Continuation from Part 1

Before I go into self-discovery and using with others, there is another fundamental truth about Enneagram and human being in general. It is about impure perception.

Introduction

We are human. We have brains. Our brains are filled with good and bad memories. Our brains have an automatic association mechanism (System 1 thinking). Our brains also have their own Enneagram fixation.

In Part 1, I said that to understand type, we need to look at a type as a whole map of structure. It sounds easy in theory. In practice, it's very hard to do because our own brains won't allow it. Our brains want to see things only from certain angles. Why? Two things:

1. Experience and memories create associations
2. Our own fixation

This is the whole reason why someone can know Enneagram so well but use it in a self-defeating way.

For example, I know a body center teacher who learned from Gurdjieff himself. She knew everything from the original source. She tried to teach Enneagram to heart and head center types using Gurdjieff movement. She totally believed that you just move your body first and you will gain the insight. Just do it. When heart and head types got confused, she just doubled-down on "we should start by doing the body movement correctly."

My wife and I (heart and head center) became even more confused and ended up getting nothing valuable from her. We tried the movement, and we got lost on what it meant.

In my opinion, she was deep into her body fixation, she can't see that double down on body does not work for what she wants to express. She can't get out of her own fixation and see what actually happen when we confused and try to ask question from her.

And if this can happen to someone who learn in Enneagram from original source for more than 20 years, trust me when I say it can happen to everyone.

And when you are using Enneagram while you are entangling with our own bullshit, the effectiveness will dramatically decreased wether it is for our own self-discovery or improving relationship.

We need to clean our eyes and brain to see things clearly.

And there are two things you can do to clear your own perception and use Enneagram well:

1. Detach from our own fixation (aka. Let go of our own values)
2. Prep ourselves to be in grounded state

Grounding

To preface this, I used to recommend an elaborate process toward self-discovery. And I got a question about how does that work. Is it some kind of analysis on specific content of drawing, like what psychoanalysis do?

The answer is way way simpler than that. The answer is: Grounding

In the above scenario, I recommend drawing a few versions of yourself throughout your life to use as a tool for grounding. It utilizes a simple brain mechanism.

You can be super stressed at work or pissed off at someone, but when your brain sees a picture of yourself, you can't help but think "oh, I remember that time," which takes you away from whatever bullshit you're dealing with.

When you're emotionally charged, your brain physically pumps blood into the amygdala and less to the frontal lobe. Your brain pumps more blood into the fight, flight, or freeze mechanism and less blood into holistic judgment. It's evolutionary because you can't afford to see the environment holistically when you're facing a tiger. You can't afford to hold thoughts like "tiger is chasing me, that butterfly looks nice and that plant looks yummy." You need tunnel vision at that time.

But when you're using Enneagram, as mentioned in Part 1, you need holistic perception, not tunnel vision.

There are specific techniques for grounding designed for the self-discovery process (like the drawing yourself practice above), and there are some techniques designed for relationship improvement. I might dive into that in a later part.

For now, If you know how to ground yourselves, do that. You know yourselves much better than me. But if you don't I have some generic practices you can do when you're serious about using Enneagram. You can choose to do any of these:

1. Breathe and sit still for at least 5 minutes
2. Take a walk alone for 10 minutes. No cellphone. And no interacting with others. Just be with yourself.
3. Stare at the wall without doing anything for at least 5 minutes
4. If you're more into physically active stuff, you can stretch yourself, take a round of running, or do weight training. But it must be in silence.

The common theme is to reduce sensory input, so you are grounded with yourself instead of reacting to whatever happens externally.

You might think I'm joking, but many teachers I know actually meditate or ground themselves in their own way before starting their Enneagram workshop. I do the same thing when I teach other stuff aside from Enneagram as well.

And after that, you prep yourself to be in a better state to use Enneagram for your own self-discovery or perceiving others.

Detach from Fixation (Let Go of Our Values)

After you ground, here's a tough pill to swallow.

