What's the Point?
Joel M. Rothaizer (Ashoka), Type 3
This article is about what I’ve learned, on my particular journey, about how the enneagram can be a tool for both freedom and bondage.
All of us need to ask what we truly want. To what are we truly committed? Most all of us would say that we want to be happy, to be at peace. Most people still believe that happiness lies in attaining or getting rid of some objects of consciousness: if I just had the right lover, if I just had enough money, if I could just feel really healthy, then I’d be really happy. Those with a more therapeutic bent may feel that: if I could just get in touch with my anger, if I could heal my inner child, if I could just work through some early memories, then I could be free. Within the human potential movement if might be: if I could just keep my agreements, if I could just clarify, visualize and manifest my goals, then I’d be more happy. Even those on a spiritual path have generally traded in those objects of consciousness for others: if I could just understand this theory, if I could just find the time to meditate more, if I could just get all of my chakras opened, if I could just master this particular practice, if I could just reach the next level, then I’d be closer to enlightenment.
I’m sure I’m like most of you out there. I’ve gone for that lover, that job, that healing, those goals. I’ve attended countless workshops, dutifully followed a large number of spiritual practices, etc. Through it all, though, there was the nagging awareness that something was missing.
A few have come to the awareness that true and lasting happiness can never be dependent on any objects of consciousness, whether material, physical, mental, emotional or spiritual. The only thing we can count on, with any objects of consciousness, is that they change. Sometimes relationships are working, sometimes not. Financial and physical conditions fluctuate. Everything changes. Like it or not, eventually this body will rot and we’ll have neither relationships, money, health, understanding, nor spiritual practice.
Some conclude that the pursuit of true happiness, true peace, true tranquillity is illusory. Others have had glimpses of a profound Peace that is beyond any objects of consciousness. Having experienced desireless Bliss that exploded and then faded, they may then spent their lives seeking to reclaim and reside in this state.
That awareness of a deep peace within can arise in so many ways. Most of us have had it, at least to some degree. For some it was fleeting, for some it remained for a considerable period of time. For some it was something that got filed away in a secret part of memory, rarely to be shared, and not directly influencing day-to-day life. For others it had a powerful life transforming impact, and nothing is ever again the same.
There are many names given to such transcendent experiences. Some call it finding God, or experiencing Spirit or Essence. Some call it the Higher Self, or just Self. Many view it as an experience, sort of like a place we can visit now and then. Others have the direct knowing that rather than being just a place to visit, this profound Peace is who we are. For the purpose of this article, I’ll talk about this transcendent deep peace as simply being Home.
So how does this relate to the enneagram? There are so many equations, “if I just had X then I’d be Y,” where “X” is some object of consciousness and “Y” is lasting happiness, freedom, security, comfort, etc. It seemed to me that these attempts to find lasting states of being in changing objects of consciousness only leads to frustration and suffering. The enneagram’s great gift is in describing nine strategy clusters for “getting” something, nine belief systems regarding how one can achieve some state, nine misguided attempts to find Home.
I should say something about my background. The spiritual lineage with which I resonate comes from Ramana Maharshi, and most principally his disciple H.W.L. Poonja (Papaji). My experience, consistent with this lineage, is that what we have always been seeking (peace, love, happiness) is always immediately available because it is who we are. It is what is effortlessly revealed when we stop struggling, when the mind quiets, when we give up the search, when we stop seeking some external (or even internal) source for happiness. “Home” is available right here, right now, but it’s the very pursuit of it, the very strategies to which we cling, that close the door on actually having happiness, peace, freedom, etc. Fulfillment comes from emptiness, not from getting more of anything (including knowledge, concepts, belief systems). The enneagram describes these strategies to which we cling which inadvertently cause suffering. I’ll be using the term “fixation” to refer to any following of those strategies, any attempt to find lasting happiness in objects of consciousness.
Those of us who have had even a glimpse of that Peace know that there is a “heaven.” I’ve heard the “ego” defined as that which obscures conscious abidance in the Self (being Home). The enneagram describes how we leave “heaven” and descend into one of nine versions of a personal “hell.” In that “hell” we forget that we are Peace itself, and we go looking for it. We become attached to a particular version of “me” and “my story.” We begin acting from the belief that something “out there” or even “in here” will give us what we most deeply want, and we create suffering for ourselves and for others.
