A Useful Model #enneagram 01

I’m a fan of the Enneagram.  

There I said it.  I know it’s super trendy, and you might want to stop reading right now just because so many people are talking about it.  But read on anyway. 

The Enneagram is typically classified as a personality assessment tool.  It’s usually lumped in with Meyers-Briggs, DiSC, SDI, Strength Finders, or Working Genius.  I’m actually a fan of most of these personality assessments (except DiSC - I just couldn’t figure out how to make it useful in the real world). They all have some value in acquiring a level of self-awareness, which is an essential component on our spiritual journey.   

However, the Enneagram aims much deeper than any of these other tools.  The Enneagram, when properly understood and applied, aims at helping us uncover the layer below our preferences and behaviors: our motives.  The Enneagram understands that two people can have the exact same behavior, but for two very different reasons.  Why we do what we do is an invaluable bit of information on our spiritual journey, and the Enneagram has the potential to help us unearth this self-awareness gold.  

Two Camps

I find that most people fall into one of two camps when it comes to these types of assessments.  

1) They love them and take the newest test as soon as they hear about it, or 

2) they hate these things and see them largely as flawed models that people use to excuse bad behaviors. 

I encounter more people in the first group, but it seems like about 20% of the people I meet fall solidly into that second group.  I’m pretty sure they’re all 4s and 5s (j/k). They’re not wrong.  As my friend Clayton so eloquently put it (quoting British statistician George Box), 

“All models are wrong, but some models are useful.”  

I like his pragmatism.  

This is why I love the Enneagram: In practice, I’ve found it to be the most useful of any of these models.  

Nature vs. Nurture

All of these personality models have their limits.  Human beings are incredibly complex, and the factors that create a person’s “personality” are numerous.  The prevailing thinking on nature (I was born this way) vs. nurture (I’m a result of my experiences up to this point) is that BOTH are factors in the development of your personality.  

Family of origin, country of origin, the region where you grew up, how many parents or guardians raised you, the mental and social health of the people who raised you, your socioeconomic status, how well your basic needs were met, traumatic life experiences, friends, diversity of experiences, and an incalculable number of other factors all figure into the “nurture” side of the equation.  

But there’s still some things that appear to be there from Day 1.  

I remember my son, who, at 6 months old, army-crawled out onto the living room rug to grab something he wasn’t supposed to grab.  My wife and I simultaneously have him a firm, verbal “No.” His face scrunched up, and he began to wail bitterly at this injunction.  Then he began to pound his little forehead on the floor (thank God for rugs!), pausing between hits to make eye contact with us, before bonking his forehead on the floor again.  Thump. Thump. Thump.  

Maybe a psychologist could tie this behavior to something my wife and I caused, but it sure seemed to be an innate stubbornness that he’d had from birth.  His brother didn’t behave like that.  He remained strong-willed up into his pre-teen years, a trait we saw as leadership gifting in the raw.  

No model is going to adequately account for all of the complexity of human personality, and when we expect them to, we’ll always be disappointed.  But, unlike the 20% who dismiss these models out of hand, I find some of the models useful.  

It’s common for people to treat the Enneagram like a rigid self-fulfilling model.  “I identify as a 2, so I will now behave like a 2.”  When the model is used this way, it becomes an excuse for all sorts of bad behavior.  “I’m a 1, so of course I’m judging you.”  But the misuse of the model is not an advocacy for disuse of the model.  If the model has value, then we must use it as it was intended (spoken like a true 1).   

The Enneagram begins with bad behaviors.  “Are you busy judging everyone?”  “Are you secretly bitter because no one sees how unique you are?”  “Have you put others first to the point that you’re burnt out?”  “Do you bully everyone around you?”  “Are you a chameleon, changing personality expressions with every new face you meet?”  

The key awareness point for the Enneagram seems to be the suffering we experience when we’ve behaved poorly. We discover that we’re unhappy with some aspect of our personality that is hurting us.  That spark of awareness is where the Enneagram journey begins.  The fundamental question the Enneagram is asking is, “What is the motive down below the behavior that is driving your thoughts, actions, and words?”  In my experience with all of the other models listed here, the Enneagram is the only one that is exploring the deeper threads of motive.  

But what makes the Enneagram so useful is that it proposes a path forward toward health.  It has practical advice on answering the question, “How can I get healthy?”  If you have some awareness of your perceived Enneagram number a pastor, mentor, spiritual director, trained therapist, or even a friend, spouse, or family member can help you talk through possible options for moving toward health.  That’s useful!

