“Using the Enneagram for Spiritual Growth and Peace (Rob Field)” Ep#42

In this episode of Spiritual Hot Sauce, Chris is joined by returning guest Rob Field, Director of the Center for Spiritual Wisdom, to educate us on the origins, history, and spiritual usage of the Enneagram. They also discuss why we struggle to hold on to the peace we gain through prayer and meditation.

Connect with Rob Field: Visit the Center for Spiritual Wisdom at centersw.org or email him at director@centersw.org.

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

Book: The Sacred Enneagram: Finding Your Unique Path to Spiritual Growth by Christopher L. Heuertz

Book Recommendation for Beginners: The Enneagram: A Christian Perspective by Father Richard Rohr

Enneagram Testing: Take the RHETI online inventory at the Enneagram Institute.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

The Enneagram says that I have the God-given gift of serenity. And my job is to balance this gift of serenity as kind of a counterweight to the anger that is kind of waiting at the door to stick its leg out and let me trip over it if I don't access the spiritual gift I've been given.

Chris Jones 0:24

Many of us have struggled with the challenge that when we try to pray or meditate, as soon as real life happens, we lose our peace. Our conversation today offers a way to move past what is waiting in our door. Discover the spiritual gifts we already have and learn how to live in them. I'm joined by Rob Field, the director for the Center of Spiritual Wisdom. I'm Chris Jones, and this is Spiritual Hot Sauce.

SPEAKER_02 0:54

Rob, welcome back to the sauce. It's good to see you. Thanks, Chris. I really appreciate the invite to come back and talk about some of my love.

Chris Jones 1:03

The Enneagram. If you would just dive into this and tell us about the history of the Enneagram, where does this come from?

SPEAKER_02 1:11

Yeah, so first things first, Enneagram means a circle, and within that circle, an equilateral triangle, overlaid on that a hexagram, a six-sided figure. For each of the nine points, you have a number starting nine at the top, and then one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight going all around it. So that's the symbol for what is a very intriguing and I think powerful tool to help people understand how I am made in the image of God. And the Enneagram sort of shows you what that looks like. It's almost like a spiritual roadmap, if you will, once you figure out which of these nine points most resembles you. So a lot of people use it for personality typing, and it's just gone crazy. I mean, people use it in business and people use it for psychology, people use it for psychotherapy, people are hanging shingles left and right as Enneagram consultants. So that's a little bit about what is this thing? I think of it as a spiritual typology more so than a than a personality uh typing thing.

Chris Jones 2:22

How old is it?

SPEAKER_02 2:24

Do we do we know its origins and where it comes from? Yeah, we know some of its origins, and others are kind of shrouded in mystery, but we know that the roots of it go back to before the Christian era. Pythagoras, he was not just into math. He was a philosopher, he was quite spiritually minded, he had sort of principles for understanding what it means to be human and how we live the best human life. And so his ideas were probably picked up by a Christian desert father, Evagrius Ponticus. And he's the fourth century after the time of Jesus. Well, fast forward another thousand years because we've we've lost the exact thread, but somehow the wisdom captured in the Enneagram gets preserved, possibly by the Sufis. They often would study other non-Islamic religious thought and philosophy and teachings. Somehow it re-emerged, and in the 20th century, a guy named G.I. Gurdjieff begins to talk about this nine-pointed symbol. And then you have to go into the 1960s and 70s when we have two people from South America, Oscar Ichazzo from Bolivia, and then Claudia Naranjo. And it's Ichazo who is credited with putting it all together and adding a psychological element. So then we get from him the nine-pointed symbol borrowed from Gurdjieff and added this spiritual/slash psychological overlay. Then we get the Enneagram of personality, which is what most of us are talking about today.

Chris Jones 4:12

How did it become so popular?