My experience has been that my ego structure, that of a self-preservation Three, creates particular filters through which I view myself and all the other objects of consciousness When I’m attached to that structure, when I get carried by the waves of its ego movement, I find that lasting peace and happiness is always off in some distance, tantalizingly on the horizon, something I can achieve if I just do enough “X.” When I hold onto nothing (including any spiritual experience or idea that I’ve acquired some special spiritual knowledge), welcoming everything and resisting nothing, I naturally and consciously reside in that most pristine Silence. I’m consciously Home.
I’ve found the enneagram to be extraordinarily powerful in serving this awareness. The enneagram is a map of egoic movement. It shows how we leave Home, how we descend into “hell.” It reveals the whole structure of how we create suffering for ourselves and for others, how we search for something permanent in the world of the impermanent. It identifies the subtleties of egoic movement, the ways in which we fool ourselves into believing we’re being spontaneous, believing we’re acting freely, believing that we’re “getting somewhere.” We discover that we’re often acting as egoic robots, cleverly programmed to believe we’re acting from free will. Used correctly, the enneagram provides a point of awareness from which we can begin to unravel the egoic knot.
More correctly stated, the enneagram has the potential to assist us in seeing the suffering that resides in all egoic structures. It can also be used (and often is used) to deepen egoic identification. Some enneagram teachers devote equal time to the strengths of each type, the particular assets each brings to relationships, organizations, etc. Positive names are given to each point: The Leader, The Motivator, The Supporter, The Thinker, etc., etc. On face value there would seem to be some validity for that. Isn’t a Three useful in helping to get people pumped up? Isn’t it great to have a Two who monitors people’s needs? Aren’t we all fortunate to have an Eight who can take charge and get things done? The problem is that when enneagram teachers are discussing the strengths of each type, it seems to me that they are almost always referring to what’s positive about each type while it’s still in fixation. With healthy development we’re in relatively less fixation, to be sure. But as long as we’re still in fixation, no matter how subtle, we continue to cause unnecessary suffering for ourselves and others, no matter how things look on the surface.
When I began to honestly examine my own behavior I found that as long as I was in any way attached to the Three fixation, everything I did was contaminated by a deep selfishness, where others were objects to hopefully please this egoic structure. No matter how any behavior appeared on the outside, there was a selfish root. True love and compassion were masked, and at best imitated, except in those blessed moments when fixation relaxed or dropped. For example, I received a lot of approval throughout my life for being someone who was “good to talk to,” and I suppose I was. However, while in college I had the uncomfortable realization that internally I’d get really upset if someone “got better” and didn’t need my help any more, or if they talked to someone else about their problems instead of me. On the egoic level, I clearly was less interested in their well-being than in my own. Similarly, Twos in fixation aren’t really “giving,” they’re taking. Nines in fixation aren’t true “peacemakers,” they’re placators who aren’t willing to bear the discomfort that it would take to truly deal with the issues at hand. And so it goes with all the types and their “strengths.” Each type certainly has unique gifts which are revealed when fixation drops. As long as there’s fixation, however, people at best display the imitation of those gifts. Ultimately the only good fixation is a dissolved fixation.
There’s nothing wrong with focusing on the positive aspects of each type (in fixation) if one is still at the stage of ego strengthening. Everything has it place. The problem is that at this stage one still believes that deep and lasting happiness comes from augmenting those strengths and watching out for the type’s particular pitfalls, and this is a limiting idea. As long as I’m operating within the relative world, the world of objects of consciousness, I can achieve relative results. Perhaps I can decrease my suffering and increase my happiness. Unfortunately, however, one must ultimately consider the possibility that this very pursuit of happiness obscures the true source of it. When we’re busy trying to “get somewhere,” trying “work on ourselves,” we miss the discovery that deep and lasting peace resides where most of us are least likely to look, in the blissful silence that’s revealed when we stop the efforting and the doing, when we welcome everything, even our pain and suffering.
I know so many people who devote such energy to “working on themselves.” With great sincerity they process early life traumas, reflect on their feelings, and do a variety of other practices to free themselves from limiting beliefs and patterns. Some do so with the enneagram as a principle frame of reference. I too have “worked on myself” so much in this lifetime. When I stepped back, however, I had to come to terms with the fact that the more I processed the more I found to process, that there didn’t seem to be an end in sight. Perhaps “you can’t get there from here?”
