Missing the Point
John Howe
This tale, entitled “No Time to Waste,” is from Idries Shah’s The Pleasantries of the Incredible Mulla Nasrudin:
“Nasrudin ran to an appointment in a near-by town, stark naked. People asked him why. “I was in such a hurry to get dressed that I forgot my clothes.”
In this essay I share the process of discovering my Enneagram type and the life-altering lessons I learned along the way.
I was convinced of my Enneagram type One fixation after reading Riso’s Personality Types and Palmer’s The Enneagram. I was amazed by the insights contained in the type descriptions—it was as if they had been written specially for me. A friend had introduced me to the Enneagram, and she confirmed my type. I felt overjoyed as I experienced that magical Enneagram ”Aha!” moment. At last, I could understand myself and explain my behavior.
For years, I had recorded self-observations and accumulated self-knowledge; my binder was over an inch thick. It seemed a disparate collection of traits with no underlying theme to connect the dots, but now the Enneagram had given me an outline and the picture was clear.
After reading many books about the Enneagram, it became my belief system and religion. Knowing my Enneagram type gave my life a sense of purpose and meaning that had been missing; my life’s work was to transcend my false self by being present and working on the unhealthy aspects of my type One fixation through ego-reduction.
I attended Enneagram classes, including a workshop exclusively for Ones. I became a type One exemplar. I sat on panels and was interviewed about my type One fixation. Around this time, I decided I wanted to become an Enneagram teacher myself. I wanted to deepen my study of the Enneagram and help others learn from it. So I enrolled in a professional training program.
Shortly before the training, I attended a meeting of a group led by Mel Risman at his home in Berkeley. Mel and others in the group told me I was not a type One, but a type Six. I resisted this idea strongly and argued my case for having a type One fixation. During the ensuing debate, I became angry and lashed out verbally. Some group members were upset and cried. I left.
My head was spinning and I felt numb. Could it be so? I recalled when I sat on a panel and a member of the audience said: “You seem really in your head for a type One.” I remembered how I alone would not participate in movement exercises at Beverly Sorensen’s workshop for type Ones. I did not really understand the Six fixation. I had not studied it half as much as type One nor did I know many Sixes.
My resistance was too strong and I kept returning to the evidence of Oneishness I had constructed by matching known type One traits to my own observed behavior. I was so emotionally invested in having a type One fixation that I could not be open-minded and consider the alternatives. I tried to reassure myself by taking type tests which all indicated a type One fixation.
The Enneagram had been my main focus for the last year. Could I have spent so much time and thought and come up with the wrong conclusion? How hideously embarrassing to have been helping others with their types when I had mistyped myself. I began to feel crushed.
For three days, I walked around in a daze. Then it occurred to me that if I could be wrong about my Enneagram type, then I could be wrong about many other things. This was what I had been resisting: the acceptance of the limits of my own mind and the extent of my ignorance. My pride was shattered and my sense of security was threatened, not just by having mistyped myself but by the admission of my own fallibility. I was concerned about what others might think about me, but I was more scared of how harshly I would judge myself.
I began to see how I had mis-mapped my observed behavior to type One traits. I had mistaken my aggressive reactivity for anger, my skepticism and rebelliousness for criticality, and doubting mind for critical mind. What I thought was the perfectionism of type One was in fact a fear of mistakes reinforced by a grasping need for certainty.
As I understood the Six fixation more deeply, I recognized my emotional volatility, my feelings of inferiority, and the anxiety which, like the air I breathe, is all around me but hardly noticed. The anxiety drives me to quickly resolve ambiguity and uncertainty—for example, wanting to “nail down my type” right away…
I have noticed in my meditation, that even random thoughts can cause feelings to arise, and those feelings often motivate my behavior—especially if I am not present. While I had observed and recorded my behavior, I had not examined the underlying motivations. I had to go deeper. I saw myself as an angry young man but had not noticed the rage was caused by fear. It is an eerie moment when you first realize you live constantly in fear and have been oblivious to it.
One of the worst aspects of thinking you have the wrong Enneagram fixation is the transition from fantasy to reality. I thought I was this incredibly healthy type One: “Well, I must be pretty enlightened because I don’t suffer from any the bad type One stuff.” The reality was less alluring and meant accepting unpleasant type Six traits I had been in denial about.
I felt so stupid about mistyping myself that I nearly withdrew from the professional training course. How could I teach people about the Enneagram if I couldn’t even type myself? I attended the course though my aspirations were now more personal than teaching-related. I explained the painful process of mistyping myself at the first opportunity. There were ten others on the course. Five of them changed their type during the week! This made me feel less of a fool. At every course, training or group I have attended, someone has changed his or her type. For a while I suspected it was my influence, then I figured it just happens all the time, especially to those who learned the Enneagram from books or from an acquaintance.