SPEAKER_02 4:15

Yeah, well, I think it just reached a critical mass because so many people started talking about it. And then you add, you know, blogs and podcasts and social media, and all of a sudden, people, you know, when it reaches meme status on the internet, it's like, okay, this is this is really taking on a life of itself. So so, but but I, in Christian circles, because I know some of your listeners are Christian, it seems to have been the Jesuits, the Jesuit order in the Catholic Church, that were given basically permission to learn a variety of different, sometimes non-religious subjects. And some of them became students of this Claudio Naranjo. Remember, he was the student of Ichazo from Bolivia. And both of them eventually brought this work to the United States. So there were some Jesuit priests andor seminarians who took classes and learned about this thing called the Enneagram. And a lot of them said, hey, this reminds me of what we learn in seminary about the passions, the deadly sins. And they've got nine, but you know, it seems to match our list, classic list of seven. Right. There's got there's got to be something going on here. So they start sharing it, and then people, not a not a Jesuit, but a Franciscan people like Father Richard Rohr, a preeminent Christian teacher for a lot of people today, picks up on it. He studies it and he starts teaching about it and writing books about it. So I think from there you get some of the people who really appreciated how he brought a Christian perspective to this and really showed how Christians don't need to fear this as some kind of new age, something or other that's going to lead them astray. He really grounded it in scripture, grounded in a tradition, and for example, talked about examples of biblical characters for each of the nine Enneagram types to help us really see it from a deeply Christian perspective. But then just things like the Enneagram Institute and the narrative school of Enneagram teaching began doing good quality work, teaching people how to use this tool. And those of us who are working in religious and spiritual circles began listening to people like Richard Rohr. He's who I first heard it from. And we said, wow, this is an incredible tool. This is so helpful to me in my own faith, in my own spiritual journey. I'm going to start sharing it with others. So at some point we reached a tipping point, and now poor Chris Jones and company, you know, encounter that. They go, What, huh? How do you spell that? What is that?

Chris Jones 6:57

Right, right. Tell us about how it works now. Now we've kind of gone through the history of it. Now, how does this work? And I mean, what's the nuts and bolts of it?

SPEAKER_02 7:07

Yeah, well, so somebody who's who I, for example, when I do one-on-one spiritual mentoring, spiritual direction work with, I will say, I use a tool called the Enneagram. It could be very helpful in our conversations. If this is becomes something with multiple sessions and we get into deep conversation about yourself and your spiritual life, this could really be helpful. Sometimes I will give them a little thin introductory book, introduction, Enneagram for Dummies, let's call it. Sometimes they take an online inventory, you could call it like a test, where there are these forced choice questions you have to answer. You're more like this or more like this. Choice A or choice B. A hundred questions later, you come out with a score that says you really ought to look at the following Enneagram numbers. And it'll be, I'll give you an example. Three, four, and nine, you scored the highest on. Read the descriptions of each of those Enneagram types and see if one of them is not a pretty good match for you, how you know yourself to be. And it could be from a completely secular psychological perspective where we're just talking about personality type, or it could be the authors and teachers I really appreciate who bring it in the spiritual dimension because really it's about spirituality, it's about going to the roots of who we are, as I said at the top of our conversation, Chris, figuring out who I am when I'm told I'm made in the image of God. What does that mean? What does that look like? Here is why this is so powerful, Chris. It begins to help us know what our subconscious motivations are for having the preferences, the hang-ups, the inhibitions, the fears, anything that might block us from living a full life in the image of God, that uh abundant life that Jesus said he came to show us. The Enneagram can help us figure out what our gifts, what our virtues, something called holy ideas, for example, that are all wrapped up in and embedded in the Enneagram. It can show us how we have a ready ability to tap those gifts, those virtues, those holy ideas, and by the same token, what might keep us from being able to use these gifts that are God given. So I'll I'll use myself as an as an example.

SPEAKER_00 9:45

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 9:45

I am a type one on the Enneagram. That's my home base. If you will, these are my default factory settings. And what that means is I tend towards the highest ideal of any possible thing, solving world peace or how to load the dishwasher. Just ask me. I'm gonna tell you the ideal to do it, which makes me sometimes look a rather perfectionistic. And when I'm having a bad day, it makes me pretty picky and pretty kind of put out with people who don't want to do things up to the highest standard and the highest ideal. So you can see immediately how that has a good side and it's got a bad side. Good side for us type ones is we always aspire to the highest and best of whatever it is we're doing or what we're involved in. Give us a noble cause and watch a type one on the Enneagram go to work. However, we can get tripped up so easily by our over-insistence, our pushiness about a high ideal, a very high standard, that we can alienate people, that we can become our own worst enemy in trying to pursue whatever we think this noble cause might be. So that's just one example of how helpful this can be. But then there's more on the spiritual dimension as well.