I’ve generally loved and recommended Riso/Hudson’s new edition of Personality Types. It’s a major contribution, and my partner and I have all of our workshop participants read it. The nine “levels of development” are a really useful way of showing the range of behaviors within each type, from least fixation to deepest fixation. Their “level one” reflects a remarkable degree of health, and can serve as a beacon for people to see what’s possible as their fixation weakens. Despite the beauty of the “level one” descriptions, however, my sense is that there’s still something more that’s revealed at each enneagram point when egoic attachment has truly dropped. This could be aptly called a “level zero,” the fully awakened manifestation of each type, a level where all sense of “me” as a separate individual has dissolved. At this level it becomes nine flavors of desirelessness, nine flavors of pure Self expression where all duality has disappeared.
As I’ve said, my particular egoic structure is that of a self-preservation Three. At first I saw the grossest aspects of this fixation. During my first enneagram workshop, for example, a man was talking to me and I realized that, within the fixation, I really didn’t care what he had to say. Inwardly I was impatient for him to stop talking so I could say something that was really significant and of course impressive. The awareness of the selfishness of that was quite uncomfortable. Well, there’s actually some deceit in that statement as well. It would have been quite uncomfortable, even unbearable, if I’d slowed down enough to really feel the depth of the selfishness fully. Instead, I of course managed to put a positive spin on the awareness and shared it in an optimistic way that turned it into a “win,” attempting to gain the approval of the workshop leader and participants in the process. I recognized the enormous power of the enneagram in that first workshop and it has been with me consciously on a daily basis since then.
The enneagram presents such a profound framework for understanding ourselves and others. It can facilitate the dropping of so many veils from our perception, resulting in an ever-deepening clarity regarding what drives our behavior and that of others. Some authors (e.g., Tom Condon) aptly talk about the fixations as hypnotic trances, where there are more awakened and more entranced versions of each type. The enneagram can be used to awaken from fixation, and it can also be abused and used to deepen fixation, to deepen identification with the ego. It can support freedom or bondage. It’s a two-edged sword.
How can the enneagram be both a tool for liberation and for bondage? It becomes a tool for bondage when one believes that one is one’s fixation. It then becomes an excuse for behavior, a way to avoid taking responsibility. But I am not a Three. In the absence of identification with the egoic structure called “point Three,” I’m consciously Home. The value of the enneagram is in revealing who I am NOT, but have come to believe I am. When people identify the fixation as who they ARE, they solidify their identification with the egoic structure, and thus also solidify their attachment to illusion and suffering.
I began a process of self-exploration and opening around the age of twenty that became the central feature of my life. The journey included psychotherapy, personal growth, the human potential movement, living on a spiritual commune, sitting with enlightened teachers, doing countless spiritual and meditation practices, and much more. Later, in my initial enneagram workshop, I looked at my whole life and saw that virtually all of it had been contaminated by the motivation of the Three fixation, and much of what I’d done had inadvertently strengthened the fixation. Once I entered a system I would begin to turn it into an achievement vehicle. This unfortunately required significant self-deception. Whatever “deep understanding” was supposed to look like, that’s who I “was,” or at least thought I was. In order to fit in I generally turned off my discernment. What looked like surrender was really abdication of responsibility. I added to my spiritual resume, at times even making a list of all the enlightened beings with whom I’d sat.
Fortunately, my exposure to the enneagram coincided with direct experiences of being Home. For twenty years I’d done so much, tried so hard to re-experience the peace I’d discovered in that public meditation. The ultimate cosmic joke was revealed: the belief in an “I” who had to make some efforts to be free was what had always been in the way of residing in that inner peace. The enneagram became a tool to show the egoic movements through which I left inner peace and re-created “hell.” That which I had longed for was always present, but my consciousness did not always reside there. The enneagram was a map of the particular habitual desire structure within this Three-ness, the actual routes into “hell.”
There were ongoing discoveries. I found that the first movement of the egoic structure often could be experienced in the eyes, as a kind of pressure, a reaching out to the other to get approval. I explored how this egoic structure could co-opt spiritual truth and use it to support fixation, e.g., using principles like spiritual detachment to support an aloof and arrogant position, or using an awareness of the illusory nature of reality to support the Three’s defense of not feeling things authentically and deeply.