The first step to using Enneagram effectively: you need to let go of your own values, at least temporarily. When we get wrapped up in our own values, we can't see clearly.

If there's some fundamental truth Enneagram taught me, it's that people truly value different things at the core level.

I'm a 7, and I used to assume that at the end of the day, everyone just wants to be happy. And all the "make it correct," "giving," "chasing success," "chasing predictability," "getting autonomy and power," etc. are just stepping stones toward happiness at the end of the day.

And boy, I was totally wrong. And looking back, I'm very lucky to learn this very early in Enneagram.

When I used Enneagram with my wife (a 4), at first I made a lot of mistakes assuming that about her. There are many assumptions proven wrong:

1. Given there are easy and hard ways to achieve the same result, people always choose the easier way. Wrong!
2. People want to be seen in a positive light. Wrong!

There are more that I learned. But for today I can only think of 2.

And until I truly internalized that there are people who can truly sacrifice their own happiness for the sake of their _________ (other type's core desire), I found myself totally getting Enneagram.

I now understand that happiness and freedom are not the only path toward a meaningful life. It's just my own fixation.

Now, if you want to use Enneagram well, internalize these messages:

1. There are people who don't mind doing things wrong all their life, as long as ____________.
2. There are people who don't mind taking everything and never giving a thing, having zero contribution, as long as __________.
3. There are people who don't mind living like a total failure and total loser, as long as _______________.
4. There are people who don't mind becoming an indistinguishable copycat of others, as long as _________________.
5. There are people who don't mind letting themselves become fully dependent and intertwined with the world and others, as long as _______________.
6. There are people who don't mind having no idea what they're doing and where they're going, as long as _________________.
7. There are people who don't mind being trapped in suffering all their life, as long as ______________.
8. There are people who don't mind being a slave and subject to someone else's will and mercy, as long as _________________.
9. There are people who don't mind not having any peace in their life, as long as _____________.

And when I say internalize, I mean accept this without having positive or negative feelings toward those people. It's simply a fact that these people exist.

When you can view all of those from a neutral point of view, as simply people who just have different values. When you can, for a moment, give space to truly understand and empathize with these people without assigning any positives or negatives such as cool, strong, wise, or failure, stupid, wrong, weak, etc.

Then you can wield Enneagram in an effective manner.

(There are some nuances in the above messages, but I won't talk about them for now.)

My teacher used to ask "what do you fear most when facing death?" My answer is I'm afraid of dying before I get to do what I want. My friend, a 3, answered he can't let himself die as a failure where there's no achievement left to prove that he was alive.

When we shared our answers, I told him that I don't see anything wrong with dying like a failure where no one can remember me. To me, success and achievement are just stepping stones to happiness, and if I can go directly to a happy life, I don't mind having none of that.

He also told me that he doesn't mind dying and never getting to do things he wants to do. To him, it's just "a normal life." Who the fuck always gets to do things they want? But dying without anything to show for it, like you never existed? That, to him, is like wasting all the years of his life without being alive at all.

For me, achievement is simply nice-to-have, but happiness and freedom are must-haves. For him, happiness and freedom are nice-to-have, but achievement is a must-have.

And I got to understand 3s deeply when I could talk to my friend without projecting my own type's bullshit onto him. I didn't assume that deep down, he must want to become happy.

And as I got to know 3s deeper, I can now:

1. Connect with my friend deeply.
2. Get in touch with 3 energy within myself and utilize it when needed. Utilizing 3 energy has helped me a lot in professional life.

And this happened even before I knew all the delicate theory of Enneagram. Again, knowing Enneagram well does not equal using Enneagram well and gain benefit from it well.

So, the first step is to internalize the message that anything you think is fundamental to human beings that "everyone wants" might not be true.

Let go of that lens and your perception will be cleaner.

And once you're grounded, it becomes easier to be open to people who we initially presume to be alien or heretical to us.

And that's the starting point of using Enneagram well:

Ground yourself, and let your own values go.

The preparation is enough. Next time, I'll dive into self-discovery.