Chris Jones 11:10

The spiritual stuff. That and I would really like to get into that. Can you open that up for us?

SPEAKER_02 11:15

Yeah, well, I'm gonna just quote: I knew we were gonna have this conversation, Chris. So I picked up a book from my shelf. Okay. This is the sacred enneogram from an author named Christopher Hewart. And he puts this really well, and it's just a few sentences, so I'll just read this real quick. The contemporary Enneagram illustrates the nine ways we humans get lost, but also the nine ways we can come home to our true self. Put another way, it exposes nine ways we lie to ourselves about who we think we are, nine ways we can come clean about those illusions, and nine ways we can find our way back to God. Which puts it really well. So think about the seven deadly sins. You know, for for me, I know that that deadly sin, the one I'm most prone to, is anger.

SPEAKER_00 12:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:07

Right? That if I'm gonna get tripped up by something, the Enneagram predicts that it will be this underlying anger that I try to keep a lid on. And the more contemporary lists of the deadly sins, as I say, have added anger. Uh, the Enneagram certainly does. Well, meanwhile, the Enneagram says that I have the God-given gift of serenity almost like it came at birth. And my job is to balance this gift of serenity. And for me, it's about silent prayer, contemplative prayer. That's when I can begin to sense that and touch that as kind of a counterweight to the anger that is kind of waiting at the door to stick its leg out and let me trip over it if I don't access this spiritual gift I've been given of uh serenity. And so the enneagram says, do what you need to do, Rob, to be able to touch that gift that God has already given to you, but you might not be aware that God's given it to you.

Chris Jones 13:20

Now, have you found that's actually true for you?

SPEAKER_02 13:23

Absolutely. Yes, it's really uncanny when I began reading the type descriptions for Enneagram pipes number one, which is what I am, and then comparing it to my own life, I began to make sense of a lot of things that were mysteries to me about myself. About myself. So, yes, we're fearfully and wonderfully made, but sometimes it's more fearful because we go, why do I do that? Why do I get hooked by that? Why is it that I will all of a sudden allow anger to erupt uh over something that's so minuscule like that? The Enneagram's answers and some very helpful, pragmatic ways of saying, oh, yeah, that's that's part of how you're hardwired. Your default factory setting includes anger. However, there is this other thing, and it's called serenity, and you can counterbalance this tendency towards anger by cultivating that, by cultivating this gift that God's already given to you. You just need to take it off the shelf, open it up, and start using it.

Chris Jones 14:29

There's probably people that's listening right now where instant anger or not being able to control that anger is a problem. And being put such a focus on it as you have, I'm sure you've come up with some really good tools to help control that. What's some of these tools that you've learned because of the Enneagram?

SPEAKER_02 14:48

Well, around the time I was learning about the Enneagram, I had become a pastor and was uh serving a church as senior minister. And I just knew, told you this in the last conversation we had, I was out of my depth. I something was gonna have to change.