I learned that when I was really present in my life there was an exquisite vulnerability, neither resisting nor hanging on to any experience, while in the egoic imitation there was a numbness, a lack of compassion. I found that compassion and gratitude were not qualities that needed to be developed (although the Three dutifully did the appropriate exercises), but rather qualities that were naturally present whenever the egoic movement slowed or stopped.
I discovered that I’d been doing meditation instead of being meditation. I discovered that most of my acquired “spiritual wisdom” was only borrowed and imitated. I discovered the extent of my spiritual ego, internal deceit and spiritual fraudulence. In the unmasking and revelation of that, I also directly experienced the profound fear of humiliation that runs beneath the Three fixation.
I discovered that when one chooses to Stop, chooses to not follow the egoic tendencies, one must be willing to face all the “demons” that run the fixation. Threes seem to have a particular flavor of agitation, a need to constantly be doing something. I found that there were layers of anger, sadness, fear, hopelessness, and dread that had been hidden by that agitation. I then understood much of why so many people experience inner peace and yet move back into egoic patterns, why they find Home and then leave. In the stopping of egoic movement there’s much bliss, but that bliss must also welcome everything that has been repressed for so long. We can’t welcome “peace” without welcoming “pain.” This only sounds bad to the mind; however, I discovered that when one dives into the heart of that which has been avoided, rather than running from it, one finds peace at the core of everything.
Using the enneagram, what promotes liberation and what promotes bondage? What supports a quiet mind and an open heart, and what supports further egoic identification? This seems a very important question for on-going discussion. For example, what degree of complexity is useful in supporting freedom, and what adds to egoic bondage?
The interviews with Oscar Ichazo seem to have generated considerable controversy. Rock et al. wrote that Oscar sees the enneagram as a doorway into authentic enlightenment, rather than being a mere psychology typology, and that “the ego-fixations are the mechanisms by which we hold ourselves to be separate.” This is my experience as well, that the ego fixations represent the particular ways in which we create a special “me” with its particular desires and attachments, and that identification with this fixation is the barrier to true awakening. I also deeply resonate with the value of self-examination, recognizing the subtleties of egoic movement and being willing to not follow them, no matter what demons must then be faced.
At the same time, I wonder about the value of trying to understand the degree of conceptual complexity that I find in the interviews. When does more knowledge add to the unraveling of the egoic knot, and when does it deepen the sense that there’s a separate “I” who has achieved some very special “knowledge?” When does more knowledge allow the mind to let go of its grip, and when does it strengthen its grip with the belief “I’ll be so much freer if I can just understand these concepts?” When people meet in study groups to understand complexities, how does this facilitate a quiet mind and an open heart?
I also question that one has to work through levels or stages of anything in order to be free. My experience continues to be that freedom is instantly available when identification with the egoic structure stops. Stillness is our birthright, it is who we are, and there is no efforting necessary to reside in who we already are. What seems required is a relaxed vigilance, the resolve to not follow egoic movement, noticing the tendencies and not following them. Fulfillment comes from emptiness. It’s a letting go, not an adding-on.
I was just talking to a friend of mine who’s still active in a spiritual group to which I used to belong. We had an interesting discussion. This group is similar to many others in which a teacher tells you what to do in order to be free. I experience the ego as a sense of agitation, the belief that I have to do something in order to be free. In these spiritual communities, there seems to be a tendency to replace one set of desires for objects of consciousness (more money, more prestige, etc.) with another set of desires for objects of consciousness (better service, deeper meditation, the approval of the teacher, etc.). Home is still somewhere out on the horizon. Perhaps these spiritual teachings inadvertently reinforce what I call do-ality, the belief that there’s something I need to do in order to be free. Ultimately, perhaps, despite the best of intentions, something fundamental doesn’t change. Material agitation gets replaced by spiritual agitation. Then, what’s the point?
When I read and hear from the top names in the enneagram world, I find much of the information useful. I also notice that some of these people (but not all) seem to have developed their own arrogance of “I know more than the others do. I’m right, they’re wrong.” Their presentation contain eruptions of egohood, “me-ness,” specialness, competitiveness. I recognize all too well the arrogance of this “I know” as being a reflection of an unquiet mind. Perhaps for some the enneagram has stopped being an instrument of liberation, and instead is one of bondage. Then, what’s the point?
All I can recommend is that each of us get clear on what we truly want, and then deeply ask ourselves what supports freedom and what supports bondage.
