Mirror for the Soul (eBook)

A Christian Guide to the Enneagram

Alice Fryling (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2017
InterVarsity Press, LLC (Verlag)
978-0-8308-9092-7 (ISBN)

Infos

'Who in the world am I?'The Enneagram is like a mirror, reflecting dimensions of ourselves that are sometimes hard to see. In this helpful guide, spiritual director and Enneagram teacher Alice Fryling offers an introduction to each number of the Enneagram and their respective triads. More than just helping us discern our number, this book relates the Enneagram to our spiritual journey, as a way to identify our gifts as well as our blind spots. With Scripture meditations and questions for reflection and discussion, Mirror for the Soul offers a new perspective on our unique temperament so that we might know and extend God's grace more fully. Knowledge of the Enneagram leads us into more authentic self-awareness, richer relationships, and deeper places in the soul where we can worship God in truth and grace.

Alice Fryling leads spiritual direction groups in her church. She is a spiritual director, a retreat leader and the author of nine books, including The Art of Spiritual Listening and the bestselling book A Handbook for Engaged Couples.

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"e;Who in the world am I?"e;The Enneagram is like a mirror, reflecting dimensions of ourselves that are sometimes hard to see. In this helpful guide, spiritual director and Enneagram teacher Alice Fryling offers an introduction to each number of the Enneagram and their respective triads. More than just helping us discern our number, this book relates the Enneagram to our spiritual journey, as a way to identify our gifts as well as our blind spots. With Scripture meditations and questions for reflection and discussion, Mirror for the Soul offers a new perspective on our unique temperament so that we might know and extend God's grace more fully. Knowledge of the Enneagram leads us into more authentic self-awareness, richer relationships, and deeper places in the soul where we can worship God in truth and grace.

Autor

Alice Fryling is a spiritual director and the author of nine books, including Seeking God Together: An Introduction to Group Spiritual Direction. She has been giving Enneagram workshops for fifteen years, teaching participants how to use the Enneagram to know God and themselves more deeply. She and her husband have two married daughters and four grandchildren.

Textauszug

 

Introduction

The Puzzle of Ourselves

Who in the world am I? Ah, that’s the great puzzle.

ALICE IN WONDERLAND,

LEWIS CARROLL

I have always had a fondness for Alice. Not just because we share the same name. And not just because my favorite Halloween costume (age eight) was the Alice in Wonderland dress and apron that my mother made just for me. My adult fondness for Alice is because she asked the same question I ask: “Who in the world am I?” It is a question I have asked all of my life. It is an endless quest. As soon as I think I have discovered new things about myself, I have to ask, Who am I now that I think I know who I am?

THE PUZZLE

One of the most helpful tools for me in exploring this question is the Enneagram. The Enneagram is an ancient tool that can help us puzzle out who we are. As a child I looked to my friends to find out who I was. Like Alice I said, “I’m sure I’m not Ada. . . . I can’t be Mabel. . . . Oh dear, how puzzling it all is!” As I grew into young adulthood, I looked to those whose faith I admired. But I never lived up to the standard I saw in their lives. Later in adulthood, I decided to set my own standards for the person I wanted to be. That didn’t work either. The Enneagram led me to new discoveries about who I really am. Even more important, knowledge of the Enneagram has led me to the grace of God. I discovered through the Enneagram that I am not just my gifts, I am not just my failures, I am not just my compulsions. I am a person created by God, loved by God, and uniquely gifted to love others with God’s merciful and gracious love.

Through the Enneagram God has taught me that I am not exactly who I think I am. I think I am what I do. I think I am an expression of my gifts. I think I know what life is about, that my values are all in place. But there is a part of me that is performing and pretending. And there is a vast part of who I am that remains untapped, unexplored, and unexpressed. Only God knows those parts of my being that I hide from others and from myself. The Enneagram itself does not make me a different person. But knowledge of the Enneagram does help me see who I truly am and offers me words to describe how I would like to be transformed by God’s grace.

It has not been an easy journey. It is not a pleasant experience to embrace the discrepancy between who I am, who I want to be, who I think God wants me to be, and who others think I am. Like Alice, I sometimes feel as though I am falling down a rabbit hole. “Dear, dear! How queer everything is to-day! . . . I am so very tired of being all alone here!” And like the apostle Paul, sometimes I cry out, “I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate” (Romans 7:15 NRSV).

Paul’s words reflect the experience of all human beings, whether they know it or not. We all struggle with the disparity between who we are and who we wish we were, between our inner lives and the lives we present to the outside world. Many people call this the difference between the true self and the false self. The Bible calls it the difference between the “old self” and the “new self” (Ephesians 4:22-24). As it describes the relationship between our gifts and our compulsions, the Enneagram gives words to help us describe the struggle we all share.

THE LOOKING GLASS HOUSE

In Lewis Carroll’s sequel to Alice in Wonderland, Alice goes to the Looking Glass House. When she gets there, she discovers what we also know: when you peer into a looking glass, or a mirror, everything is backwards. When Alice picked up a book in the Looking Glass House, the words looked all wrong. Alice “puzzled over this for some time, but at last a bright thought struck her. ‘Why, it’s a Looking-Glass book, of course! And, if I hold it up to a glass, the words will all go the right way again.’” The Enneagram is like Alice’s glass, or mirror. The Enneagram gives us a different view of ourselves, our gifts, our motivations, and our behavior. In the Looking Glass House where we live, we see ourselves quite backwards. When we hold ourselves up to the Enneagram, things “all go the right way again.” The Enneagram helps us see ourselves as God sees us, not in the backwards way we see ourselves.

