TO THE NINES
Many faiths preach about compassion and loving others, but that can be hard to put into practice.
Some say that’s where the enneagram can come in.
Although not religious in nature, the enneagram is a personality-typing tool that religious leaders are using more and more to help foster understanding and compassion among their flocks.
The Rev. David Hett, dean of the Burkhart Center at First Community Church in Marble Cliff, said he has used it for years to help couples in premarital counseling.
The Burkhart Center, a learning community for people of all religions and no religion, has hosted trainings with the Columbus-based Enneagram Institute of Ohio, where Hett is on the faculty, for years as well. The institute does private sessions and virtual teachings.
“It’s to be more authentic in any relationship and also to begin to open our hearts more to ourselves and the world and allow ourselves to become more vulnerable and open and realize we’re stronger when we’re able to become more vulnerable,” Hett said of the enneagram.
The enneagram – which involves nine types – is a tool that helps people understand their fears, motivations and personality as well as others’, said Connie Frecker, director of the Enneagram Institute of Ohio. The tool was created in the 1960s, but draws on ancient wisdom, according to the Enneagram Institute in Stone Ridge, New York. “Ennea” means nine in Greek, Hett said.
Frecker said she has done workshops on the enneagram for religious organizations, including Trinity Lutheran
Seminary, Covenant Presbyterian Church and conferences of United Methodist ministers. Linworth United Methodist Church on the Northwest Side had an enneagram workshop in 2020, and Hilliard United Methodist Church hosted one in 2019, according to their websites.
It has been rapidly growing in popularity in the past few years – especially among millennials – in part, some say, because of its focus on individualism.
People fill out a questionnaire to figure out their enneagram type – one of nine that can range from reformer to helper to challenger. Other types include the investigator, loyalist, achiever, individualist and enthusiast.
Hett’s type is peacemaker. He said since he learned years ago about the enneagram and his type, he’s noticed his personal tendencies toward avoiding conflict.
“Peace often means just the absence of conflict, so denying conflict became a way of being peaceful,” Hett said of his own behavior as a child and earlier in his life. “I began to see that I needed to recognize that I accommodated so much I
lost the sense of who I was and what I wanted.”
That understanding became a pathway of growth for Hett, who said that, although the enneagram is a personal growth tool, it can also be used as a tool for spiritual growth.
“Spiritual practices are designed in every tradition to allow those participants to really develop as much as they can the full realization of each of those traditions or full enlightenment from each of those traditions,” Hett said. “Enneagram is one of those tools in terms of spiritual practice people can use to more become their authentic self.”
Lisa Bueche, spiritual director of the Enneagram Institute of Ohio, said she’s seen people start to believe in a higher power through learning the enneagram and seeing it work.
“It helps folks with having faith in a higher power ... because it speaks such a truth that they can experience,” Bueche said. “It’s not just theological, philosophical, mental concepts, it’s actually experiential.”
After learning more about the nine enneagram personality types, people
can go out in the world and experience the truth of them, Bueche said. They also can change their own behavior, she said.
Understanding different types of people through the enneagram can help affirm who people are in their own eyes and give compassion for someone else’s fears and desires, Frecker said.
“We can build that compassion for the fact that other people have different kinds of motivators for their behavior because a lot of behavior looks the same but the reasons why people do things can really vary quite a bit,” she said.
For Bueche, the enneagram goes back to the foundational Golden Rule – treating others as one would want to be treated – by helping people put it into practice.
“In order to love others as yourself, you know, it intuitively seems easy to do but it’s really difficult to actually carry out,” Bueche said.
Understanding why people feel, act and speak the way they do through the tool can help people treat others with care and compassion, she said.
The enneagram teaches and highlights the importance of many spiritual and religious tenets, Bueche continued.
“It’s all very interfaith,” she said, of the tool. “It has that common boundary between psychology and spirituality.”
Bueche and Frecker work together to teach people about the enneagram and how to use it in professional and personal relationships. They have worked with businesses, churches and universities.
“On a very practical level, it really helps with community,” Bueche said. “The enneagram really does help us understand that people have nine different ways of communicating in the world. It can just be very practical. You don’t have to take it any further than that.”
Enneagram personality tool can help spiritual seekers, couples