#25: Enneagram Overview, Part 1, with Erin Slutsky

Love Is Us: Exploring Relationships and How We Connect

In today’s episode I talk with Erin Slutsky, an Integrative Enneagram Accredited Practitioner. The Enneagram is a personality system, made up of 9 types. When you understand your type, you better understand what motivates you, the ways you interact and relate to others, and paths for growth. And yet, there is so much more to it than that!

This episode is part one of two. Today, Erin is going to give us an orientation to the Enneagram, by explaining what it is and how it can help you, plus giving us an overview of the nine different types. For part 2, I’ll be speaking with Rosemary Hurwitz about how the Enneagram can help us improve all of our relationships.

Erin Slutsky is an expert in helping women who have spent much of their lives supporting others, but still struggle to put themselves first. Erin understands the difficulties of being self-sufficient, and believes that every woman has the potential to achieve the life she desires with the right tools and support.

Through her over 20 years of experience mentoring and coaching women and her expertise in the Enneagram, Erin offers the guidance and support necessary to empower women to prioritize their needs and create the lives they want.

Erin has been married to her husband (Aaron) for over 30 years. They have four grown daughters and a four-year-old granddaughter. She lives in Bristol, Wi, and enjoys nature walks, thrift shopping and wine and cheese pairing.

Erin’s website: Erin Slutsky Coaching

Find Erin on IG: https://www.instagram.com/erinslutskycoaching/

Learn more about the Enneagram: https://www.enneagraminstitute.com/type-descriptions

Karin’s website: https://drcalde.com

Transcript

Podcast Intro:

[00:00] Karin: This is Love Is Us, Exploring Relationships and How We Connect. I'm your host, Karin Calde. I'll talk with people about how we can strengthen our relationships, explore who we are in those relationships, and experience a greater sense of love and connection with those around us, including ourselves. I have a PhD in Clinical Psychology, practiced as a psychologist resident, and after diving into my own healing work, I went back to school and became a coach, helping individuals and couples with their relationships and personal growth. If you want to experience more love in your life and contribute to healing the disconnect so prevalent in our world today, you're in the right place. Welcome to Love is Us.

Episode Intro:

[00:49] Karin: Hello, everybody, and welcome. I am so excited about this episode. We're going to be talking about the Enneagram. I had the idea for this episode when I was just starting my podcast, and it took me a little while to figure out how I wanted to organize it and to find the right people or the right experts who I thought would be a good fit for Love is Us. So I'm really happy with the way it's come together, and this is part one of two.

I've always been into maps, whether they're roadmaps or personality maps, and personality systems seem like another kind of map to me, but they're maps that help me understand my own landscape and where I want to go. I especially enjoy personality systems when they offer not only a way for people to understand themselves, but also different ways for them to grow. And I have found the Enneagram to be helpful in seeing my own tendencies, blind spots and growth areas. And it's also helped me better understand my partner, friends, family, so that I'm less confused when they make choices that are different than the choices that I would make. But also, the Enneagram is my personal favorite, not only because it has so many layers, but it doesn't pigeonhole people, and I'm sure that there are people who would disagree with that, but I find it to be a really practical tool that gives you a lot of movement and areas to experience all the different types. So I also use this a little bit with my clients, not as a focal point for our work together because I'm not certified in it, but I have found it to be helpful for them.

So today for part one, my guest is Erin Slutsky, who is going to walk us through the nine different Enneagram types to give us a better understanding of it. And then next week, I am going to interview Rosemary Hurwitz, who is kind of a big deal in the Enneagram world, I found out. But Rosemary is going to help us use the Enneagram to improve our relationships. So I hope you like this episode. I hope you'll share it and leave me a review. And here we go.

Transcript:

[03:06] Karin: Welcome, Erin.

[03:08] Erin: Hello. Karin, it's great to be here.

[03:11] Karin: So good to have you. I am excited for this episode. I am just a bit of an Enneagram geek. I have never been trained, but I think it's kind of one of those early signs that I might become a psychologist one day. Because when I discovered it way back in the early ninety s, I was just so enthralled and read the books and talked about it all the time. So I'm so excited to have you here with me and sharing what you know about it today.

[03:46] Erin: Yes, I'm excited about it.

[03:48] Karin: Good. But first tell us where you are in the world.

[03:52] Erin: I am in the Midwest of the US. I'm right between Chicago and Milwaukee on Lake Michigan. I was born and raised in this area. I couldn't imagine living anywhere else except maybe November through March. My husband and I are seriously considering what we're going to do in the wintertime once our nest is empty, which is very soon.

[04:20] Karin: Time for change, perhaps.