The Enneagram corrects the puzzling reflection we have of our own lives. We think we know our desires and motivations. And we think that our behavior comes from the best of our motivations. We think we are acting in love, but we see that we are really promoting ourselves and our own limited point of view. We believe we live in grace, but as we see ourselves in the paradigm of the Enneagram, we may see that even receiving grace has become something we feel we need to accomplish. We know God loves us unconditionally, but our false self tells us that pleasing God means that we have to do everything just right.

If we are honest with ourselves, we admit that what we think we believe does not always play out in our experiences and relationships. This is because we have so much backwards, but we don’t know why. With Alice we say, “It’s rather hard to understand!” With Paul we cry out, “I’m at the end of my rope. Is there no one who can do anything for me? Isn’t that the real question?” (Romans 7:24 The Message).

The Enneagram helps us understand this dilemma. Through the Enneagram we learn that we do not have to strive to use our gifts beyond our capacity. We do not need to be like someone else, we do not need to have more abilities, and we do not need more opportunities to be the person God created us to be. In fact, life is not so much about being more as it is about letting go. (That is a puzzle indeed!) The Enneagram invites us to let go of our compulsions to express our giftedness, to let go of our need to love others according to our own standards, and to let go of our grasping for more, in order to come to God with empty hands, to receive the unique graces offered to us.

ENNEAGRAM PERSPECTIVES

There are many ways to look at the Enneagram. We need to know where we are going. Even Alice asked, “Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?”

“That depends a great deal,” answered the Cheshire Cat, “on where you want to get to.”

Alice replied, “I don’t much care where.”

“Then,” said the Cat, “it doesn’t much matter which way you go. . . .”

“So long as I get somewhere.”

“Oh,” said the Cat, “you’re sure to do that, if only you walk long enough.”

Before we begin this long walk, let me say that “where I want to go” is to the grace of God. I come to the Enneagram as a Christian believer. Others approach the Enneagram from a variety of different perspectives. The Enneagram is only a tool. It is only words, as helpful as those are. I believe that by God’s grace and help we will learn to live out the truths of these words in ways that reflect God’s truth, the truth of Scripture, and the truth of our own lives. With this in mind I will include two important tools to take with you on this journey.

REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

The first tool is a set of questions to facilitate deeper personal reflection or group discussion about the chapter. One of the best ways to grow in the knowledge of the Enneagram is to experience it with other people, perhaps in a small group. This follows the oral tradition of the Enneagram. A woman who participated in a recent workshop had read extensively about the Enneagram. She told us that she hadn’t really “gotten” it until the workshop, where she had the opportunity to hear many people talk about the Enneagram and to interact with others about its truths and applications to daily life.

As you engage with the Enneagram with others, remember that the Enneagram is a very personal experience. It can be encouraging, but it can also be embarrassing. As you discuss the ideas in this book, be respectful of each person in the group. Some will be introverts who will appreciate the conversation but may not speak up. Others will come with the pain of past relationships and circumstances. They may not be ready to share their own journey with others. And still others may be so new to the Enneagram and the spiritual journey that they can barely about talk about it.

But if the group is a safe place with a loving and welcoming atmosphere, it can be the best way to engage with the Enneagram. Hopefully many in your group will be willing to talk about each part of the Enneagram and apply it honestly and authentically to their own lives. These questions are offered with that in mind. Use them as they suit your particular group. Take as long as you need with all of the questions you choose to discuss.

PERSONAL MEDITATIONS

At the end of each chapter I also include a personal meditation. The purpose of each meditation is not to teach more about the Enneagram but to invite you into deeper self-awareness. The idea is to invite you to be in God’s presence, where transformation happens. The journey of the Enneagram, at its best, helps us to be open to the movements of God in our lives. Go slowly. Let your mind wander into the passage. Listen to what your heart, through the Holy Spirit, is saying to you.

If this reflective way to read the Bible is new for you, be patient with yourself. Remember that the Holy Spirit is guiding you. Often the first thing that comes to mind seems strange. That...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 7.7.2017
• Verlagsort: Lisle
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Religion / Theologie ► Christentum ► Moraltheologie / Sozialethik
• Schlagworte: Ch • Christian • Christian enneagram • Christian personality • Christian Spirituality • contemplate • created • Enneagram • Enneagram guide • enneagram number • enneagram space • evangelical • God • Grace • journey • know yourself • perrsonality type • Personality • Personal Reflection • Prayer • Reflect • reflection • Richard Rohr • Self-knowledge • spiritual director • spiritual disciplines • Spirituality • spiritual journey • spiritual practices • the road back to you • Think • Tool • Transformation • Understanding • Unique
• ISBN-10: 0-8308-9092-0 / 0830890920
• ISBN-13: 978-0-8308-9092-7 / 9780830890927