Ones and counterphobic Sixes can be lookalike types according to Naranjo in Character and Neurosis (p. 228). Naranjo found counterphobic Sixes represented in the MBTI type ENTJ (p. 229). My MBTI type is ENTJ.
I get angry often and quickly, so I assumed I must be an anger type. It is much harder to see the flash of fear that precedes the explosion of my temper. It happens so fast there is no time to observe it.
There is a clue, however, in the nature of my anger, which at its worst can be an aggressive outburst of vicious insults and wild threats. The threats are a manifestation of my defensiveness. They are a way of warning off others and avoiding repetition of whatever situation upset me. It is the snarling and bared teeth of a guard dog. Oneish anger has a different quality, perhaps less hot-blooded.
Around this time, I read in Ouspensky’s In Search of the Miraculous, that Gurdjieff said to be in the “Work,” a person must have a teacher because a person cannot see himself objectively. This helped me to understand how I could make such a mistake and I felt grateful for having a wise teacher and a supportive group to help me through the process. Mel Risman helped me develop emotional awareness and straighten out my confused thinking. He even had a word for my fear-based anger: “fanger.”
My mistyping experience should not be generalized. Each type and each individual has their own unique process. Some things are type-specific; for example, it was important for me to “know” and be able to explain my inner workings. As a Sixish person, it was hard to let go of the security this apparent certainty of knowing had given me.
No harm came to me when I was trying to work on my perceived type One fixation, but little progress was made. Working on issues I did not have while ignoring the real ones was a form of stagnation. I do not regret the months I spent working on type One issues. In fact, the process of mistyping myself was immensely valuable, not just because of the skills and deeper self-knowledge I gained, but as a lesson in humility.
On several occasions, I nearly wrote a piece about my typing process and what I learned from it, but I found excuses not to write. A few years have now passed and my reluctance is outweighed by my desire to encourage those who do not feel comfortable with their type to find a wise teacher, and to remind those who feel bad about a mistyping experience to remember there are no mistakes in life, only lessons to be learned.
__________ Enneagram Monthly Issue 41, July 1998
John F. Howe MBA is a business consultant and certified Enneagram teacher. Originally from Britain, he relocated from San Francisco to Durham NC, and recently Seattle WA.
“Nasrudin ran to an appointment in a near-by town, stark naked. People asked him why. “I was in such a hurry to get dressed that I forgot my clothes.”
In this essay I share the process of discovering my Enneagram type and the life-altering lessons I learned along the way.
I was convinced of my Enneagram type One fixation after reading Riso’s Personality Types and Palmer’s The Enneagram. I was amazed by the insights contained in the type descriptions—it was as if they had been written specially for me. A friend had introduced me to the Enneagram, and she confirmed my type. I felt overjoyed as I experienced that magical Enneagram ”Aha!” moment. At last, I could understand myself and explain my behavior.
For years, I had recorded self-observations and accumulated self-knowledge; my binder was over an inch thick. It seemed a disparate collection of traits with no underlying theme to connect the dots, but now the Enneagram had given me an outline and the picture was clear.
After reading many books about the Enneagram, it became my belief system and religion. Knowing my Enneagram type gave my life a sense of purpose and meaning that had been missing; my life’s work was to transcend my false self by being present and working on the unhealthy aspects of my type One fixation through ego-reduction.
I attended Enneagram classes, including a workshop exclusively for Ones. I became a type One exemplar. I sat on panels and was interviewed about my type One fixation. Around this time, I decided I wanted to become an Enneagram teacher myself. I wanted to deepen my study of the Enneagram and help others learn from it. So I enrolled in a professional training program.
Shortly before the training, I attended a meeting of a group led by Mel Risman at his home in Berkeley. Mel and others in the group told me I was not a type One, but a type Six. I resisted this idea strongly and argued my case for having a type One fixation. During the ensuing debate, I became angry and lashed out verbally. Some group members were upset and cried. I left.
My head was spinning and I felt numb. Could it be so? I recalled when I sat on a panel and a member of the audience said: “You seem really in your head for a type One.” I remembered how I alone would not participate in movement exercises at Beverly Sorensen’s workshop for type Ones. I did not really understand the Six fixation. I had not studied it half as much as type One nor did I know many Sixes.
My resistance was too strong and I kept returning to the evidence of Oneishness I had constructed by matching known type One traits to my own observed behavior. I was so emotionally invested in having a type One fixation that I could not be open-minded and consider the alternatives. I tried to reassure myself by taking type tests which all indicated a type One fixation.