[04:22] Erin: Maybe. Or maybe just snowbirds and go somewhere warm in the winter.

[04:28] Karin: Yeah. What do you love about it?

[04:30] Erin: What keeps you there other than familiarity? I do like the seasons. I love being by Lake Michigan. It looks like an ocean. Sometimes it is this turquoise blue. It has a beautiful sandy beach. Sometimes there's huge waves and you'd never know that it was a lake. But there's no salt. Right. And so I need to be by water. It's what I just feel brings me life and keeps me grounded. And so we have Lake Michigan and then where I live there's a lot of small lakes where people go boating or ice fishing in the winter. And so I'm surrounded by different options of being around water. And my family's here sounds really nice. Yeah.

[05:22] Karin: So tell us what you do for a living.

[05:25] Erin: What I do for a living? Well, I support women in their journey of rediscovering who they are. Instead of being told who they are like they have been their whole life, they've usually come to a place where they said, wait a minute timeout. Who am I and who do I want to become? And so I guide them through that journey using the Enneagram.

[05:55] Karin: How did you come to do this work?

[05:57] Erin: Well, I have been working with women, leading them and mentoring them for about 25 years now. And it's just something I've always done. I've always found myself in a leadership position and once my kids started leaving the nest, I kind of said, wait, what do I want to do? I've poured my whole heart and soul into my raising my kids and now it's like it's my turn. Now, where can I take my experience working with women, leading them, loving on them, supporting them and my new love? And I'm a fellow Enneagram geek of the Enneagram, and how can I use that tool to help support women? So I started my coaching business from going into year five.

[06:44] Karin: Excellent. So I'm really excited to have you tell us about the Enneagram. And there's so many layers to it, right?

[06:55] Erin: Oh, yes. You can get really deep into it.

[06:59] Karin: Yeah. And it's been around for how many years?

[07:02] Erin: It's ancient. It's ancient, but I think story has it like in the 70s it started getting popular in the States, I think within the Catholic Church even. It started coming into awareness out in California. And when I discovered it, probably ten years ago, it was hitting the Evangelical Protestant Church and it has exploded. It's not necessarily a Christian system. In fact, a lot of Christians think that it's not a good thing to be aware of. I think the internet and podcasts like these have really made it grow. And people have discovered things about themselves that they couldn't with other personality tests like Myers Briggs or Disc or the strengths finder like that.

[08:02] Karin: Yeah. That's interesting. You talk about it in the Christian Church. I wasn't aware of that. I hadn't known about it in any kind of religious context, but lately I've been hearing about it, what is saying, like Sufi traditions using it, but I could be totally wrong about that.

[08:20] Erin: I'm not super aware of the religious part of it. I think I discovered it within a Christian nonprofit organization I was working with and it just seemed to really fit and it's just grown in popularity.

[08:39] Karin: Yeah, it's fun. Like I said, I was really into it back in the early ninety s. And then it seems like it's hit this resurgence, like you said, in the last 510 years. So why don't we dive in and why don't you tell us more about it?

[08:55] Erin: Well, when I like to talk about the Enneagram, I can give you all the details and the nuts and bolts of it. But have you ever wanted something to give you language to communicate who you are and how you see the world and what makes you tick? Or do you wish could be seen and heard and just understood in a deep way? Do you desire to learn to live according to what you value rather than what other people's expectations are of you? That is what the Enneagram can do for you. I know when I first found my Enneagram type, I did kind of one of those looking over my shoulder and looking around for that hidden camera because I felt like, wait a minute, how did they know this? How did this test, this assessment, know what I'm thinking and what scares me and what drives me? I just had never taken any personality test or anything like this that I felt deeply understood. So enneagram, it's a hard word for a lot of people to say, but if you break it down, enneagram ennea means nine gram. Think of a diagram and there are nine points on the diagram that represent the nine core types. It's nine ways that we make sense of our world. It's nine ways that we can describe who we are and why we do what we do.

[10:36] Karin: And I would love to be able to pop the diagram onto everyone. Yes.

[10:44] Erin: Right. It's a circle. Imagine a circle with nine points around it, and each of those points have two lines coming from them connecting with other numbers on the enneagram symbol. And one line points to a number that shows up when you're stressed, and the other line is a number that shows up when you are growing or in health. Again, like you first started, it's layers. This is probably three or four layers down, but when you look at the symbol, you can see the connections with the different numbers.

[11:22] Karin: And I love that because it really does show how interconnected we are. And it's not just that you are this number in a box.