__________ Enneagram Monthly, Issue 26, April 1997
All of us need to ask what we truly want. To what are we truly committed? Most all of us would say that we want to be happy, to be at peace. Most people still believe that happiness lies in attaining or getting rid of some objects of consciousness: if I just had the right lover, if I just had enough money, if I could just feel really healthy, then I’d be really happy. Those with a more therapeutic bent may feel that: if I could just get in touch with my anger, if I could heal my inner child, if I could just work through some early memories, then I could be free. Within the human potential movement if might be: if I could just keep my agreements, if I could just clarify, visualize and manifest my goals, then I’d be more happy. Even those on a spiritual path have generally traded in those objects of consciousness for others: if I could just understand this theory, if I could just find the time to meditate more, if I could just get all of my chakras opened, if I could just master this particular practice, if I could just reach the next level, then I’d be closer to enlightenment.
I’m sure I’m like most of you out there. I’ve gone for that lover, that job, that healing, those goals. I’ve attended countless workshops, dutifully followed a large number of spiritual practices, etc. Through it all, though, there was the nagging awareness that something was missing.
A few have come to the awareness that true and lasting happiness can never be dependent on any objects of consciousness, whether material, physical, mental, emotional or spiritual. The only thing we can count on, with any objects of consciousness, is that they change. Sometimes relationships are working, sometimes not. Financial and physical conditions fluctuate. Everything changes. Like it or not, eventually this body will rot and we’ll have neither relationships, money, health, understanding, nor spiritual practice.
Some conclude that the pursuit of true happiness, true peace, true tranquillity is illusory. Others have had glimpses of a profound Peace that is beyond any objects of consciousness. Having experienced desireless Bliss that exploded and then faded, they may then spent their lives seeking to reclaim and reside in this state.
That awareness of a deep peace within can arise in so many ways. Most of us have had it, at least to some degree. For some it was fleeting, for some it remained for a considerable period of time. For some it was something that got filed away in a secret part of memory, rarely to be shared, and not directly influencing day-to-day life. For others it had a powerful life transforming impact, and nothing is ever again the same.
There are many names given to such transcendent experiences. Some call it finding God, or experiencing Spirit or Essence. Some call it the Higher Self, or just Self. Many view it as an experience, sort of like a place we can visit now and then. Others have the direct knowing that rather than being just a place to visit, this profound Peace is who we are. For the purpose of this article, I’ll talk about this transcendent deep peace as simply being Home.
So how does this relate to the enneagram? There are so many equations, “if I just had X then I’d be Y,” where “X” is some object of consciousness and “Y” is lasting happiness, freedom, security, comfort, etc. It seemed to me that these attempts to find lasting states of being in changing objects of consciousness only leads to frustration and suffering. The enneagram’s great gift is in describing nine strategy clusters for “getting” something, nine belief systems regarding how one can achieve some state, nine misguided attempts to find Home.
I should say something about my background. The spiritual lineage with which I resonate comes from Ramana Maharshi, and most principally his disciple H.W.L. Poonja (Papaji). My experience, consistent with this lineage, is that what we have always been seeking (peace, love, happiness) is always immediately available because it is who we are. It is what is effortlessly revealed when we stop struggling, when the mind quiets, when we give up the search, when we stop seeking some external (or even internal) source for happiness. “Home” is available right here, right now, but it’s the very pursuit of it, the very strategies to which we cling, that close the door on actually having happiness, peace, freedom, etc. Fulfillment comes from emptiness, not from getting more of anything (including knowledge, concepts, belief systems). The enneagram describes these strategies to which we cling which inadvertently cause suffering. I’ll be using the term “fixation” to refer to any following of those strategies, any attempt to find lasting happiness in objects of consciousness.
Those of us who have had even a glimpse of that Peace know that there is a “heaven.” I’ve heard the “ego” defined as that which obscures conscious abidance in the Self (being Home). The enneagram describes how we leave “heaven” and descend into one of nine versions of a personal “hell.” In that “hell” we forget that we are Peace itself, and we go looking for it. We become attached to a particular version of “me” and “my story.” We begin acting from the belief that something “out there” or even “in here” will give us what we most deeply want, and we create suffering for ourselves and for others.