SPEAKER_00 15:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:06

So I began learning about different forms of prayer. So the Enneagram can scare you into a better prayer life in a very good way. So things like breath prayers, you know, in the moment, back to anger, somebody cuts you off in traffic. You are late to where you're trying to get to go, and you just feel the anger beginning to well up within you. There's nothing like having a breath prayer at the ready. Lord Jesus, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner, the classic sinner's prayer, the biblical prayer, to be able to have something at the ready instead of just letting anger have its way and blow, I blow my top. And if somebody has a weapon, this could become very dangerous very quickly for me, right? So so there are things like that. And then knowing that another of my teachers' father, Thomas Keating, the godfather of centering prayer, says, you need to think of your time in contemplative prayer as kind of an antibiotic. You know, the doctor said, twice a day with your antibiotic. And Father Keating would always say, 20 minutes twice a day, because you want to keep this level of spiritual peace, of a prayerful peacefulness in your system so it can counteract the foreign disease-producing agents that want to come in and take away that sense of peace and serenity. So then you go to your prayer chair. In my case, it is centering prayer, which I at least do once a day. And on a really, really great day, it would be twice a day, to keep that in my system so that there is something that is a counterweight. It's it's about balance, right? It's about not allowing the slings and arrows, the things of the world that are gonna invariably be there to make my anger erupt, to try to try to be prepared in advance in some way and to begin to kind of restructure and rewire how I react when something that would normally make me blow my top enters my life. Walk us through that prayer. What does that look like? Yeah, so that's centering prayer. It's a form of contemplative prayer. And the very brief version of it can refer people to our last podcast episode where I went into it more of depth. Yeah. But it's uh having a prayer word, sacred word, that you are invoking at the beginning of the 20 minutes, you are remaining in silence and simply trying to imagine yourself in the presence of God or Jesus or the Holy Spirit, take your pick. And when I begin finding myself engaging thoughts, becoming overly distracted by whatever thoughts come down the stream of consciousness, then I very gently reinvoke the sacred word, in my case, mercy, because I think of a property that I say is God is one of the greatest things God gives to us, it's mercy. And so I simply gently, in inwardly, don't say it out loud, but I don't need that, to simply re in basically restate my intention. Oh, that's right. I'm here to enjoy the presence of God. And whatever it is God wants these 20 minutes to to be, I'm gonna leave that up to God and I'm gonna let those thoughts go.

SPEAKER_00 18:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:47

Um so then the timer goes off at the end of 20 minutes, and I gradually get up out of my prayer chair and I go on my way.

Chris Jones 18:56

I think there's a lot of people out there that they have different forms of kind of what you're talking about. Some is a prayer life, some is a study life, some may use meditation. There's a lot of different things we can use to kind of balance and center ourselves and prepare for the days. But there's a lot of people that do that and come out of that and feel like life just immediately stills their joy. What would you tell those people who struggle with that?

SPEAKER_02 19:25

Well, the first thing I'd say is I'm your brother. I mean, I think the world and the state of kind of chaos and division that we seem to be in, not just in our country, it's it's anywhere you look, unfortunately, throughout the world. That is it it makes me be able to reread some of what Paul and Jesus taught about the difference between the world and the world inside me when God, when when I'm aware of God's presence in my life and how different those are. But the other thing is to say, brother, sister, whoever's experiencing these difficulties and challenges, maintaining a sense of that beyond your 20 minutes, 30 minutes, an hour, whatever you do, is to say, please don't try to do that alone. Because whether it's an online community, whether it's a prayer friend, whether it's a faith community, a church, synagogue, whatever it is, we need each other. And we need each other now more than ever. And so, however, you can find a like-minded group doesn't have to look like traditional church. It can look like a neighborhood uh prayer circle or Bible study or just, you know, one other person who's gonna meet you hopefully at least once a week, and and you can do some of that sharing. And what is the old saying, you know, a burden share is a burden sliced in half. I just really think not having the sense that I'm out here, you know, going after it every day, trying to get to that prayerful, peaceful place is just really helpful because chances are God's put this person or this group or this faith community in your life so, so that God can give you that extra support through these other human beings. So that that's part of what I would encourage. I think we have way too much lone ranger lonerism in the world. And I don't, I don't think God made us to be lone rangers. Not most of us anyway.

Chris Jones 21:33

Yeah, we need to be in our communities, and I totally agree with that. You know, I think another part of what causes us to, and I don't know if it's a fail, but I hear people start meditating or prayer or whatever they're gonna get into, they do it three times for like eight minutes, and it's not working. You know, but this takes time, does it not? This is a process, it's not an event. You are training your brain and rewiring it.

