Erhalten Sie Zugang zu diesem und mehr als 300000 Büchern ab EUR 5,99 monatlich.
- Herausgeber: IVP Formatio
- Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021
"The Enneagram teaches us that there are nine ways of being in the world, and it highlights the nine habitual, predictable ways that we get ourselves into trouble," writes Suzanne Stabile. "Without hearing the stories of how challenging it has been for other people, we end up thinking we are the only ones struggling." This is why group discussion and shared experience around Enneagram themes can be so helpful. Each of the six sessions in this companion study guide to Suzanne Stabile's book Journey Toward Wholeness includes the following: - An overview of the session theme - Discussion questions - An opportunity to journey deeper into the session's theme - Ideas for applying what we are learning between sessionsBonus content in this volume includes insights from people in each number space about how they are learning to bring up their repressed center (doing, thinking, or feeling). The struggle isn't the same for each of us, but we can journey toward spiritual and emotional growth together.
Sie lesen das E-Book in den Legimi-Apps auf:
Seitenzahl: 76
Das E-Book (TTS) können Sie hören im Abo „Legimi Premium” in Legimi-Apps auf:
Ähnliche
Contents
Introduction
Welcome! However you came to be reading this study guide, I’m so very glad you’re here. I wrote The Journey Toward Wholeness because I believe we all have the ability to grow, change, and experience transformation—spiritually, emotionally, and psychologically. Growth in all of these ways takes time, and it can even be painful, but it offers us a gift: the gift that we don’t have to do things the way we’ve always done them.
I’m convinced that you can’t change what you can’t name. Without accountability, our habitual and predictable behavior—the average space of our Enneagram type—wins out most of the time. Without intentional plans for growing and changing, we are often unprepared for the challenges that we are sure to face, and the result is that we fall back into average space in our number and make our way in the world just the same way we always have. As a result, we are faced with the same challenges over and over because we keep operating in the same way we always have.
The Enneagram teaches us that there are nine ways of being in the world and it highlights the nine habitual, predictable ways that we get ourselves into trouble. Without hearing the stories of how challenging it has been for other people, we end up thinking we are the only one struggling. The struggle isn’t the same for each of us, but it can be shared. We can always learn from the other eight ways of seeing the world, and learning always has the potential to lead to growth.
I have always had a general desire to do better and be better. But until I learned the Enneagram, I didn’t have an identified understanding of the areas in my life that needed my attention. The first time I heard it taught I was able to name, almost immediately, the places in my life that were working and the situations where I had to make necessary changes. Hearing about my number literally changed everything for me in terms of how I saw myself and how I saw other people. That is the primary reason why I decided to dedicate the remainder of my career to teaching the Enneagram: because it offers specific, tangible ways to move toward balance and wholeness.
My experience is that almost all of the teaching about spiritual formation includes information about balance and integration, but it’s rare to find a method or a book or a teacher offering instruction about how to balance or integrate.
The Journey Toward Wholeness is designed to support growth and stability in a time of enormous transition. We aren’t the first to face this challenge of transformation in a time of liminality and we won’t be the last. It’s uncomfortable and unpredictable and uncertain, but it can also be a time for new understanding about ourselves, our culture, and our capacity for accommodating change. The truth is, we all have experienced shorter amounts of time in liminal space. Upon hearing the definition of liminality, I suspect most seniors in high school would say that’s where they find themselves. College graduates find that the time between graduation, getting a job, finding a place to live, and starting their “new life” perfectly defines liminality. The last month of pregnancy, buying and then moving into a new home, completing the plans to move to a new job in a new state, preparing for retirement, embracing limitations that slowly approach—all liminal space. Some have said that liminal space is the most teachable space, and I agree, but we have to be open to learning from it. That will be part of your work as you engage in this study.
You will gain much insight about why you do the very things you don’t want to do, and I hope you allow yourself to dream about who you can be as a result of what you learn. And my dream for you is that you come away from this experience with more hope and more peace than you would have imagined. The truth is we can all be better friends, better coworkers, better family members, and better advocates for ourselves and our ways of seeing the world. The combination of liminal space and Enneagram wisdom offers an opportunity for all of us to move beyond wishing we could be different or healthier or better. We can be.
WHAT TO EXPECT IN EACH SESSION
The sessions are designed for sixty to ninety minutes of discussion each week. Each includes the following components.
■Check In: a time for your group to reconnect and share observations based on the previous week’s material
■Overview: a broad picture of where the week’s topic is headed
■Engage: some weeks include an opportunity for participants to start personalizing the information right away
■Reflect and Discuss: questions for participants to engage with the material and with each other (some sessions include a second set of questions for additional engagement and discussion)
■Journey Deeper: additional teaching on the week’s topic
■Journey On: suggestions for participants to apply the work between gatherings
FOR GROUP LEADERS
I am so grateful for your willingness to lead a group through this study guide. I have found that although a leadership position requires a larger commitment, there is often a gift to be found in the role. It’s my prayer that this will be true for you.
You’ll find each chapter in this study guide generally follows the same format. You are surely welcome to work your way through each chapter however you see fit, but I have structured the chapters imagining that groups will want to gather for about an hour or so:
Check In: approximately ten to fifteen minutes
Overview, Engage, Reflect and Discuss: approximately fifteen to twenty minutes
Journey Deeper, Reflect and Discuss: approximately fifteen to twenty minutes
Journey On: approximately five to ten minutes
Keep in mind that Enneagram work is inherently very personal. So as you set the table for your group to enter into this transformational work, I would encourage you to be gentle but firm in naming and encouraging some group norms for your time together. There are a number of excellent resources for creating grace-filled, honest environments for groups, but as we consider this study guide in particular I would encourage you to shape your gatherings around the Four Mantras. These mantras come from Angeles Arrien and are found in her book The Four-Fold Way. I have found them to be helpful in so many situations, and I believe they provide a framework for entering into this work together. Here’s my summary of them:
1. Show up: It’s important to be there for group work—physically present in the room, of course, but it’s also important to be engaged mentally and spiritually.
2.Pay attention: In group settings, it’s important to pay attention to what others are sharing. It’s just as important, though, to pay attention to what is happening within ourselves.
3. Tell the truth: It’s important to tell the truth to ourselves and to others.
4. Don’t get attached to the results: Transformation is rarely linear and happens even less often according to our timetable. The journey is significantly more important than the destination.
As a last reminder, the purpose of these gatherings is not to problem solve. This study guide is set up for participants to learn about other people, not to “help” other people be different. So much of the goodness of spiritual work in community comes from the unique opportunity to be with other people—people who represent all nine ways of seeing the world, and whose goal is being healthier themselves. This solitary work cannot be done alone, but it also cannot be done on behalf of others.
May your time together be a gift and a blessing, and may this study guide be an offering of grace—grace for yourself and grace for the people you encounter as you journey toward wholeness.
1
Safeguarding Our Souls
Even when there is much to do, we must first guard our souls.
READ
The Journey Toward Wholeness part one, “Triads: Naming and Managing Your Dominant Center of Intelligence”
CHECK IN
Welcome! I’m so glad that you have chosen to spend some more intentional time working through the concepts presented in The Journey Toward Wholeness. I’m hopeful that this offering will give you the opportunity to explore the essence of who you are—essence