The Enneagram had been my main focus for the last year. Could I have spent so much time and thought and come up with the wrong conclusion? How hideously embarrassing to have been helping others with their types when I had mistyped myself. I began to feel crushed.
For three days, I walked around in a daze. Then it occurred to me that if I could be wrong about my Enneagram type, then I could be wrong about many other things. This was what I had been resisting: the acceptance of the limits of my own mind and the extent of my ignorance. My pride was shattered and my sense of security was threatened, not just by having mistyped myself but by the admission of my own fallibility. I was concerned about what others might think about me, but I was more scared of how harshly I would judge myself.
I began to see how I had mis-mapped my observed behavior to type One traits. I had mistaken my aggressive reactivity for anger, my skepticism and rebelliousness for criticality, and doubting mind for critical mind. What I thought was the perfectionism of type One was in fact a fear of mistakes reinforced by a grasping need for certainty.
As I understood the Six fixation more deeply, I recognized my emotional volatility, my feelings of inferiority, and the anxiety which, like the air I breathe, is all around me but hardly noticed. The anxiety drives me to quickly resolve ambiguity and uncertainty—for example, wanting to “nail down my type” right away…
I have noticed in my meditation, that even random thoughts can cause feelings to arise, and those feelings often motivate my behavior—especially if I am not present. While I had observed and recorded my behavior, I had not examined the underlying motivations. I had to go deeper. I saw myself as an angry young man but had not noticed the rage was caused by fear. It is an eerie moment when you first realize you live constantly in fear and have been oblivious to it.
One of the worst aspects of thinking you have the wrong Enneagram fixation is the transition from fantasy to reality. I thought I was this incredibly healthy type One: “Well, I must be pretty enlightened because I don’t suffer from any the bad type One stuff.” The reality was less alluring and meant accepting unpleasant type Six traits I had been in denial about.
I felt so stupid about mistyping myself that I nearly withdrew from the professional training course. How could I teach people about the Enneagram if I couldn’t even type myself? I attended the course though my aspirations were now more personal than teaching-related. I explained the painful process of mistyping myself at the first opportunity. There were ten others on the course. Five of them changed their type during the week! This made me feel less of a fool. At every course, training or group I have attended, someone has changed his or her type. For a while I suspected it was my influence, then I figured it just happens all the time, especially to those who learned the Enneagram from books or from an acquaintance.
Ones and counterphobic Sixes can be lookalike types according to Naranjo in Character and Neurosis (p. 228). Naranjo found counterphobic Sixes represented in the MBTI type ENTJ (p. 229). My MBTI type is ENTJ.
I get angry often and quickly, so I assumed I must be an anger type. It is much harder to see the flash of fear that precedes the explosion of my temper. It happens so fast there is no time to observe it.
There is a clue, however, in the nature of my anger, which at its worst can be an aggressive outburst of vicious insults and wild threats. The threats are a manifestation of my defensiveness. They are a way of warning off others and avoiding repetition of whatever situation upset me. It is the snarling and bared teeth of a guard dog. Oneish anger has a different quality, perhaps less hot-blooded.
Around this time, I read in Ouspensky’s In Search of the Miraculous, that Gurdjieff said to be in the “Work,” a person must have a teacher because a person cannot see himself objectively. This helped me to understand how I could make such a mistake and I felt grateful for having a wise teacher and a supportive group to help me through the process. Mel Risman helped me develop emotional awareness and straighten out my confused thinking. He even had a word for my fear-based anger: “fanger.”
My mistyping experience should not be generalized. Each type and each individual has their own unique process. Some things are type-specific; for example, it was important for me to “know” and be able to explain my inner workings. As a Sixish person, it was hard to let go of the security this apparent certainty of knowing had given me.
No harm came to me when I was trying to work on my perceived type One fixation, but little progress was made. Working on issues I did not have while ignoring the real ones was a form of stagnation. I do not regret the months I spent working on type One issues. In fact, the process of mistyping myself was immensely valuable, not just because of the skills and deeper self-knowledge I gained, but as a lesson in humility.
On several occasions, I nearly wrote a piece about my typing process and what I learned from it, but I found excuses not to write. A few years have now passed and my reluctance is outweighed by my desire to encourage those who do not feel comfortable with their type to find a wise teacher, and to remind those who feel bad about a mistyping experience to remember there are no mistakes in life, only lessons to be learned.
__________ Enneagram Monthly Issue 41, July 1998
John F. Howe MBA is a business consultant and certified Enneagram teacher. Originally from Britain, he relocated from San Francisco to Durham NC, and recently Seattle WA.