[11:30] Erin: Right? I like to say it describes the box that you're already in. And we have all nine numbers in us, but there is one core type, and that represents our core desire, our core fear, and our core struggle. And so it helps us keep our priorities in order according to what we value. And it helps you become more self aware when you're headed towards unhealthy places.

[11:59] Karin: Helps you grow, right?

[12:01] Erin: Oh, yes, for sure.

[12:02] Karin: And then, of course, in next week's episode, I'll be talking with Rosemary Herwitz, and she's going to apply this to how it affects relationships. But we really need to know what all the numbers are and start to be able to be familiar with them and also start to figure out what numbers you might identify with. And so I think that'll be helpful before next week's episode, right?

[12:32] Erin: Yeah. It's really important to know that your type pointed in the right direction. There are a ton of online assessments you can take. None of them will say that they are 100% accurate. They can't be. It doesn't take into account your body language or your mood, maybe, that you're in. And so, like, when people take my assessment, I offer a free 30 minutes call just to confirm your type, and sometimes it takes longer than that. It can be a journey to discover your type, and a lot of times you just don't know because you're not very self aware. But the more you read and the more you learn, the more self aware you become and happen upon your type. And it's helpful in relationships, in any relationships, personal, romantic, work relationships, to know that other people see things differently. And that's okay. In fact, it creates empathy.

[13:41] Karin: Yeah. And I love that you have not only the test, but also a conversation. When I first learned about the anagram, there weren't any kind of tests, and so I was surprised when I had started looking a few years ago that found all these tests and didn't necessarily match up with who I know I am. But it used to be it was only an interview process. But again, I love that you have that. You have the two of those together.

[14:12] Erin: That's great. Yeah. So would you like me to go through the nine types? All right, well, we're going to start with the Type One, and some people call that the perfectionist or the improver. They desire to be good. They fear being judged, and they struggle with anger. And a lot of times, type ones may not realize that they're angry, but deep down inside, that's their main emotion. Then there's type two.

[14:51] Karin: Yeah. So I'll just say that I'm a one, and we can talk about this as we go in. But when I was finally able to tap into that feeling of my anger and understand it and work with it, it was life changing for me. So learning your type and learning the things you struggle with and really being able to work with it really can make a huge difference in your life.

[15:19] Erin: Absolutely. Type two the helper. I want to say something about the Type Two, especially with women. A lot of times women get mistyped as a Type Two because of their role. A lot of them are mothers and wives, and they're just put into a role of being the helper. But that doesn't mean that that is your core type. You need to ask yourself, Why am I helping?

[15:46] Karin: That makes a lot of sense. Yeah.

[15:48] Erin: And if it's to receive appreciation or love, then maybe you're a Type Two because they desire appreciation. They also fear being rejected, and a lot of people do. But the Type two, this is crushing for them. They struggle with pride. And that comes out in maybe saying, no, I don't need help. Right. The helper wants to help other people and yet doesn't feel like they receive help because they're not asking for it. And they think it's weak to ask for help.

[16:27] Karin: Okay.

[16:29] Erin: Type three the achiever. They desire success. Everything they do has to be the best. They fear failure, so they avoid that like the plague. And they struggle with deceit. Usually that's self deceit. They're tricking themselves into being someone that they think other people want them to be rather than who they truly are. And I know this because I'm a type three.

[17:01] Karin: So being honest with oneself about, um, about maybe your your weaker qualities or the ways that you have to grow can be especially challenging for a three. Is that right?

[17:16] Erin: Absolutely. Yeah. Because if you can't be honest with yourself about that, you're not going to be able to show up authentically. Then we have the Type four, the creative. They desire authenticity. They're authentic. They are unique. There's no one else like them. And that's why they fear being inadequate or boring. They want to be the most different. They want to be not like anyone else. But yet at the same time, they struggle with envy. And in some of the reading, it'll say jealousy, but envy is more like, I want what they have, and I don't want them to have it either. Jealousy is just, oh, I wish I had that. So that struggle of envy has a little negative spin to it.

[18:12] Karin: Yeah, there's more of a nuance to it.

[18:13] Erin: Yeah. So they tend to compare themselves with other everyone.

[18:17] Karin: Okay, interesting. Okay, I'm learning.

[18:22] Erin: Oh, yeah, I know. There's so much to learn. Type Five, the observer, the analyst, they desire to be competent. They want to make sure that people see them as having the right answer and all the information, because they fear annihilation. Meaning they fear people thinking that they don't have all that knowledge, that they need to answer the right question. And they struggle with connection. They struggle with relationships and emotions because they tend to just kind of ignore those. My husband is a Type Five, and can I tell a story real quick?

[19:05] Karin: Oh, please do.

