nines, and Ones perceive or filter the world through their basic gut instincts. This triad knows things in their bones. They say things like “I have a gut feeling . . .” Gut intelligence types bring passion and energy to their lives. They are independent people who embody agency and power. Gut people remind us that “your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit” (1 Corinthians 6:19). As living temples, Eights reflect God’s justice, Nines reflect God’s peace, and Ones reflect God’s goodness. The virtue of Eights is innocence, the virtue of Nines is action, and the virtue of Ones is serenity.
GQ
Healthy gut people can discern how much force, power, autonomy, and passion are required in any given moment. They are aware of their intensity and can monitor their instinctive responses so their power is user-friendly and their goodness is easy goodness. They embody Ephesians 3:20-21: “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.”
GUT DEFENSIVE POSTURE
When unhealthy gut people can’t control reality, they convert their frustration into anger. This dominant fixation on anger brings energy and gives them a sense of strength and power. Eights express anger. Nines have stubborn, passive-aggressive anger. Ones suppress their anger, and it leaks out in criticism and resentment.
EXPERIENCING THE SACRED
Gut types often connect with God through their bodies. Kneeling, lifting their hands, walking, dancing, singing, experiential worship, and stillness are all body sensations that open this triad to God, life, and others. The body can answer the questions, “How am I?” and “How am I being touched or moved?” The body knows! Offering our bodies to God is a spiritual act of worship (see Romans 12:1-2).
Eights
Strength Is Contemplative Love
I am not interested in power for power’s sake; but I am interested in power that is moral, that is right, that is good.
MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.
I am an independent, vigorous person who is comfortable taking the lead. I want to be respected for my strength and dependability, and that is more important than being liked. I am a no-nonsense go-getter who values honesty and faithfulness. I have no room for people who choose to be weak. But I will crusade for those who are weak without choice. I will defend people I care about at any cost. I resist taking orders from people I don’t respect or agree with. I will make my opinion known, my presence felt, and challenge the status quo. I want to fight injustice. I am direct, confrontational, decisive, and courageous in the heat of battle. And I can create my wars. Some people may think I’m bossy, controlling, and ready to grab others’ power. But I don’t want them to have power over me. I am known for having the last word.
WHO I AM AND WHO I AM NOT
Eights bear the image of God as strong. Your life resonates with Isaiah 1:17:
Learn to do right; seek justice.
Defend the oppressed.
Take up the cause of the fatherless;
plead the case of the widow.
Strength is inevitably part of your story. Stories about who we are and who we are not shape what we do, who we become, and where we get stuck. Eights have a narrative about being tough, strong, and decisive. You skip over the chapters of your life about tenderness, weakness, or vulnerability. This section gives you awareness of some words that shape the narrative of an Eight.
▶▶▶ BELOVED EIGHTS
Spend some time with the words below that describe who Eights are and are not. Circle the characteristics that resonate with your journey. Star words that express your gifts. Underline words that describe parts of your personality that are unusable by God in their present form. Put a checkmark beside characteristics that you celebrate.
Eights Descriptive Words List
I AM
I AM NOT
strong
passionate
weak
ambivalent
powerful
energetic
impotent
phlegmatic
magnanimous
impulsive
small
procrastinator
self-sufficient
hardworking
needy
easy going
independent
industrious
dependent
lazy
assertive
forceful
push-over
shy
confrontational
intimidating
avoidant
meek
challenging
aggressive
wimp
timid
revolutionary
fearless
slave
fearful
in charge
hard
subordinate
soft
in control
rough
helpless
smooth
my way
tough
accommodating
bleeding heart
boss
invincible
subservient
vulnerable
➤ Which words reflect the image of God in you?
➤ Which words are you most attached to? Addicted to? Compulsive about?
➤ Which do you resist and judge the most?
➤ If you opened up to the words you resist without judgment, how might your life and relationships shift?
➤ Journal about the words that reflect how God’s strength and power affect you.
▶▶▶ GETTING TO KNOW EIGHTS
This Eight shares how she began to know things in her body when she was three years old. She knew something others did not: “I am the one who knew bigger was better.” Notice how this awareness shapes her narrative.
My first memory attached to my gut intelligence is the Christmas I turned three years old. That year, the one big gift I received was a large doll. She was about three feet tall (she was as tall as I was!), had dark hair and dark eyes, and had a red dress. I named her “The Child” and she never had any other name! I distinctly remember feeling more powerful than and superior to my older sister, who had received a normal-sized baby doll as her gift. In my mind, it was simple: I had a child, she had a baby. Obviously, bigger was better. I don’t remember that we ever talked about it or fought about it; it was just something I knew was true in my gut—my doll was better than my sister’s.