My experience has been that my ego structure, that of a self-preservation Three, creates particular filters through which I view myself and all the other objects of consciousness When I’m attached to that structure, when I get carried by the waves of its ego movement, I find that lasting peace and happiness is always off in some distance, tantalizingly on the horizon, something I can achieve if I just do enough “X.” When I hold onto nothing (including any spiritual experience or idea that I’ve acquired some special spiritual knowledge), welcoming everything and resisting nothing, I naturally and consciously reside in that most pristine Silence. I’m consciously Home.
I’ve found the enneagram to be extraordinarily powerful in serving this awareness. The enneagram is a map of egoic movement. It shows how we leave Home, how we descend into “hell.” It reveals the whole structure of how we create suffering for ourselves and for others, how we search for something permanent in the world of the impermanent. It identifies the subtleties of egoic movement, the ways in which we fool ourselves into believing we’re being spontaneous, believing we’re acting freely, believing that we’re “getting somewhere.” We discover that we’re often acting as egoic robots, cleverly programmed to believe we’re acting from free will. Used correctly, the enneagram provides a point of awareness from which we can begin to unravel the egoic knot.
More correctly stated, the enneagram has the potential to assist us in seeing the suffering that resides in all egoic structures. It can also be used (and often is used) to deepen egoic identification. Some enneagram teachers devote equal time to the strengths of each type, the particular assets each brings to relationships, organizations, etc. Positive names are given to each point: The Leader, The Motivator, The Supporter, The Thinker, etc., etc. On face value there would seem to be some validity for that. Isn’t a Three useful in helping to get people pumped up? Isn’t it great to have a Two who monitors people’s needs? Aren’t we all fortunate to have an Eight who can take charge and get things done? The problem is that when enneagram teachers are discussing the strengths of each type, it seems to me that they are almost always referring to what’s positive about each type while it’s still in fixation. With healthy development we’re in relatively less fixation, to be sure. But as long as we’re still in fixation, no matter how subtle, we continue to cause unnecessary suffering for ourselves and others, no matter how things look on the surface.
When I began to honestly examine my own behavior I found that as long as I was in any way attached to the Three fixation, everything I did was contaminated by a deep selfishness, where others were objects to hopefully please this egoic structure. No matter how any behavior appeared on the outside, there was a selfish root. True love and compassion were masked, and at best imitated, except in those blessed moments when fixation relaxed or dropped. For example, I received a lot of approval throughout my life for being someone who was “good to talk to,” and I suppose I was. However, while in college I had the uncomfortable realization that internally I’d get really upset if someone “got better” and didn’t need my help any more, or if they talked to someone else about their problems instead of me. On the egoic level, I clearly was less interested in their well-being than in my own. Similarly, Twos in fixation aren’t really “giving,” they’re taking. Nines in fixation aren’t true “peacemakers,” they’re placators who aren’t willing to bear the discomfort that it would take to truly deal with the issues at hand. And so it goes with all the types and their “strengths.” Each type certainly has unique gifts which are revealed when fixation drops. As long as there’s fixation, however, people at best display the imitation of those gifts. Ultimately the only good fixation is a dissolved fixation.
There’s nothing wrong with focusing on the positive aspects of each type (in fixation) if one is still at the stage of ego strengthening. Everything has it place. The problem is that at this stage one still believes that deep and lasting happiness comes from augmenting those strengths and watching out for the type’s particular pitfalls, and this is a limiting idea. As long as I’m operating within the relative world, the world of objects of consciousness, I can achieve relative results. Perhaps I can decrease my suffering and increase my happiness. Unfortunately, however, one must ultimately consider the possibility that this very pursuit of happiness obscures the true source of it. When we’re busy trying to “get somewhere,” trying “work on ourselves,” we miss the discovery that deep and lasting peace resides where most of us are least likely to look, in the blissful silence that’s revealed when we stop the efforting and the doing, when we welcome everything, even our pain and suffering.
I know so many people who devote such energy to “working on themselves.” With great sincerity they process early life traumas, reflect on their feelings, and do a variety of other practices to free themselves from limiting beliefs and patterns. Some do so with the enneagram as a principle frame of reference. I too have “worked on myself” so much in this lifetime. When I stepped back, however, I had to come to terms with the fact that the more I processed the more I found to process, that there didn’t seem to be an end in sight. Perhaps “you can’t get there from here?”