SPEAKER_02 21:59

Yeah. It will. Be any worthwhile practice, I'll just keep it on the level of like a a new athlete or an athlete, a longtime athlete picking up a new sport. The training regimen is going to make you feel uncomfortable. And that means, in a sense, that it's effective, not that you ought to go out and injure yourself every day. Right. But there's going to be something that's against the grain. Same in the spiritual realm. A practice, call it a discipline if you want to. I prefer the word practice. Yeah. It's going to be something that, if it's going to provide benefit to you, that you have to be willing to give it a good college, high school try, which means try it for a considered period of time. I say give it at least eight to ten weeks on a daily basis and try not to judge the fruits of it because we're trying to leave that up to God, right? We're trying to say, I trust God, the Holy Spirit, to make use of this in a way that is going to be for my benefit, my uplift, my soul's well-being. And I think it it takes that for most of us because honestly, when I started doing centering prayer, my form of contemplative prayer, I had all kinds of restlessness. I thought, what's the matter with me? I have all of the some of them ludicrous, silly and or scary thoughts, you know, knocking around in my brain. And I would have preferred just to, I love music, you know, go turn on some piece of music that I like. I knew I'd feel much better. But I trusted something about these teachers and what they reported. They seemed very credible and persuasive that if I stuck with this, I would begin to sense, and maybe other people I'd live with and interact with more so than me would begin to say, oh no, I hope you'll keep doing that. I mean, there are lots of stories in the centering rare community of people saying, Yeah, I was thinking about giving it up after 10 weeks. I just didn't think it was worthwhile. And and my spouse, or in some cases, my kids, went, oh no, please, please, Dad, don't really prefer how you are after you do that. Maybe to the person's surprise. Oh, no kidding. Oh, okay.

Chris Jones 24:22

Yeah, yeah. I think you've just hit on a real major point, though, because you're right. A lot of people, like when they they start to meditate or something, they'll put music on in the background. And I think they're lolling themselves into a false sense of state of peace because music impacts us so much. And the idea is to be able to control our emotions, like you said, that when anger comes up, you're in a place where you've learned how to control your emotions. The time to learn how to use a fire extinguisher is not during a fire, it's beforehand. It's preparing and knowing what you need to do, which is kind of what you're describing. Making yourself go through like the prayer, like you're talking about, or meditation, where you force yourself to do it without music, you are learning to control your emotions through that exercise.

SPEAKER_02 25:14

Those are really valid ways to look at it. Another is do the fruits and gifts of the spirit sound good when Paul lists those? Would you like to enjoy more gentleness, peacefulness, kindness, generosity? Most of us would say, yeah. I just while figuring out how to how to access that. Well, what time and the spiritual teachers who are worthy of respect, including Jesus, have taught us is this is a classic way to do it. And it's classic for a reason. It's because it has worked for so many people for so long that I like myself better because I think I tap into the fruits and gifts of the spirit a bit more readily when I do this maybe boring, sometimes challenging, and frankly, at times uncomfortable thing.

Chris Jones 26:05

Yeah. Well, I like what you're saying because you're exactly right. This is a spiritual thing. And the fruits aren't the fruits of religion or the fruits of practice or the fruits from the spirit. So when you make your mind mind you and you are focused on the spiritual things, you are learning to allow your spiritual person to control somewhat of your physical external experience. So it's kind of goes back to what we were talking about as you go through this exercise over time, you are training your being to become aligned with your spirit person.