➤ What does “The Child” story bring up in you?
➤ What is your memory of your first Eight experience?
➤ What is it like for you to know something is true instinctively and in your gut?
TRUE SELF AND FALSE SELF: THE POWERFUL PERSON
Who we are or are not comes with expression and energy. The attitudes, behaviors, and motivations of beloved Eights convey powerful energy. Your true self emerges from union with God. It is not built by powering up and balancing the scales of justice. Your false self is the compulsive, deeply entrenched, old nature—the psychological or ego self that is constructed on a complex mixture of nature, nurture, and agency. This section will help you begin to recognize compulsive and impulsive false self reactions, as well as true self FLOW that loves God, others, and self.
True Self Eights: Sacred Strength
Eights are designed to reflect God’s strength and passion. A true self Eight has user-friendly power and intensity that serves the marginalized and needy. Eights are resourceful, decisive, and assertive. You drive hard, live large, initiate, champion, and take risks that can be noble and heroic. Passionate, earthy, and at home in the world, your presence says, “I am here!” Beloved Eights are comfortable wielding power and being in control. You prefer respect to approval. You don’t need to fill every leadership vacuum. When Eights live present to God, others, and self, you are warm, powerful, empathetic, independent, and vulnerable. As a leader, you are decisive and think about how much strength is needed in any given moment. Centered Eights embody God’s sacred strength.
Breath Prayer
In silence and solitude, ask God to help you see yourself clearly. Begin with breathing. Breathe in: “Made in God’s image,” and then breathe out: “I am not God.” Spend a few minutes with this breath prayer. Feel the goodness and freedom of being made in God’s image; feel the liberty of letting God be God. Breathe this prayer in and out throughout the day.
False Self Eights: Constrict in Control, Aggression, and Lust
Compulsive false self Eights over-identify with being strong and in control, which makes your energy user-unfriendly. Constricting around default and repetitive patterns of anger and control, you deny weakness and avoid vulnerability. This instinctive, reactive self finds it hard to soften and trust others. In your false self, Eights are unaware of how you can be aggressive, confrontational, oppressive, self-centered, self-righteous, domineering, insensitive, and prone to excess. Although lust is the vice of the Eight, we use this word to reflect the intensity or force that drives the Eight to power up and take control. These lusty, tough, bossy, “go big or go home” personalities often get things done through intimidation and autonomy rather than collaboration. You take on injustices with your own brand of justice. Eights who can’t be the boss or lead the charge may act out or pull away. If you can’t call the shots, direct the program, right the wrongs, and have the last word, you may take your marbles and leave.
▶▶▶ TRUE OR FALSE SELF
As you think about your true and false self, consider these questions. Notice what comes up for you; notice without judgment. What questions particularly invite you to jot down or journal responses?
➤ How do true self Eight characteristics show up in your relationships with others?
➤ Where do false self Eight qualities show up in your relationships with others? How does anger show up? (“I’ve had enough!”) How does guilt show up? (“I haven’t done enough!”) How do you pull away or act out when you don’t have control?
➤ What makes you constrict your muscle (power and control)? What is a cue to relax your muscle?
➤ How do you feel the difference between centered, true self energy and edgy, false self energy?
GutReactions to GainControl
This reading highlights the disciples’ gut reaction to people they couldn’t control, and Jesus’ response to resistance. Notice who he “rebukes.”
As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem. And he sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him; but the people there did not welcome him, because he was heading for Jerusalem. When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, “Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?” But Jesus turned and rebuked them. Then he and his disciples went to another village. (Luke 9:51-56)
1.When does “calling down fire” show up as your go-to, ego response?
2.Who are the Samaritans in your life that trigger you to power up? How easy would it have been for you to just go on to another village?
3.Jesus didn’t rebuke those who didn’t welcome him. He rebuked the Eight-like, call-down-fire reaction from his own followers. What might true self Eight energy look like in this instance?
HARMONY: STRENGTH IS CONTEMPLATIVE LOVE
Eights are often thought of as the powerful number, but you are much more than just one number! You bear the image and harmony of a three-in-one God. When beloved Eights are present to their head and heart intelligence, they harmonize and FLOW with the contemplation of Fives (IQ) and the care of Twos (EQ). This section creates awareness of how FLOW is the unique gift of the Harmony Triads.
In harmony and FLOW, an Eight’s instinct for justice flows with thoughtfulness and compassion. Your just action rights the wrongs in ways that respond wisely to need and oppression with the IQ of a Five and express sacrificial love of others with the EQ of a Two.
