Epiphany time
I always thought I was a control freak with the redeeming characteristic of trading control for information. If I know what is going on, I don’t have to be in control of the situation.
Last Friday, I figured out that I have had it backwards. I am an information freak. I need to know what is happening around me and what will happen. The way I feel safe and secure is if I can prepare for what is now and what is next. The best way to get this information is to be in control.
This is an interesting paradigm shift that doesn’t changes anything in how I live my life only in how I see it.
It’s good to know your motivations for things. I’m interested in stuff like that, but then got me interested in the whole enneagram thing, which is all about distinctions of that kind. Am I a type-6 with a type-5 wing, or a type-5 with a type-6 wing? Same kind of distinction, encoded to the point where you have to read enneagram books to understand what it means 
Eneagram
Oh Angelbob, what a can of worms you have opened up.
I am sputtering trying to be coherent with all the things I want to say in a manner that is expressive through written text. I lay no claim to being a writer. I am a talker.
My dad introduced me to the eneagram and I have found it oh so useful. It has made work/co-workers possible to deal with. He thinks I am a 4 but I am pretty sure I am a 7 with a 6 wing. But I have a lot of 4 characteristics in me. Helen Palmer pegged me as a 7 pretty quickly but I can’t say I trust her evaluation so I am still a little leary. My dad is planning to pay for a one week training class in June or July that is suppose to clear up any questions I have. I think it is with Riso and Hudson.
It was explained to me that being a 4 was just the tension between 5 and 3. It is not an actual location but an equilibrium point between two pulls. Which pull is stronger is your wing. If you are a type with a wing, that means you are closer to that type than to the wing. It could easily go the other way.
The way I think you can refine your type vs. wing is to see what types you slide to when you are under stress and also very happy. I can remember if the 6 goes to 9 or 3 when stressed. The 5 goes to 7 when stressed and 8 when doing well.
Of course, I am unique (4) and it works differently for me. I could be anything (7) in different combinations. Ha.
Re: Eneagram
You don’t immediately strike me as a four, but then I’ve only encountered a very specific subset of fours, one you certainly don’t resemble. I don’t know them more generally. Soon a book will arrive and I can begin learning more.
The idea that a four is merely the tension between a five and a three seems silly. Possible, I guess, but silly.
Six goes to three when stressed, or to nine when healthy. I’m a six, I remember these things
You’ve probably seen it already, but for a quick run-down recommended this site.
Re: Eneagram
Comment take two. LJ and I are not getting along right now.
My 4 characteristics are based in abandonment issues. On the surface, I sure look like a 7.
Actually, I don’t think I have run into that site. I haven’t been surfing for enneagram for about a year. This is another site I enjoy.
9types.com
And then there is Helen Palmer’s site.
http://www.authenticenneagram.com
What book do you have on the way? I have a couple at home.
Re: Eneagram
I’m mixed on 9types so far, but Helen Palmer’s site looks really excellent.
The book is “The Spiritual Dimension of the Enneagram: Nine Faces of the Soul” by Sandra Maitri. Amazon shipped my copy a couple of days ago.
Re: Eneagram
You may want to look into some of Helen’s upcoming classes. She supposedly moving away from straight enneagram teaching to the more spiritual side of it all.
I went to a weekend siminar with that focus. I don’t think I am ready for that yet so I didn’t get as much as I could have. I have the audio recording of it if you are interested.
Re: Eneagram
I suspect that such spiritual teaching won’t sit well with me, either. Or, as you more diplomatically phrase it, I don’t think I’d be ready for that yet.
But then, apparently what I lack and need to work on is faith, though more in the world around me than in any particular spiritual power.
Re: Eneagram
The reason I wasn’t ready for it yet is because I was still so confused on what my type was/is. I still hadn’t gotten the basic enneagram stuff under my belt yet. It is a little hard to break through your type when you aren’t sure what your type is.
The spiritual side was actually kinda interesting. It is sooo not “Higher Power” type of stuff. More like faith in yourself and what you perceive about the world around you. The focus on how to achieve this comes from Helen’s background in meditation. BTW Helen is a six and most of the stuff she does is very tainted with that perspective.