I’ve generally loved and recommended Riso/Hudson’s new edition of Personality Types. It’s a major contribution, and my partner and I have all of our workshop participants read it. The nine “levels of development” are a really useful way of showing the range of behaviors within each type, from least fixation to deepest fixation. Their “level one” reflects a remarkable degree of health, and can serve as a beacon for people to see what’s possible as their fixation weakens. Despite the beauty of the “level one” descriptions, however, my sense is that there’s still something more that’s revealed at each enneagram point when egoic attachment has truly dropped. This could be aptly called a “level zero,” the fully awakened manifestation of each type, a level where all sense of “me” as a separate individual has dissolved. At this level it becomes nine flavors of desirelessness, nine flavors of pure Self expression where all duality has disappeared.
As I’ve said, my particular egoic structure is that of a self-preservation Three. At first I saw the grossest aspects of this fixation. During my first enneagram workshop, for example, a man was talking to me and I realized that, within the fixation, I really didn’t care what he had to say. Inwardly I was impatient for him to stop talking so I could say something that was really significant and of course impressive. The awareness of the selfishness of that was quite uncomfortable. Well, there’s actually some deceit in that statement as well. It would have been quite uncomfortable, even unbearable, if I’d slowed down enough to really feel the depth of the selfishness fully. Instead, I of course managed to put a positive spin on the awareness and shared it in an optimistic way that turned it into a “win,” attempting to gain the approval of the workshop leader and participants in the process. I recognized the enormous power of the enneagram in that first workshop and it has been with me consciously on a daily basis since then.
The enneagram presents such a profound framework for understanding ourselves and others. It can facilitate the dropping of so many veils from our perception, resulting in an ever-deepening clarity regarding what drives our behavior and that of others. Some authors (e.g., Tom Condon) aptly talk about the fixations as hypnotic trances, where there are more awakened and more entranced versions of each type. The enneagram can be used to awaken from fixation, and it can also be abused and used to deepen fixation, to deepen identification with the ego. It can support freedom or bondage. It’s a two-edged sword.
How can the enneagram be both a tool for liberation and for bondage? It becomes a tool for bondage when one believes that one is one’s fixation. It then becomes an excuse for behavior, a way to avoid taking responsibility. But I am not a Three. In the absence of identification with the egoic structure called “point Three,” I’m consciously Home. The value of the enneagram is in revealing who I am NOT, but have come to believe I am. When people identify the fixation as who they ARE, they solidify their identification with the egoic structure, and thus also solidify their attachment to illusion and suffering.
I began a process of self-exploration and opening around the age of twenty that became the central feature of my life. The journey included psychotherapy, personal growth, the human potential movement, living on a spiritual commune, sitting with enlightened teachers, doing countless spiritual and meditation practices, and much more. Later, in my initial enneagram workshop, I looked at my whole life and saw that virtually all of it had been contaminated by the motivation of the Three fixation, and much of what I’d done had inadvertently strengthened the fixation. Once I entered a system I would begin to turn it into an achievement vehicle. This unfortunately required significant self-deception. Whatever “deep understanding” was supposed to look like, that’s who I “was,” or at least thought I was. In order to fit in I generally turned off my discernment. What looked like surrender was really abdication of responsibility. I added to my spiritual resume, at times even making a list of all the enlightened beings with whom I’d sat.
Fortunately, my exposure to the enneagram coincided with direct experiences of being Home. For twenty years I’d done so much, tried so hard to re-experience the peace I’d discovered in that public meditation. The ultimate cosmic joke was revealed: the belief in an “I” who had to make some efforts to be free was what had always been in the way of residing in that inner peace. The enneagram became a tool to show the egoic movements through which I left inner peace and re-created “hell.” That which I had longed for was always present, but my consciousness did not always reside there. The enneagram was a map of the particular habitual desire structure within this Three-ness, the actual routes into “hell.”
There were ongoing discoveries. I found that the first movement of the egoic structure often could be experienced in the eyes, as a kind of pressure, a reaching out to the other to get approval. I explored how this egoic structure could co-opt spiritual truth and use it to support fixation, e.g., using principles like spiritual detachment to support an aloof and arrogant position, or using an awareness of the illusory nature of reality to support the Three’s defense of not feeling things authentically and deeply.
