I CAN REST EASY
in the castle of my identity

PREVIOUS: Type STRENGTHS (Part 2)

REMINDER: In this context – EGO = FALSE SELF
NOT the same as a HEALTHY EGO, and read “The EGO”)

To appreciate the POSITIVES of our Type, it helps to put the work of the Enneagram in context. Chasing ‘healthiness’ is not the main goal of the Enneagram – but rather to become aware of our unique Role in the larger scheme of life, & experience how it plays out in every-day experience. Our fixation behavior – the acting out of the Defect – is Ego trying to hang on to its particular version of Reality.
EXP: #5: “I must fill the unfillable hole of not-knowing”.

“Primal Catastrophe” The Defect of our type is formed in response to the primal catastrophe of our childhood – losing touch with our specific Essence & the Divine. In Christian terms, we’re born separated from God by our sin-nature, forgetting our birthright as children of God. In reaction, humans develop 9 different (ineffective) strategies to try reconnecting with Spirit & our deepest self.

● This unconscious pull toward Essence, with its ‘best’ way of thinking & feeling, suggests that each Number represents an archetypal energy pattern, a Higher Octave, intuiting its deeper Reality. This awareness can provide self-knowledge & a way to connect to Spirit. (Enn in Motion).  

Ego vs. Essence 
Essence = our True Self, originating at birth. It’s different for each Type, & depends on the basic flavor which each Number is most sensitive to, based on one’s Holy Idea. When we’re in touch with it, we feel a sense of aliveness, connection & well-being.

Ego: not the Healthy Self from Psychology, but rather the ego of the False Self, the ‘personality mask’ with all its illusions, defenses & hidden features, only a dim reflection or imitation of our individual Truth.
BTW – it’s not accurate to think in B & W terms – that ‘negative’ ego/ personality is an extreme opposite of ‘positive’ Essence, because humans are on an ego<—>Essence continuum all the time. Understanding & working with both ends are needed for growth.

A.F. Almaas reminds us in ‘Diamond Heart Book Four :  Indestructible Innocence’ that “The personality is not something that needs to die or be thrown away…. but rather developed over time, to be refined & integrated with the sense of Being-ness” (p. 69).

VIRTUES
Based on the spiritual insights of the Holy Ideas, the Virtues (in Part 1) are the natural expression of the awakened heart – the unified, expansive qualities of humans experience when abiding in our True Self. They identify the way to reconnect to Essence. (Holy = objective spiritual reality, expressed in the higher essential qualities of the human mind & soul)

The Virtues are each type’s antidote to its Passion, pointing to its Strength, AND cannot be ‘practiced’ or claimed as personal achievements.  Our ego-self is very preoccupied with recreating it  but it’s only a narcissistic self-aggrandizement – the very opposite of a Virtuous state.
Rather, they are ‘their own reward’ as expressions of Grace & a method of transformation*.  So if we “Let-go-&-let-God”, accepting what is already waiting in us to emerge, our specific Virtue begins to express itself in our daily life.

*Transformation can be understood as a conversion of energy : shifting from the narrowness & futility of our Vice into our Virtue. It’s not easy to do, since our Type is hardwired, & a life-time of doing things a certain way are hard to soften & dissolve.
Shifting this vice-energy takes time.  It requires great desire & determination, persistent effort & a willingness to look deep inside oneself. Repetition of new habits & patterns create new neural pathways that, over time, allow us to catch our automatic responses before they get going. This makes it possible to choose a new way of responding to PPT (people-places-things).

● When our focus is on becoming less & less attached to our defensive way of functioning, it slowly heals the split between parts of ourself, between ourself & others, & between us & our Higher Power. Transpersonal* experiences allow us to see ourself as we are meant to be – in our current state, but moving toward being whole.
*Transpersonal = having “experiences where the sense of Self-identity stretches beyond (trans) the individual, to embrace wider states of humanity, life, psyche & cosmos”. (Shakti – 10/16/05)

NEXT: Type Strengths (Part 3)