[19:06] Erin: When we first discovered our enneagram types, I remember vividly sitting on the couch, and we were having a heated discussion. That's what I would have called it anyway. And I like to do that. I like to just kind of, like, pull things apart and try to figure things out and solve problems in an aggressive way. And my husband is not like that at all. In fact, that conversation, he got up and left the room. Well, I was really hurt, and I felt abandoned. But remembering what his enneagram type was, oh, he needs to withdraw, take a step back. He needs space to process and analyze the answer he wants to give me without hurting me. And so he always comes back with a wise answer and very thoughtful and thought through response instead of me, who has that kind of knee jerk reaction, he needs time and space. So now I give it to him, and I'm not hurt anymore.

[20:14] Karin: Yeah. So understanding that has been really helpful to the two of you.

[20:18] Erin: Yeah, for sure.

[20:19] Karin: Yeah. My father is a Five, the classic engineer, totally separated from the feelings. It's very data driven.

[20:32] Erin: Yeah. And it's not right or wrong. It's just the way they are. And when we can understand how people present themselves, we're not as offended, we're not as hurt. We give them more space or whatever. They need to be who they are.

[20:50] Karin: Yeah.

[20:52] Erin: All right. Type Six is the Loyalist. This is one of my daughters.

[20:57] Karin: You have the hardest time with this one, so I'm super interested.

[21:00] Erin: Yeah.

[21:01] Karin: I just have a harder time wrapping my head around this. All the other ones I think I have pretty well, but this is my biggest challenge.

[21:09] Erin: Yeah. Type Six, the Loyalist, they desire safety, so they're on the lookout, constantly scanning the horizon for dangers, which is a good thing. They fear fear. They're afraid of being afraid, so they're constantly on alert and they struggle with security. They want to make sure that things are going to be as they appear and not move and not change, because they don't know how to adjust very well, though they are really good at anticipating and planning for the future, planning for dangers that come in. So with any of these types, there's a good quality, but taken too far to one side can be a downside for them. Type seven, the enthusiast. They desire to be satisfied, so they're always looking for the next thrill. They fear being deprived, you know that term FOMO, fear of missing out. That's the type seven. They don't want to be missing out on anything. They struggle with gluttony. And when I say gluttony, it's not necessarily eating a lot of food, though it can be, but filling themselves up to feel satisfied because that's what they desire. So they have too much adventure. Adventure. They take too many risks, they load their calendar with too much, too much, too much, because nothing ever seems to satisfy. So that's what I mean by gluttony.

[22:58] Karin: And I think of them as the partier they can be.

[23:03] Erin: But again, each type has different ways of presenting and that's probably level four or five down when we're talking about there are three different types of each type.

[23:14] Karin: Yes, right. Healthy and more average.

[23:18] Erin: And then the subtypes, there's a social subtype, sexual, which is intimate, one on one subtype, and then a self preservation subtype. And you can have three sevens in a room and they all seem very different, but when you take it down to the cores, they all agree on those things.

[23:38] Karin: Oh, so interesting. Yeah, that's new for me. I always admired the sevens in my life because they were always so relaxed in the life of the party and so much fun to be with. And it is what I always aspired to be more like, which makes sense for me because I'm a one and my healthy direction is towards seven.

[24:03] Erin: Yeah, exactly. You got it. Type eight, the challenger. For some reason, this is my favorite. You don't have to question what they're thinking or what their motives are. They will tell you they desire power, they want to be in charge, they fear being controlled and so sometimes they tend to control things. And people struggle with vulnerability, they see that as a weakness rather than a strength. And if they can tap into that vulnerability and take off some of that armor, they will have that sense of power. It's that power underneath that armor that they carry around.

[24:50] Karin: The eight. I used to feel a lot more intimidated by eight and I think that's probably a common experience because they can really dominate. And then I had an eight, my daughter is and I just see it from a bit of a different perspective now and I think they're pretty awesome, pretty amazing. And they do have a lot of power if they choose to yield it.

[25:26] Erin: Right in the right direction. Our youngest daughter is an eight, and so her and my husband, it used to appear that they butt heads, but it's actually they're connecting at their eight because the five is connected with the eight, too. And they get talk about heated discussions. They start going at it, and I'm trying to break them up and stuff, but that's how they connect. And then after they have that interaction, they're fine, like nothing happened. They weren't hurt by it, they weren't okay. They just have to leave the room because that makes me a little anxious to see them going at that. But yeah, you're right. If any of these types, if they can harness the power of their strength, they can do some amazing things. Yeah. Our daughter is on her way to law enforcement and doing something good for the community. They're very focused on justice and making sure that little guy has a word, and so she's very into social justice as well.