SPEAKER_02 26:42

This is a good segue back to the Enneagram, if I can make that. Yes, please. Because we talk about personality that Enneagram describes, persona, you know, to use that old Jungian analytical term, and your essence. So this is what falls out of people who teach the Enneagram only as personality typing without any of the spiritual basis for it. We all live on the continuum between our pure God-given essence, how we're made in the image of God, and then this homemade, subconsciously constructed self that the ego tends to prefer, which is what in Enneagram terms is kind of your personality armor. You know, somewhere along the way, a good child development psychologist could explain it, we perceived an injury or a deprivation of some sort. We didn't get what we needed, mom or dad, whatever, our caregiver didn't provide it. And so, in our very immature, you know, a few months-old into the world way, we devised the strategy almost unbeknownst to ourselves. It literally happens unconsciously and subconsciously. And for me, as a type one, it was if I'm a good boy and I always do what mom or dad says and I do it to the best of my ability, I'll be okay. I'll get what I need, I'll get the love I need, et cetera. All nine of the enneagram types can be explained that way and also in more religious terms, in terms of which of the deadly sins are you more prone to? Okay. But the essence has to be the other side of it, because what we're doing with the enneagram as a tool and then a spiritual practice like meditation or or contemplative prayer, is we're trying to restore the balance more towards the God-given Imago day made in the image of God side. The Enneagram describes as your essence. We're back to virtues, we're back to gifts, we're back to these holy ideas, which are yours almost for the taking, but it's almost as if we have to relax this overlay of ego-based personality armor in order for these to begin to be revealed and more approachable, that for us to be able to tap into them. And it's honestly not so much effort, it's almost getting out of our own way that the best spiritual practices are designed to do.

Chris Jones 29:21

I like that. And you know, you brought up Galatians 5, 22 and 23, the fruits of the spirit. And Paul goes on to say, but you crucify the flesh in this so you can get to that. I obviously that doesn't mean to crucify your flesh, but I think it does mean the flesh has to give in and give that time to the spirit to let that come out. Exactly what you were pointing out about Jesus out in the wilderness.

SPEAKER_00 29:45

Exactly.

Chris Jones 29:45

That he was quieting the external so he could focus on what God had to say.

SPEAKER_02 29:52

I think that's what Jesus was doing in those times of prayer and somehow communing with God, maybe not giving him his list of, I'm gonna go out and heal these 20 people today, and I want you to be there. Maybe it was simply some sense of faith and trust that that God would be with him. And going through this practice, this discipline, this prayer, in order to hear it again, hear it anew.

Chris Jones 30:22

I think prayer and what we're discussing, and exact I think you're saying it so beautifully, is more about letting God tune our heart to His so we serve whatever purpose that we need to. And in that we find peace. It's not where we think it's gonna be, it's what God tunes us to be.

unknown 30:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:41

And when you get on the divine wavelength, when you are hearing the beautiful music and beautiful poetry that God wants to flow into you from the divine self, the divine presence, that in itself is healing. That in itself brings about a ready access to some of these fruits and gifts of the spirit all at once. No. Miraculously, in a way that uh would be made into a feature-length film. No, probably not. Right. But by degrees, you know, one of my teachers says you engage one of these practices and you yell at the kids when you come home from work a little less loudly than you did the day before. We're not looking for an all-at-once quick fix cure, the way we Western, westernized consumers are thinking. We're we're in it for the relationship, we're in it for the long haul.

SPEAKER_00 31:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:37

And we begin to realize because we've made this commitment to be in it, we think we're called to a different way to live, then some of this healing and then greater balance and greater godliness, I guess, is the old-fashioned word. Uh a little more, a little more godlike or a little more like Jesus begins to just creep in. And we can't attach much ego or pride to it because we know it didn't come from us.

Chris Jones 32:07

Aaron Powell, you know, I think so many of us think and go through life feeling like spiritual things happen outside of us, and we don't realize the spiritual thing is within us. And for us to hear that, we've got to quiet the distractions of life. And so we can, in that quiet place, focus on what we need to. And as you say, it's slow, it's in degrees as that starts to manifest in the external of what is in the internal. I think that is a tremendous thing that people could take away from this, of exactly what you're saying. Well, I got a quick question for you, because you brought up testing online. How do you identify a reputable place?

