Reframing Acceptance

Elisa had been reading all the right books, studying the cutting edge of current philosophy about how to reduce her suffering. She’d spent her life not speaking up but swallowing other’s perspectives like drinking a slurpie. It goes down kind of slow and sometimes gives you brain freeze when you take in too much. She was currently reading about the practice of “accepting what is” and it felt familiar. Hadn’t she been doing that already? What’s wrong with her that it doesn’t feel good when she does that?

From an Enneagram perspective, this may be the dilemma of Type Nine, called the Mediator or the Peacemaker. This is the type that tends to forget their agenda, opinions and needs to avoid conflict and keep the peace. Another brilliant survival strategy developed in childhood that ends up choking the adult. There is part of you in there that knows what she wants and she starts rebelling! That may be through depression, physical pain, or a general frustration towards life, but she will be heard. She wants to get your attention. She wants her voice!

You may be confused about this practice of “accepting what is.” Let’s start by talking about what it doesn’t mean. It does not mean withholding the truth about what you think, feel or need. In short, it does mean accepting YOUR EXPERIENCE. It does not mean reacting to your experience through suppression or aggression. It’s like shaking hands with someone you know well or even someone you’re just meeting. You greet and open to them.
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Finding the Gift Buried in the Junk

A friend of mine had a dream some years ago. She found herself in a shop, piled high with seemingly worthless junk. She felt drawn to an old trunk and when she opened it and peered inside, the bottom was a window into the vastness of the cosmos. As she gazed at the starlit universe, she knew that was her own unfathomable Self, radiant and whole, the God within.

This dream points at a deep truth.

Everything inside of you, all the stuff you think is worthless, is a potential opening into the vastness of you.

Cheryl, a fairly new client, had discovered her Enneagram type. She was excited about her new insights but was still frustrated about her ongoing reactivity. Cheryl has lists of “what if’s” and “if only’s” that keep her on edge. Nearly all of the items on her lists require that something outside of her change. “If only” her partner would be more appreciative. ”What if” this isn’t the right job for her after all?

This is the norm for most of us. If something out there would just be different, then we would be okay. We would feel worthy, have a better relationship, make more money, be more at peace and the list goes on. But like the song goes, we’re looking for love in all the wrong places!

The right place is inside of you!

You’ve got a great map, the Enneagram, and now you have to use it. You have to bring the rest of you, your body, into the exploration to make this map truly transformative. There is the beauty and vastness of the cosmos, and a deep well of peace and love, at the core of who you are. And you need to be willing to go into the “junk” store and open the trunk to find it!
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The Enneagram Raps

Maybe you think you can’t rap but think again! Put a funky attitude in your mind, get your head a boppin’ and rap these Enneagram poems. These poems were part of skit night during my professional training and, yes, I was rapping the Two…certainly not well but with spunk. So thank you to all my fellow students and teachers who created these raps (especially Lynne who wrote the first rap poem for each of the types which includes the vice and the virtue) and then all the rest including Sean, Pads, Andrea, Azwin, Sandy, Barbara and Roopa.

THE ONE

I’ll take Resentment to contentment
Use Serenity as a remedy
To turn my Anger to confection
On the way to my Perfection
The deed has been done!
I’m a One!!

There’s nothing wrong
With knowing what’s right
I look at a problem
And turn on the light
I’m certain and I’m air
I’m strong and I’m bright
But then, you all know that
Way before tonight!
I’m undeniably fun!
I’m a One!

Sean

THE TWO

My Flattery is creative
The “Juice is my Pride
When I find my Humility,
I’ll take a Freedom ride!
Don’t wait for the other shoe….
I’m a Two!!

I’m a Two
I know what to do
And I’ll do it for you
So let me through!
I’m a Two!!

Renée

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Who’s Minding Your Mind?? Moving from Tyranny to Kindness.

No, really. It’s a real question. Who did you leave in charge? By default, we almost all leave in charge of minding the “store” (our minds) a tyrant. Yep, someone may be watching, but it’s not the Observer. That’s the part of us that watches too but with a neutral stance. It’s usually a very critical Judge, evaluating what we or someone else did wrong.

Sarah is sitting at her computer, staring at the computer screen, but not seeing a thing. She is churning over a conversation she had with her brother last night on the phone. Her mind grinds through detail after detail, trying to find the place it went wrong. She’s sure she said something that made him feel distant. They used to be so close as kids and it really hurts when she doesn’t feel that old closeness. Sarah is brutal in her examination of what she remembers saying and, truly, she feels horrible. “I am a lousy sister,” she groans.

What Is The Judge?

Often called the inner critic, the Judge examines our behaviors and words, often times causing us pain. Becoming aware of our reactivity and our habitual patterns, we may become more aware of another part of our inner world. A part that often operates below the surface or just out of conscious awareness, a part that we often assume is there to help us navigate life. It tells us what is right and wrong, whether we’ve been good or bad. Like an unfriendly version of the Santa Claus of childhood, whether you’ve been naughty or nice. Of course this Santa Claus often judges others as well.
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Ready to Benefit from Listening to the Same Tapes in Your Head? Discover Your Enneagram Type.

Tom is driving to work, barely noticing the road as his thoughts pull him into another world. “I can’t believe my boss said that to me yesterday. What a jerk! I bust my butt for that place and all he can tell me is what I haven’t done perfectly.” As he pulls into the parking lot, he sighs, “I wonder what I did wrong today.” With a sense of resentment, he enters the building, still cycling through the story of yesterday in his mind, yet also sensing the familiarity of both this feeling and this story.

Why Does This Keep Happening?

There is a sense of familiarity that you may notice in the types of problems that keep cropping up in your life. These familiar issues are reflected in your thinking: same story, different day. We often find ourselves frustrated with feeling like we’ve solved an issue, only to find it coming up again and again, and with it the same kind of inner dialogue. Many of us are unaware of how much chatter is constantly going on. But stop and listen for a minute. You’ll see that there is rarely a time of quiet, of just being open and aware.
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Are You Tired of Reacting the Same Way? Take One Huge Step in Breaking Through Your Reactivity.

Mary sits at her kitchen table, again, holding her head in her hands. “Why can’t I stop getting angry,” she moans. She’s been here many times before. There’s a pit in her stomach as she weakly concludes “there’s something really wrong with me.”

Mary is remembering the argument she had with her husband last night. She’s filled with remorse for losing control and saying things she now wishes she had not.

She is feeling defeated. She felt judged when her husband commented on what a wreck the house was. Like wildfire, she burst into flames of anger blaming her husband for making her feel bad. When the flames dwindle, she’s overcome with feelings of self-hatred. She promises herself to never lose it like that again. Even as she makes the promise, she feels hopeless, knowing she probably will.

What does it mean to be reactive?

Feeling hopeless is a common response to finding ourselves in the same cycle over and over. We desperately want our reactions to be different, but we find ourselves responding the same way. Feeling reactive means feeling like we have no choice in how we respond in a situation. Mary feels out of control when she perceives herself being judged by her husband, and becomes angry and blaming. Later she blames herself, and feels ashamed, about the anger she expressed earlier. And so the cycle continues.
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