[26:34] Karin: That's funny. That's exactly my daughter. I could imagine her being a civil rights lawyer one day or something like that. She loved her law class she took in high school, and yeah, she loves protecting the little guy. She was almost a little disappointed when they lifted the mask mandate because she loved telling people, put on your mask. Yeah, right, that was funny.

[27:07] Erin: Yeah. And then finally, the nine, the peacemaker. They, of course, desire peace because they fear conflict. They don't see conflict as a good thing. They avoid it like the plague. They struggle with self-forgetting, so they almost think of themselves as being invisible. And they're observing. And I have a friend who is a Type Nine, and my sister is a Type Nine, and they have told me several times, oh, I wanted to say this when we were together or something. I'm like, that would have been brilliant. I really needed your perspective, your point of view. But they don't feel like they're going to be heard or seen, so they just kind of stay in the background. So I would encourage any type nine peacemakers. Speak up. We want to hear what you have to say. It's valuable.

[28:11] Karin: Yeah, my husband's a nine.

[28:13] Erin: Oh, yeah.

[28:14] Karin: And my ex-husband is a Nine, too.

[28:17] Erin: Okay, interesting. Yeah, it is interesting.

[28:23] Karin: Wonderful.

[28:23] Erin: So those are the nine types, in brief.

[28:26] Karin: Okay, so what can you say about some of the drivers for the different types? I mean, I know there are things like there are three that are driven by the gut and the heart, and there are childhood origins. So what can you do to help us add a little bit more to our understanding of them?

[28:58] Erin: Yeah, so there are nine types, and they're divided up into triads, and there's different triads within the enneagram. So, for example, like you were talking about, some are driven by the gut, the gut-oriented numbers are the eight, nine and one. So they're at the top. If you see the, the diagram, they're at the top of the diagram, the top of the circle. And they have that gut instinct. They just know they need to trust it, though. Sometimes it's hard to do. And then there's the heart triad, which is run by your feelings and your emotions. These are the two, three and four, which is on the right side of the circle. They are about relationships. They're about sensing other people's emotions. A lot of empaths are in that triad. And then you have the head triad, which is your thoughts and your thought life. That's how they process the world. Their information first is they think through things. And that's the five, six and seven. Sometimes they get stuck in their head and they're not in touch with their feelings or their body. And then that's one set of the triads, the gut, the head, the heart and the gut.

[30:25] Karin: And a lot of people make decisions based upon those things, isn't that right?

[30:30] Erin: Sure.

[30:30] Karin: Yeah.

[30:32] Erin: We need to use all three, obviously, to be integrated. Right. But initially, that first triad that we go through in the process of making decisions or communicating or solving problems is in that order.

[30:49] Karin: Okay. Can I give an example of something that I heard about that, that I thought was really it just brought it to life for me. So this isn't mine. This isn't this not didn't come from me originally, but it talked about in terms of if you are going to buy a new car, if you make your decisions primarily from your head. So that five, six, seven, you're going to collect all the data you can on that car and that's how you're going to make probably how you're going to make the decision of whether or not to get to get that car. You might look at Consumer Reports and.

[31:31] Erin: Read all these articles and talk to people and blah, blah, blah.

[31:34] Karin: And then for those that are more heart driven, it's the sway that they get that feeling from the car. I just love this car. So it's a little bit more emotion based, and that might be how they would make that choice. And then for the gut based, does this feel right? And so they might have to go sit in the car. And this really, for me, one of the most recent cars I bought on this a while ago, but I had collected the data. I had thought that this one car was going to be good, and then I sat in it and it just didn't feel right. And that made a lot of sense to me. And when I got in my current car, I was like, oh, yes, that's it. Yeah.

[32:24] Erin: I love that.

[32:26] Karin: So there are some things that can happen during childhood that can help us develop these different types. So what can you say about that?

[32:37] Erin: Yeah, well, that is probably one of the most popular questions I get is how do you become your number? Right? I mean, we all have childhood stuff that happens to us that leads us to our core number. So I would love to share my story of how I have traced it back.

[32:58] Karin: Yeah.

[32:58] Erin: So I'll start at the very beginning, and I mean beginning because I was the first grandchild on my mother's side of the family, and this was the family that we were closest to and ended up spending the most amount of time with. Not only was I the first grandchild, but I was born on St. Patrick's Day, which was a really big deal in my family because they're Irish. So you could say I was the golden child at the end of the rainbow.

[33:26] Karin: Oh, wow. Okay.

