The enneagram is the most complex system I know for describing, studying, and understanding one’s personality. We usually begin by identifying our enneatype, one of nine basic personality styles. Each enneatype is known formally by its number (1 through 9), though we sometimes add monikers like “the individualist” or “the peacemaker.” Then we can learn about our “wings,” the two styles with which we share some traits, and the fact that one of those wings often stands out in a more obvious form than the other, although both are present in our personalities. From there we go on to learn about our “security point” (or “heart point”) and our “stress point”–that is, the personality movements we make when especially relaxed and when especially tense or upset; about the “center” within which our basic type resides; and about our subtype, or instinct, which has to do with our individual manner of prioritizing our instinctual needs. And for those who want to delve deeper, there is even more!
Is it overwhelming? It doesn’t have to be, because we learn the enneagram incrementally, as we learn ourselves in a new way a little bit at a time. We take time to digest what we learn before moving from one concept to another, so that step-by-step it becomes part of our consciousness.
And why do we do it? We take the time to get to know ourselves through the enneagram in order to live more consciously and to open doorways to our spirit which we closed, mostly unconsciously, early in life, primarily in infancy and early childhood and perhaps also later, at times of trauma or extreme pain.
Human beings are complex creatures, and the enneagram is a marvelous tool for shedding light on our beautiful complexity.
(For earlier posts not shown here, go to http://www.lablanche9.wordpress.com/.)
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