An Example: Enneagram 1

An example might help here.

I’m an Enneagram 1 with a 9 wing (maybe a 2 wing? I'm trying to sort this out).  This means I primarily find myself engaging with the world with the motivations of a 1.  I like the way Alice Fryling describes these motivations in her wonderful book, Mirror For The Soul (I’m paraphrasing her idea here).  

Each number has a corollary gift that God has given to that person that has been corrupted by this fallen world.  1’s have a gift for seeing the potential good in the world around them.  They can see the way an organization is lead, or the way a blog was written, or the way a building was constructed, and they can instinctively see “the potential good” - how it could be better.  

The corruption of this gift of goodness is that the 1 can become impatient with the fact that nothing around them ever lives up to its potential, which is just the way the world is.  Nothing ever achieves it greatest expression.  Everything could be made better, and if you doubt this, ask your 1 friend.  

1s are often insufferable because they really do want the world to be a better place.  They want to help the people around them.  Their motive is pure and good.  But their means can often be relational harmful. 

It can be overwhelming for a 1 to see all the things that could be better that no one seems to cares about, or that no one is trying to fix.  Even worse, when this gift of “the potential good” is turned on PEOPLE (instead of things), especially friends, family, and coworkers, the 1 can become an unloving insufferable judgmental jerk.  Most people aren’t looking to be fixed, especially by their loved ones.  

The usefulness of the Enneagram is that it proposes a counter-balanced virtue for the unhealthy number to embrace that will help them move toward health.  For an Enneagram 1, it's grace.  The answer to the tyrannical demand that things should be better is grace.  For 1s out there, Sleeping At Last captured this idea beautifully in their song “One.”  

When an Enneagram 1 begins to understand and apply grace, they can begin to see that there are layers of greater good above the perceived imperfection they see right in front of them.  

It’s a greater good to love your friends well, rather than to demand they meet your expectations. YOU can’t even meet your own expectations. 

It’s a greater good to invest in others at their pace in ways that work for them, letting them experience their own learning (rather than you teaching them).  The “goodest” understanding of an idea is the one you acquire for yourself.  

It’s a greater good to liberally extend grace, because you know that you have been shown incomparable grace by our good and beautiful God.  

This is the usefulness of the Enneagram.  When we take an educated guess at our number, we can begin to apply strategies for healing the hurts we’ve experienced - and caused.  

One more thought

The final comment I want to make about the Enneagram’s usefulness, is that it promotes healthier relationships.  It gives practical advice on how to engage in healthy ways with the people around you.  If I’m meeting with someone who is a 3, I’ll go out of my way to encourage them.  The 3’s vice is an insatiable desire for affirmation from others.  I know this, and I can put them at ease by simply complementing them.  I do it because it’s good care to give people what they need.  

In the same way, I won’t be hurt by my 5 friend politely turning down my invitation to the party.  

I’ll let my 2 friend help me.  

I'll pick the restaurant if my 9 friend is feeling distressed by the decision.  

I’ll explicitly comment on how unique my 4 friend is.  

I’ll make sure my 6 friend has all of the details for the party this weekend well in advance.  

I’ll let my 8 friend pick the restaurant.  

I’ll let my 1 friend rant about all the ways the world could be better.  

I’ll block out half a day for my 7 friend and just go with whatever flow they have in mind.  

For me as a 1, loving my friends well is the better good.  

All models are wrong, but some models - including the Enneagram - are useful.      

P.S. The second most useful model on this list is the Strength Deployment Index (SDI).  It’s simple to understand, provides some principles that help relationally, and does a pretty good job of contributing to greater self-awareness.  

P.S.S. Since I wrote this, I've had some additional training on Gallup's Clifton Strengths (it used to be called Strength Finders).  This might be my new second favorite.  I initially thought it was primarily for understanding your coworkers in an employment context, but it has a broader application than that.  I'm going to continue to observe and see how useful it is...

P.S.S.S. Also, since I wrote this, I've taken the Table Group's (Patrick Lencioni's organization) Six Types of Working Genius assessment.  This one is designed for understanding your role in the workplace, but it may have contributions beyond.  We'll see.  

What is your attitude toward these types of assessments?  Why?

What experiences have you had with these types of assessments in the past?

How might these types of assessments help bring self awareness for a situation in your life today?