[33:28] Erin: Well, the expectations and the attention I received went deep and filled a place in my soul. I was the funny one, the good girl, the one who could do no wrong. So when I did, I would be crushed with shame. I didn't live up to the expectations of the family to represent them as perfect charmed or having it all together. As much as I loved the attention, I hated the rejection even more. This made me hide my mistakes, lie about doing wrong, and pretend that I was perfect until I couldn't anymore. So fast forward to high school where I was rebelling and sneaking and stealing because I could no longer meet people's expectations and decided to give up and go the opposite direction. But you know what? It still filled that place that needed attention and acknowledgment and acceptance. It was just in a negative way, but in my brain, it translated the same. Well, this lasted until after I was married a few years and had our first child. That was my wake up call. Giving birth to my beautiful baby girl was what I needed to wake me up from my shameful ways and gave me the desire to be the best mom to this little girl and three other little girls. But that also brought out unhealthy ways in me, like overachieving, controlling, needing to present my family as picture perfect. I wanted to be seen as a role model of motherhood, not a mess. I made sure my girls had their hair done and wore matching clothes. We chose the best way to educate them, and I even ended up mentoring moms to be their best, which isn't wrong. It's not bad. It just went a little overboard. So several years ago, I found myself putting everyone else's needs ahead of my own, which happens to a lot of moms, right? I wasn't asking for help because my middle name is self sufficient. My hubby and I have been married up for over like, 30 years. We have four beautiful daughters, right? But a few summer years ago, we had our hands full. Our. Oldest had graduated college, our second had graduated high school, our third had graduated middle school. So we had parties for all that, right? This is just in one summer. Our oldest was getting married and we planned her wedding. We moved her out as well as my second one who was going to college. We had three birthdays, including the birth of our first granddaughter. I wasn't taking care of myself at all and I ignored what my body was telling me. I was so stressed, I had those getting floaters in your eyes. And I broke out in hives from head to toe right before the wedding and had to change the dress I was wearing just to cover it up. My body was telling on me. When I discovered the Enneagram, I found something to give me the language to my inner thoughts, to explain how I saw the world, to show me when I was going down that path of attention seeking and people pleasing. The Enneagram has been my game changer. And so I see that thread of the Enneagram, type three, that achiever that attention seeker, that success seeker, avoiding or running from failure, running through my whole life until I found the Enneagram. I'm not saying that I'm over this or anything, but I still catch it. But now I can see failure as something to learn from so I can be more successful. I can set my priorities in the right order and say no when I need to and not be people pleasing. I'm more in tune with my body and what it's telling me, and especially when it says take a break because threes don't like to take a break. So that has been just so interesting to look back at my life and see that thread that runs through. There's also a theory out there called Soul Child. And as with any theories, there's some people who are all for it and some are. It rang true for me when you look at your core type. So say I'm a type three, right? And we talked about the two lines that are coming from it. The one pointing away is more of a stress line. The one pointing back towards your core number, that's your growth line. And the theory says that was your original number before the world got its hands on you. Interesting.

[38:40] Karin: Yeah.

[38:41] Erin: So before I was a three, I was a six. And what that child looks like is kind of shy and timid, which I was kind of scared of what was going on. But to overcome that, I put on some three aspects. Again, it's just a theory, but it's interesting.

[39:04] Karin: That is really interesting. Okay, so for threes, their origin story is something about attention. Is that right? Is that they really that's how they thrive?

[39:20] Erin: Yeah, usually. Yeah, usually I would say that a type three. If they look back and see where they were attention seeking, usually from a parent and what they were doing to get that attention. Sometimes positive, sometimes negative. I remember vividly. My room was always a mess as a kid, but when I cleaned it up, I got praise. So it's almost like I let it go dirty so I could get the praise after I cleaned it, because there was such a difference, simple little things like that, but it takes a long time. I don't know about you, but I'm into journaling, and that's really where a lot of my thoughts come through and process comes out.

[40:05] Karin: Yeah. So what about the other numbers? So what are the origin stories for the other numbers?

[40:13] Erin: Maybe looking at that core desire. Right. The one is to be good. Right? You're a good girl. Is that what you got excited about and what made you happy and what felt like love to you?

[40:28] Karin: I'm sorry. So how is that different from three?

[40:31] Erin: So the three wants to look good.

[40:36] Karin: Okay.

[40:36] Erin: Not necessarily be good.

[40:38] Karin: Got it. Okay.

[40:39] Erin: It's about appearances for three.

[40:42] Karin: Okay, great. Yeah.

[40:43] Erin: And like, the two, they feel loved when people say thank you, so they.

[40:49] Karin: Want to be appreciated.

[40:50] Erin: They want to be appreciated. So that core desire of appreciation, that's how they feel loved. And when they're helping other people, usually it's because they're receiving love from that.

