The Enneagram
What is It?
Think of it like a road map, or a chart, to help us understand how people are motivated through life. In many ways, it is rather like a wisdom tradition that has shown itself to be quite helpful for self-awareness, compassion, and personal formation and growth.
We all make decisions based on our head’s thought processes, our heart’s emotions, or our gut’s instinct. Since we tend to favor one more than the others, we are apt to leave out other important ways of navigating the world. We can be influenced by our fear, anger, or shame, and can become our own largest obstacle at times.
Because of how complex we as human beings are, all frameworks are wrong, and yet, some are more helpful than others. The Enneagram is a helpful tool for getting unstuck, noticing our pitfalls, celebrating our gifts, and becoming more holistic in how we approach ourselves and one another.
Where Did It Come From?
As a wisdom tradition, it predates modern psychology in its earliest roots. However, it has been attached to major philosophical and spiritual teachers worldwide. Some have connected it to the desert father Evagrius Ponticus, others with the Sufi mystical tradition, and even more recently with spiritual directors worldwide. It has a growing number of people studying it alongside neuroscience and other researchers. Although it is still early in its formal research, anecdotally, many feel it has helped them.
How Do We Use the Enneagram for Our Growth?
There are four tiers of questions that I tend to ask people when they are first interested in growing in self-awareness through the Enneagram. They are:
- Do you make decisions with your head, your heart, or your gut?
- What is your go-to emotion throughout your day, fear, anger, or shame?
- Would you say that you are withdrawn, compliant, or assertive in your engagement with life?
- Would you say you spend most of your relational energy in 1-1 relationships (the sexual subtype), in a group (the social subtype), or toward yourself (the self-preservation subtype)?
From these questions, it is possible to start discerning what of the 9 types you might be. And, once you can tell which of the 9 types you might be, it can become easier to understand how to relate to others and understand how others experience you.
The Enneagram is designed first and foremost for self-reflection and accountability, and then can best be a tool to remember there are 8 other ways of seeing the world, problem-solving, and going about relationships.
For some, they often feel both validated and exposed when they read their Enneagram type. This is because the Enneagram shows us how our core values/motivations can help us to bring a gift into the world while also being a potential pitfall, all depending on whether or not we are at our best or our worst.
The Enneagram is useful in some ways because it is also like a manual to a board game. It is almost as if we are playing the game of life without ever saying the rules out loud, and the Enneagram comes along to show us what our approach to the game of life has been all along. The Enneagram also can reveal to us that others are playing the same game of life with a different approach. Navigating life becomes so much easier when we become consciously aware of the rules we didn’t know we were following!
Can Christians Use the Enneagram?
Of course! There are many insights that transcend religious lines that would benefit anyone if they incorporated them. The Enneagram can be seen as a wisdom tradition to which people from many backgrounds have contributed.
Let’s think of it from a theological lens… I’m sure you agree that anything that helps us to grow, to heal, and to become whole has the Christ within it.
For things that are overtly connected with the Christ, his teachings, and the tradition, we call these things “Christian.”
However, for things that are covertly connected with the Christ, and aid our growth, healing, and wholeness, we call these things “Christic.” Other examples of “Christic” things include medicine, counseling, eating well, physical fitness, and the like.
The Enneagram certainly falls within this category.