I learned that when I was really present in my life there was an exquisite vulnerability, neither resisting nor hanging on to any experience, while in the egoic imitation there was a numbness, a lack of compassion. I found that compassion and gratitude were not qualities that needed to be developed (although the Three dutifully did the appropriate exercises), but rather qualities that were naturally present whenever the egoic movement slowed or stopped.
I discovered that I’d been doing meditation instead of being meditation. I discovered that most of my acquired “spiritual wisdom” was only borrowed and imitated. I discovered the extent of my spiritual ego, internal deceit and spiritual fraudulence. In the unmasking and revelation of that, I also directly experienced the profound fear of humiliation that runs beneath the Three fixation.
I discovered that when one chooses to Stop, chooses to not follow the egoic tendencies, one must be willing to face all the “demons” that run the fixation. Threes seem to have a particular flavor of agitation, a need to constantly be doing something. I found that there were layers of anger, sadness, fear, hopelessness, and dread that had been hidden by that agitation. I then understood much of why so many people experience inner peace and yet move back into egoic patterns, why they find Home and then leave. In the stopping of egoic movement there’s much bliss, but that bliss must also welcome everything that has been repressed for so long. We can’t welcome “peace” without welcoming “pain.” This only sounds bad to the mind; however, I discovered that when one dives into the heart of that which has been avoided, rather than running from it, one finds peace at the core of everything.
Using the enneagram, what promotes liberation and what promotes bondage? What supports a quiet mind and an open heart, and what supports further egoic identification? This seems a very important question for on-going discussion. For example, what degree of complexity is useful in supporting freedom, and what adds to egoic bondage?
The interviews with Oscar Ichazo seem to have generated considerable controversy. Rock et al. wrote that Oscar sees the enneagram as a doorway into authentic enlightenment, rather than being a mere psychology typology, and that “the ego-fixations are the mechanisms by which we hold ourselves to be separate.” This is my experience as well, that the ego fixations represent the particular ways in which we create a special “me” with its particular desires and attachments, and that identification with this fixation is the barrier to true awakening. I also deeply resonate with the value of self-examination, recognizing the subtleties of egoic movement and being willing to not follow them, no matter what demons must then be faced.
At the same time, I wonder about the value of trying to understand the degree of conceptual complexity that I find in the interviews. When does more knowledge add to the unraveling of the egoic knot, and when does it deepen the sense that there’s a separate “I” who has achieved some very special “knowledge?” When does more knowledge allow the mind to let go of its grip, and when does it strengthen its grip with the belief “I’ll be so much freer if I can just understand these concepts?” When people meet in study groups to understand complexities, how does this facilitate a quiet mind and an open heart?
I also question that one has to work through levels or stages of anything in order to be free. My experience continues to be that freedom is instantly available when identification with the egoic structure stops. Stillness is our birthright, it is who we are, and there is no efforting necessary to reside in who we already are. What seems required is a relaxed vigilance, the resolve to not follow egoic movement, noticing the tendencies and not following them. Fulfillment comes from emptiness. It’s a letting go, not an adding-on.
I was just talking to a friend of mine who’s still active in a spiritual group to which I used to belong. We had an interesting discussion. This group is similar to many others in which a teacher tells you what to do in order to be free. I experience the ego as a sense of agitation, the belief that I have to do something in order to be free. In these spiritual communities, there seems to be a tendency to replace one set of desires for objects of consciousness (more money, more prestige, etc.) with another set of desires for objects of consciousness (better service, deeper meditation, the approval of the teacher, etc.). Home is still somewhere out on the horizon. Perhaps these spiritual teachings inadvertently reinforce what I call do-ality, the belief that there’s something I need to do in order to be free. Ultimately, perhaps, despite the best of intentions, something fundamental doesn’t change. Material agitation gets replaced by spiritual agitation. Then, what’s the point?
When I read and hear from the top names in the enneagram world, I find much of the information useful. I also notice that some of these people (but not all) seem to have developed their own arrogance of “I know more than the others do. I’m right, they’re wrong.” Their presentation contain eruptions of egohood, “me-ness,” specialness, competitiveness. I recognize all too well the arrogance of this “I know” as being a reflection of an unquiet mind. Perhaps for some the enneagram has stopped being an instrument of liberation, and instead is one of bondage. Then, what’s the point?
All I can recommend is that each of us get clear on what we truly want, and then deeply ask ourselves what supports freedom and what supports bondage.
__________ Enneagram Monthly, Issue 26, April 1997