[41:04] Karin: And the fours want to be they want to be unique.

[41:07] Erin: They want to be authentic. Yeah, exactly.

[41:09] Karin: Authentic.

[41:10] Erin: Right? Yeah. Well, unique, special. All those words. Not just one word, but that little child probably dressed with mismatched socks or was really into art or dance or didn't want to be like the other kids. And so sometimes they got bullied or they were left out of parties because they were so different. But that's who they feel like. If they can be unique, they are loved. They are worthy. Type five. Their core desire. Yeah. To be competent. They don't want to look stupid.

[41:50] Karin: Yeah.

[41:50] Erin: And somewhere along the line, someone called them that in one way or another, and they don't want that to ever happen again. So they acquire the knowledge. They do the research, they analyze everything to make sure they've got all their bases covered, because when someone asks them a question and they have the answer, they are worthy of love. Type Six, the loyalists, they desire safety. So I would think that a Type Six, as a child, probably took some risks, got hurt, got reprimanded, and learned that the world is not safe, so they ended up protecting themselves. Type Seven, they desire to be satisfied. It could look like something that kid at the playground that's jumping from the top of the monkey bars, taking risks, breaking the rules, wanting more and more toys, friends, whatever it is. They may have felt deprived as a child, so they're compensating for that. And so once they have that thrill, they feel satisfied, and they feel loved. Yes, I'm good. I'm whole.

[43:14] Karin: And is it true that sevens often don't want to have to talk about the hard stuff?

[43:20] Erin: No, yeah. They will definitely focus on the positive. They really struggle with negative emotions and things going wrong. They just kind of either ignore it or avoid it or just deny it because it's too hard. They think that if they get stuck in one of those negative emotions, they're stuck, that it's always going to be that way. Yeah, but they forget that it's temporary.

[43:48] Karin: Okay.

[43:48] Erin: And eight, they desire power. So in some part of their childhood, they may have felt powerless, like they weren't heard, that they didn't have a say in something. And it's interesting, the type eight typically is the baby of the family and felt like they needed to protect the mother.

[44:17] Karin: Oh, interesting.

[44:18] Erin: Yeah. I did my case study on the eight, and I've had several eight clients, and this has all rung true. So interesting. So that I think is where that protecting of the weaker one comes in is starting with their own mother.

[44:37] Karin: So interesting. Okay.

[44:40] Erin: Nine, peacemaker, they desire peace. So maybe they grew up in a home that was full of conflict, and so they decided to either be the peacemaker and the mediator, but usually it was, I'm going to leave this scary situation. Mommy and Daddy are fighting, or My friends are fighting, or I'm just going to disappear and not be part of that because it's too scary.

[45:16] Karin: And they want to avoid recreating that kind of situation.

[45:19] Erin: Right. They don't want to be the problem. They don't want to be part of it either.

[45:24] Karin: Yeah. Okay. Thank you for going through those. Yeah. Okay. So the other thing, and we're not going to have time to go into in depth in this, but after you identify your core type, there are also wings. And this is not something I've ever gone too deeply into, but I'm curious if you could just say just a little bit about what that really means.

[45:52] Erin: Yeah. So the wings are the numbers on either side of your core type. They can't be any other number. So you're a type one, one of your wings is a type nine, and one of your wings is a type two. And this is where the diagram comes in handy because it's a circle. And so it makes a lot more sense when you look at it that way. And if you do take online tests and there's some experts out there who will give you a core type and a wing, like you're a type one, wing. Nine, the way I have been taught and educated on it, and the way I teach my students and my clients is to use both wings. Because imagine a bird with just one wing. It's going to be flying around in circles in one direction. You need both wings to fly. And so I teach you how to look at your situation, make a decision, resolve a conflict from both of your wing perspectives. So if you were trying to make a decision on what car to buy, you could look at it through your nine lens. Okay, again, going in your gut. What feels right, what makes me feel at peace? Does a red car make me feel at peace? Or is it something more silver? This is just a general example. And then you go to your type two, which is your other ring. All right? Is the size of this car practical? Right? Is it going to help my family get to where I need it to go? Is it going to help my budget think along the lines of that and relationships, hey, I could have my kids and all their friends come in this car or this one's, just for me and my hubbies. So relationship oriented. So if you look at your wing numbers to help you make decisions, resolve conflict, it just gives you a different perspective so you can be more objective.

[47:57] Karin: Okay, so the way you approach it is we have access to both wings and we can call upon the strengths of either wing to help us, correct?