Very stare at your navel stuff.
The main problem I have with it now is that to reach the spiritual side you have to let go of your type. I like my type and I like being in it. I feel much safer here. Especially since I know what I am up to and why (for the most part). I have power here. Letting go of that is not something I want to do yet. Also, it could be that I have a problem with the whole “spiritual” thing. I think I have been burned out at a young age and have been avoiding anything spiritual ever since.
Re: Eneagram
“to reach the spiritual side you have to let go of your type. I like my type and I like being in it. I feel much safer here. Especially since I know what I am up to and why (for the most part). I have power here. Letting go of that is not something I want to do yet.”
I can understand that. I suppose that’s my problem as well, though I don’t think of it in quite those words. What I need to let go of is apparently self-defense. I tend to be very paranoid, very self-protective and very prone to preemptively divert or even attack things I see as threats to my well-being. I’m very good at it, which is apparently the problem.
Being in that situation feels very safe, or at least, very powerful and very much in control. Apparently I need to simply have faith that things that look dangerous won’t actually hurt me. I’ll spare you all the obvious physical analogies for how incredibly stupid that sounds at the moment.
“Also, it could be that I have a problem with the whole “spiritual” thing. I think I have been burned out at a young age and have been avoiding anything spiritual ever since. “
Fair enough. There are only a very few spiritual pursuits I’ve ever really understood, but the idea of a personified (anthropomorphized?) God sits poorly with me. The idea of an intelligent Guiding Force seems ludicrous, and the idea of an unintelligent but all-beneficent guiding force seems self-contradictory.
The idea of an unintelligent, all-neutral guiding force seems irrelevant.
Re: Eneagram
What I need to let go of is apparently self-defense. I tend to be very paranoid, very self-protective and very prone to preemptively divert or even attack things I see as threats to my well-being. I’m very good at it, which is apparently the problem.
Your type is what has allowed you to survive. It is very important. It will always be with you and it is good. But like all behaviors, there are times when it is more detrimental than positive. That is when you need to get out of it.
With the whole spiritual thing, when your type is causing more problems than it is solving, i.e. thinking someone has it in for you when they aren’t even thinking about you, the spiritual approach helps you let go of your type and gather all the information so that you can act appropriately. (how’s that for a long sentence?)
A very general physical example would be trying to cross a street. With your type, you think every vehicle is aiming at hitting you. One solution is that you wait until there are no more cars before leaving the curb. If it is really bad, you don’t ever leave the curb. Once you get out of your type, you can see the patterns they are making and work your way across the street. Many other options open up for you.
That is the theory. My take is that it is a great idea but my type keeps me safe. How do I know when it is safe to let my type go? Just because I only see the information that is colored by my type, that doesn’t mean that there aren’t things out there that will hurt me. I can do it on a small scale. And it doesn’t feel all that spiritual to me.
I would probably do better with it if the word “spiritual” wasn’t attached. That and I am lazy so I don’t practice much.
Fair enough. There are only a very few spiritual pursuits I’ve ever really understood, but the idea of a personified (anthropomorphized?) God sits poorly with me. The idea of an intelligent Guiding Force seems ludicrous, and the idea of an unintelligent but all-beneficent guiding force seems self-contradictory.
The idea of an unintelligent, all-neutral guiding force seems irrelevant.
I think I can agree with you across the board on this. What spiritual pursuits have you found useful?
Re: Eneagram
“A very general physical example would be trying to cross a street. With your type, you think every vehicle is aiming at hitting you.”
A fine example, and one I can instantly respond to. As a motorcyclist, this is precisely what I do. It’s surprising what a good model it is for the way people drive, especially the ones using cellphones. Bastards. I make sure that I am never relying on people’s goodwill to not get squished, only their lack of maneuverability and their inability to coordinate with the other malevolent SUV-owners around them. I credit this very specific paranoia with saving my life several times, and that’s just in the last year or so.