SPEAKER_02 32:49

Well, kind of by trial and error, and then the people I trust who have pointed the way. I mean, it's not hard to figure out who's been doing this work for a long time, and people like Richard Rohr will include lots of footnotes and tell you who he's been reading. And I trust Richard Rohr, so I know that it fits from Don Richard Risto and Russ Hudson, who founded the Enneagram Institute, that that is a reputable source. I know that the books Father Richard Rohr wrote, I think there are maybe three Enneagram-related books that he wrote. The one I recommend is the Enneagram, a Christian Perspective, for example. For Christians, it's a great entry point because he explains it very well, ties it in with Christian teaching very solidly. The narrative school of the Enneagram, someone named Helen Palmer helped get that going, and a teacher named David Daniels picked that up and continues. So there are these schools of Enneagram teaching, some of which are more reputable. And uh, somebody who wants to try, I think it costs maybe 15 bucks. Maybe it's a little bit more than that now. You can go take the online test at the Enneagram Institute, and it's just Enneagram Institute.com. They also will offer you classes and books and all that good stuff. But really, the easiest way to do it is look at some of the free information online at the Enneagram Institute and poke around and read the different, the nine different types. And you'll know that you're getting pretty close to what your type is when you both are positively impressed by a type description because you think that describes aspects of yourself that you're a little bit proud of, maybe, maybe justifiably so. But then you get a little peasy or even a little nauseated because it's uncovering things about yourself that you really wish most people didn't know about you.

Chris Jones 34:47

Rob, this has been fantastic. I think you've offered a lot of valuable information. So it's not just an Enneagram, it's a spiritual thing that helps you that even if you don't subscribe to the Enneagram, uh, the insight into prayer and meditation of spiritual growth to find our peace, that it's not instantaneous gratification, that this is a long-term investment of our time for us and our family and people we love. What's the last thing that you would like to share with everybody and like them know before you know we we say goodbye to everyone?

SPEAKER_02 35:23

Well, if there are other folk out there like you who are new to the Enneagram, I just want to say, as a teacher of the Enneagram and a card-carrying Christian, don't fear this. There are teachers who will help you make connect the dots with Christianity. And of course, there are the more pharisaic-minded folk within Christian circles who will want to scare you and say, oh no, that's got this or that element that we don't want to bring in. But my my response to that would be: is God not the author of all truth? And whether it's got, you know, a label on it that says Christian truth or not, I believe God is the author of everything true, everything that is good, everything that is holy. And I'm here to say you will find truth that will be pragmatic and helpful to you in your faith, in your spiritual life, if you take a little sampling of being.

Chris Jones 36:27

Now, if people want to visit you and visit the center of spiritual wisdom, what's some of the things you guys got going on and where can they come see everything at?

SPEAKER_02 36:36

So we're in western North Carolina. Sometimes we venture into Upper South Carolina, and you can check out our offerings, as you say, many of them are online at centersw.org. The S stands for spiritual, the W stands for wisdom. So centersw.org, Center for Spiritual Wisdom, and we've got uh staff that will respond to any of your questions or inquiries. And let's see, things we've got coming up. Something I'm very excited about. We have a pilgrimage to follow in the footsteps of St. Hildegard of Bingen, Meister Eckhart, a renowned teacher and preacher in his day, and a really interesting group of Christians called the Begines. So we'll be traveling from Charlotte, North Carolina to first Amsterdam, then we'll venture into Germany along the Rhine River, and then 10 days later we'll end up in Strasbourg, France. And along the way, we will be delving into the teachings and the lives of these incredible mystical saints and learning more about them. That happens in the fall. We do have some spaces remaining, but then there's the classes that are one-off events. We'll be doing another Enneagram series in the fall called the Enneagram for Relationships. And I'd love for people to know about that. So check us out, sign up for our mailing list, and we'll tell you more.

Chris Jones 38:03

Awesome. And if people want to get in touch with you, Rob, or have questions, how can they do that?

SPEAKER_02 38:08

Be glad to respond directly to them through email. My email address is director at centersw.org.

Chris Jones 38:17

Rob, this has been great. I think you've uh given us a lot of food for thought and some insight, and I appreciate it. And uh it was good to see you back on here again. And I can't wait until the next time. Appreciate it. Even if you have no faith in the Enneagram whatsoever, guys, don't quit the daily prayer and meditation. It is one of the greatest investments of your time you can give. I know it's tough, I know it's hard, and sometimes it feels like that there's nothing coming out of it. But that's not true. It's in degrees, and it happens over time. So don't give up. And I will see you again next week.