[48:11] Erin: Yeah, it gets us out of that. Sometimes we get stuck in our type. Like, this is the only way we can see things. It gets us out of that so we can be more objective and make wiser choices and decisions and resolve conflict a lot easier.

[48:30] Karin: Right? Okay, so when someone knows their number, say, okay, so I'm a one, so now what? How can that help them?

[48:45] Erin: Right? It makes you more self aware. You will start noticing your patterns. You will start noticing, how did I get here again in a place maybe that you don't want to be and you can trace it back. Right? I was avoiding failure, so I quit before I could fail. For example, a type three, instead of learning from that failure to improve the process. And it also helps you with communication in relationships, like the story I share with my husband. When I hear him talk, I'm hearing him from his perspective, not necessarily mine. Same with my children, same with other people. I interact with my family. It creates that empathy and understanding of other people. So you don't get stuck with black and white thinking with right and wrong, thinking with you have the right and the truth and the only way to see the world. And so on a large scale in the world we live in right now, we need empathy. We need to be able to be open. To hear everyone's perspective doesn't mean we agree with it. If we could just sit and listen and try to understand one another, I think we would live at peace with one another and have more love for each other as humans.

[50:18] Karin: That sounds like a good thing. Yeah. And it seems like it's a really.

[50:24] Erin: Great.

[50:27] Karin: I don't know if it's quite this, but almost like a roadmap to help you grow and become the best version of yourself? Absolutely, yeah. Is there anything else you want people to know about the enneagram before we.

[50:42] Erin: There is so much to learn and what I hear a lot is people being confused. It's not just initials or a number or a color or whatever. It is so deep into intricate and complex because we are we're not simple, we're not just a number. So make sure that you have the right starting point of your core type and then from there gradually do that self awareness work and rediscover who you are.

[51:24] Karin: Great. Well, I'm going to come back to how people can do that. But first of all, what role does love play in the work that you do?

[51:35] Erin: I think I mentioned a lot of it. Right. I help people learn to love and accept themselves so that they can love and accept other people better. It's at the core of everything I do and it starts with you.

[51:50] Karin: So this is really a method to use to do that.

[51:53] Erin: Absolutely, yeah. If you talk about relationships and that and a lot of times I've worked with couples before, only one will come to the table because the other one isn't ready, feels forced or whatever. It really only takes one to start changing the dynamics of things, right? And so let's start with ourselves. Let's look inside. Where do I need to grow? Where do I need to adjust and watch everything else fall into place?

[52:24] Karin: Great. So how can people take a test and talk with you about their results and possibly work with you? How can they learn more about that?

[52:34] Erin: Yeah, I am everywhere on social media except Twitter. That's the only thing I haven't gone into. I probably won't, but my website is Aaron Slutskycoaching.com and there you will find your free enneagram assessment, which comes with a call, a conversation with me, just to confirm because it's important to me that you are started in the right direction. And then from there I talked about journaling a little bit. I have enneagram journals and so in each of these journals are 30 type specific prompts that you can work through to become more self aware. I went through my own, the type three, and I was like, it took me six months to get through because it was asking me questions that were going really deep. I'm like, wait a minute, who wrote this thing? It's very different when you write something versus actually doing the work and asking yourself these thought provoking questions that just create such self awareness. There's also my Self Awareness Academy digital course, doors open in September, so if you want to get on my waiting list so you can get in as quick as possible, you'll see on my website for Self Awareness Academy and we go through six modules through the enneagram at those deeper levels and according to your enneagram type. We also talk about different topics like avoiding burnout communication, setting priorities and what your values are. So that runs for six weeks, and there's a VIP experience where you can have group coaching with me as well. And then, of course, I always am happy to coach you one on one. Actually, this summer I have summer sessions. Six coach, one on one coaching sessions for this summer. It's perfect, especially for teachers or people who are adjusting their schedule in the summer and just want to do some of that personal growth in the summer. Perfect.

[54:44] Karin: Great. Erin, this was such a rich conversation. I really appreciated you sharing all of this information with everybody so they can learn more about it.

[54:54] Erin: Yeah, this has been wonderful. Thank you for this opportunity.

[54:57] Karin: Yeah, absolutely.

Outro:

[55:00] Karin: Thanks for joining us today on Love Is Us. If you liked the show, I would so appreciate it if you left me a review. If you have questions and would like to follow me on social media, you can find me on Instagram, where I'm theloveandconnectioncoach. Special thanks to Tim Gorman for my

music, Aly Shaw for my artwork, and Ross Burdick for tech and editing assistance. Again, I'm so glad you joined us today because the best way to bring more love into your life and into the world is to be loved. The best way to be loved is to love yourself and those around you. Let's learn and be inspired together.