Skip to main content

Enneagrams

Image
By


I love Meg.  She and I don't do particularly well in person, but we are seriously the best of friends on the phone.  To be fair, she's a total extrovert, and while I think our relationship is unique, I think she has several relationships like mine with other people.  *deep breath* I'm not threatened by that, or jealous.  I reach out to a lot of people over the course of living, hoping that some lasting relationship will form, but I never could've known what my reaching out to Meg would become.

The other day she asked me about my "enneagram".  My what?  Did I get my annual mammogram?  Did I eat my Golden Grahams?  No, my enneagram number.  I had never heard of it.  I asked her if it was the Myers-Briggs test, and she told me it was so much more.  In fact, she had a lot to say about it, most of which I couldn't comprehend.  So in true Meg form (turns out, she's an 8 who "persuades others to follow her into all kinds of endeavors"), she sent me a bunch of links to podcasts and articles to learn all about it.

24 hours in, and I must admit that it's pretty cool.  From what the experts say, discovering your enneagram is a life-long process, but really it's a life long process to take what you learn and make your life better from it.  So instead of just being defined as something, the definition becomes the jumping off point to figuring out yourself and your relationships with others.  It's been really fascinating.


For the record, I'm a FOUR--like, I couldn't be more of a four if I tried--but I have a little bit of FIVE in me.  And one of the things I love about the "types" link below is that there is information about how you work with other numbers.  So say if I know that someone with whom I live is a SEVEN (with some hints of EIGHT, but really, the SEVEN is pretty dang obvious), I can get information about how the two of us interact, what things to watch out for, and what will be really great.  It's almost like someone has been recording our actions for the past 30 years and wrote exactly what is happening!

I'm hoping that John and the kids will jump into this pool with me as well.  It feels like it could go a bit hokey at times, being seen as something "spiritual", but I'm going to take what I can from it and see where it goes!

Enneagram Types

Enneagram Podcast Primer


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Stuck Between a Rock and a Hard Place

By
I'm writing this, not as a complaint, but as a plea.  If anyone has any advice, I would greatly appreciate it. My children are talented.  In fact, every child that I have ever met is talented in some way.  That's the fun thing about meeting kids--discovering those hidden talents. Some of the talents my children possess are very public--you guessed it...music.  Some aren't so public--kindness and generosity. My kids are frequently judged by other children because of their musical talents.  Other kids see them as "snobs" because they play their instruments well and because they are willing to share those talents whenever asked. My kids never play with arrogance.  They recognize that they are better at music than most kids their age, but they never, ever show it.  In fact, they are very generous with compliments towards other kids and their efforts with music.  I have raised them to appreciate anyone who tries to do anything with music--it's ...
9 comments
Read more

Redefining Charity

By
I like attending church on Sunday for many different reasons, but I dislike the meetings for one very large reason:  discussions regarding charity. In case you don't remember your Sunday School lessons, charity is defined as the pure love of Christ.  If you were to actually look up the word in a dictionary, it would say, "See John Kennedy". That's right.  My wonderful husband is the perfect embodiment of charity. His life basically moves from one charitable act to another. Take any given Saturday.  He can found building some large structure on our property because I think we need it.  He can be found, rebuilding a pond for an old Indian woman who lives alone and needs some help.  On his way to a church picnic, he will stop to help an old woman reseal her driveway, missing one of his favorite meals in the world:  a POTLUCK! Other days?  He stops to help any person on the side of the road with car troubles. He'll drive 2.5 hours to a ...
7 comments
Read more

The TOOTH that Broke the Camel's Back

By
1.  Take an already busy doctor and install an EMR (Electronic Medical Record) in his office.  Kiss him goodnight at midnight as he begins to "preload" charts for future visits. 2.  Host a general authority of the church for our stake conference this weekend.  Receive a long "to do" list of jobs just five days before the conference. 3.  Feel stress because John is stressed.  Try to do his jobs around the house so that he doesn't have to worry about them. 4.  Have 16 puppies. 5.  Decide to build outside area for puppies.  Borrow backhoe from neighbor.  Watch John work long past the setting sun, and wake up before anyone else to dig. 6.  Use our own tractor to move the dirt.  Watch bucket malfunction, cut the fuel line and destroy the fuel pump.  Try to catch the leaking diesel fuel in a bucket. 7.  Catch cold last weekend.  Dread colds like a hemophiliac dreads a small cut.  Nurse fever, congestio...
8 comments
Read more