Granted, it’s not actually *true*. It’s just that people drive carelessly and can’t see anything smaller than a Buick. So I’m confusing malevolent people and those who are merely careless with a weapon that could kill me. In fact, I’m not so much “confusing” them as I don’t care. I just lump malevolent dangers to my well-being in with stupid ones, and I find that it works very well as a model.
But then, I’m a counterphobic six. I’ll never have the “not leaving the curb” problem, but I may bring my baseball bat. Or a small firearm. Just in case.
“Once you get out of your type, you can see the patterns they are making and work your way across the street. Many other options open up for you.
That is the theory. My take is that it is a great idea but my type keeps me safe. How do I know when it is safe to let my type go? Just because I only see the information that is colored by my type, that doesn’t mean that there aren’t things out there that will hurt me.”
Yeah, what you said. I tend to test theories empirically. For instance, there’s an obvious physical analogue to “stop being paranoid and trust the world to look out for you.” It’s to literally do that. Again, I ride a motorcycle. I’m well aware of how much the world feels like looking out for me.
So I suppose such sources are trying to suggest that very few activities are as high-risk as riding a motorcycle, which I find approximately conceivable. It’s just not very obvious in advance, at least to me, which ones are. That seems like a very large hole in the whole process, but perhaps I’m missing something obvious. It wouldn’t be the first time.
“What spiritual pursuits have you found useful?”
Meditation and its close relative self-hypnosis are fine ways to reconnect with your body and get it to do nice things for you (usually as a matter of trade). I do it for the coordination, the peaceful feeling and the increased perception and luck, but I’m told it’s a very spiritual thing as well. Damned if I know.
Hypnotism as therapy, which is to say, hypnotism as self-hypnotizing somebody else, has similar but different benefits for the practitioner. I’m told it’s also a spiritual activity, and I have an easier time believing that.
There are other activities which I see as fundamentally similar (but different) to meditation. Most of them boil down to being very physically present in my body. Again, I don’t really know whether those are spiritual activities. Maybe.
Re: Eneagram
Look, the posts are getting skinnier. Wheeee
Granted, it’s not actually *true*. It’s just that people drive carelessly and can’t see anything smaller than a Buick.
I can value this point of view. I credit my attitude that it is safer for me to ride on surface streets but not on the highway with my motorcycle to my belief that “they” are all out to get me. I have many years practice (ever since I was 15-1/2) predicting the stupidity of other drivers. I trust this at low speeds but at highways speeds I don’t trust my riding ability to handle the time lag. As a model for motorcyclists, it works.
Oh rapturous joy, my dizzies appear to be gone. I might be able to ride again. Now to fix the crack in the gas tank on the bike.
“stop being paranoid and trust the world to look out for you.”
Sorry, the world is not going to look out for you. It just isn’t actively out gunning for you. Is my 6-wing showing?
Meditation and its close relative self-hypnosis are fine ways to reconnect with your body and get it to do nice things for you (usually as a matter of trade). I do it for the coordination, the peaceful feeling and the increased perception and luck, but I’m told it’s a very spiritual thing as well. Damned if I know.
Some of the religions of the East have really appealed to me (Hindu, Zen, Buddhism) but I don’t have the patience to practice them. Same for meditation. I do ok when someone is leading a meditation or if things are really bad and I am grasping at anything that will help. But typically, I don’t get enough out of it to slow down from my normal bouncing.Can’t I just have a switch that will turn it on and off?
Most of them boil down to being very physically present in my body.
The main emphasis of Helen’s ideas for the ability to get out of your type is to stop being in your head with it’s planning and preparing but to be in your body. Hey, maybe you are already doing it.
Re: Eneagram
Yeah. If I were going to be some particular religion, Zen Buddhism is definitely in the top three possibilities.
Meditation is good. I find that having other people around that do it as well is a good thing, and that alternating with hypnotism helps because you get used to some of the advantages of meditation. They’re kind of addictive. I don’t do it nearly often enough these days, but a lot more often than if I hadn’t already decided I needed it