Alcohol Abuse Advice

The Enneagram and EFT

The Enneagram has been called the spiritual seeker’s Myers Briggs, and is used by millions of people around the world as a psychological tool, a vehicle for mapping the ego, and to aid in one’s spiritual growth. The word the Greek words, ennea (nine) and grammos (something written or drawn) and refers to the symbol of a nine-pointed diagram, usually within a circle. It has elements of Kabbalah, Sufism, Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism, ancient Babylonian and Egyptian principles. The Iliad and the Odyssey are even purported to be about the 9 types or 9 distinct spiritual journeys of man.

The basic personality typing of the Enneagram has been in corporations such as AT&T,

Sony, Toyota, and Boeing where they’ve applied it’s principles as a communication tool, to assist them with managing and hiring employees, for conflict resolution, and much more.

Most Enneagram authorities believe in nature over nurture as the determining factor in which type you live your life by. Our type becomes our default personality similar to an operating system in our computers. This operating system then filters how we perceive the world, how we behave, what we are motivated by, how we pursue happiness, and what we avoid to make us feel secure in the world. Some say that it is the way in which you learned to cope as a child with your separation from God.

By having some self-awareness through the Enneagram we not only discover what box we are in already but we then are presented with an opportunity to dismantle that box. When we know what our filters are we are free to become more objective about what we are experiencing in any one moment in our lives. The goal is not to transcend the ego but to actively engage it in order to change. It’s important to note that we all carry the 9 types within us and through self-actualization we become more balanced can then achieve the greatest potential for our individual type. There is no hierarchy in the numbers meaning that no one type is better than another although being human, our minds will tend to judge them as such. Although the Enneagram is a very accurate system of typography there are many variables including wings (sub-dominate types), instincts, and individual differences that make the Enneagram the most dynamic of all typology methods.

The Enneagram’s insights can be processed effectively and transformed beautifully with the use of EFT. Even if you are born into the world (as the Enneagram authorities presuppose)with a dominant nature, I find that life experiences buttress your unique perceptual reality. An example would be a person who is a type 1 who was born into an alcoholic family where being perfect became a coping mechanism. Another might be a type 8 person who attracts one

In my work with clients I never want to assess anyone’s type for them as it is much more empowering to have them discover for themselves what dominate type they are. For this I recommend the RHETI test available free online on various sites including mine.

Here are some of the labels used for each of the types followed by some suggested EFT set-up phrases to assist each one.

Read a lot more content on EFT from Alina Frank, CERT-I at Tappinginternational.com. Learn more about meridan tapping and EFT methods today!

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