Dr. Joseph Howell and Barrett Owen explore the subtypes that each ego type enters into. Dr. Howell shares what are the three subtypes, the benefits of investigating these subtypes and the concept of stacking. He discusses how our passions tell us more about our subtypes and what emerges from the ego once you have this new lens.
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Email us: therealenneagram@gmail.com
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Visit The Institute for Conscious Being: theicb.org
Dr. Joseph Howell and Barrett Owen explore the subtypes that each ego type enters into. Dr. Howell shares what are the three subtypes, the benefits of investigating these subtypes and the concept of stacking. He discusses how our passions tell us more about our subtypes and what emerges from the ego once you have this new lens.
Connect with us:
Email us: therealenneagram@gmail.com
Follow us on Instagram: @therealenneagram
Visit The Institute for Conscious Being: theicb.org
[00:01] Intro: You're listening to The Real Enneagram podcast, a Spiritual Quest, brought to you by the Institute for Conscious Being.
[00:11] Barrett: Welcome back to The Real Enneagram.
[00:14] Joe: A Spiritual Quest.
[00:16] Barrett: My name is Barrett Owen, and I'm one of the podcast hosts. And I'm here today with Dr. Joe Howell, the founder and director of the Institute for Conscious Being. We know as the ICB. Today, we are jumping into a conversation about subtypes that each of our ego types enter into. We're going to explore that in more depth, but first, Dr. Howell, how are you today?
[00:38] Joe: Hello Barrett, how are you?
[00:41] Barrett: I am doing very well. I'm particularly interested in this conversation today, because as you so eloquently stated in your book that each of the nine ego types, we each have these three subtypes. So could you just jump us into the conversation? And we'll just unpack it together. What do we need to know about this concept of subtypes?
[01:07] Joe: The concept of subtypes is a game changer for a lot of people who study the Enneagram because it helps to crystallize what their ego type is once they know that each ego type has what's called a subtype or an instinctual type. Because whatever instinctual subtype we are embellished is, to a great extent, what our ego type is. So people who don't know their ego types, if they can look at the subtypes of each of the nine Enneagram types, they'll be able to ferret out with more awareness who they really are, in terms of their ego type.
And what what are the subtypes? Well, that means that any one of the ego types could be interested in self-preservation, preserving and protecting themselves, which is one of the subtypes. And two, it could be interested in one-on-one relationships and/or the sexual component of relationships. And number three, it is more interested in the social aspects of who we are, our place in the world, who we know, and the relationships that are in our life socially.
[02:42] Barrett: So each of the nine ego types have the potential of having one of three subtypes. And those three are the same. So it's self-preservation, sexual synteny, and then social. And all nine have one of those three. Is this why you could sit across the table from someone who self-identifies as the same ego type as you, but you seem like they just seem very different than you?
[03:13] Joe: Very well put, because it has to do with intention and motivation. For example, you're a Three. If you are a Three subtype that's self-preservative, instead of sexually syntonic or social, your posturing in your life would have to do with the ways that you can accomplish but also remained safe in your accomplishments. Okay. Somebody else as a Three may not care a whit about how safe they are, just so long as everybody likes them, and they get the job done.
[03:37] Barrett: Right.
[03:37] Joe: Which would be more social, okay. Or if they were sexual, it doesn't matter who likes them, or how safe they are as much as their beloved loves them very much or that the person who they are one-on-one interested in most loves them and adores them and that they accomplish.
[03:50] Barrett: How can people know which one they are? Or do we have a little bit of all three?
[03:52] Joe: We all have all three, but there's only one of the three that is our primary. It's in the background all the time. It's a preoccupation that we have. When we walk in the room. It's about safety and preserving ourselves. Whatever about us we feel needs to be preserved, protected. It's about the beloved, the romantic, the one-on-one intimate type of relationship above everything.
When we walk into a room, instead of giving a sweep across the room, we may, if we're the sexual type or syntonic type, one-on-one type, look at that one person in the room instead of trying to read the entire room, like somebody who is a social subtype.
[05:29] Barrett: Why would someone want to know their subtype? What does it benefit them? Or once you know it, what emerges in the ego once you have this new lens?
[05:42] Joe: Well, it modulates our ego. For example, a lot of people who are Five identify themselves as being people who kind of live in a cave, spend a lot of time by themselves, hoard knowledge, don't really get out of the cave much. But if they are a Social Five, they do get out of the cave, because they are inclined to want to be with people with what they know. So does that answer your question?
[06:14] Barrett: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. And so I'm curious, how would one, especially if someone's just getting into this work of thinking about this, how would you, what would you tell them to do to help name their dominant subtype? What can somebody do to name it? How would they know which of the three they are?
[06:14] Joe: I love that question. I like the when you walk into a room scenario. When you walk into a room, do you need to feel safe more than to connect with people? Or do you need to have a one-on-one with people in that room? Are you socially inclined, one-on-one inclined? Or are you more inclined to have a protective covering over yourself? What is the number one consideration? Then the other two come behind it. It's called stacking. That's called stalking.
[07:12] Joe: And then my book, "Becoming Conscious," there's a chapter on subtypes, and there's an illustration on stacking. Let's see, that would be page 125 in the latest edition, and that is Figure Eight that shows what a dominant subtype is like, and how the other two subtypes within us stack up. Considering that the better part of our mental and emotional energy goes through our subtype.
The other way as a surefire way to know what our subtype is, is to know what our passion is, because our passion tells us more about our subtype, because we run our passions through our subtype more than any other thing. For example, okay, if a Three uses deceit through their subtype, and they all do, all people of an ego type processes their passion through their subtype.
For example, if you were a Self-preservative Three subtype, Barrett, deceit would be very important for you to make sure that you were protected. Even if you had to tell a white lie, present a false image, walk into the room with maybe extra plumage that you do not have, or that goes true for males or females.
In your speech, propaganda would be the way that a Three would talk, but it would be to propagandize in ways that create a safety net for yourself. When you're with somebody, and for example, if you're a stockbroker, and you're Number Three, and your speech may be about what wonderful, wonderful job that you did for all of your clients' portfolios. When the stock market went down, your clients went up. Okay. That's deceit in order to create an image that makes you impregnable. You're safe. You're okay. You're good. And that's true for every ego time.
[09:47] Barrett: So by knowing your subtype, I feel like there's a lot of people when they enter into the Enneagram, they begin to really wrestle with "Well, people keep telling me that I'm an Ego Type Five, but I don't feel like I am." And I hear that language a lot, like I don't really know what I am. Some people seem to know exactly what they are. And I'm the person over here that can't, I just seem to can't narrow it down between either one number or two numbers or three, or they just not sure they trust the whole process to begin with.
Would you say that's when if you get into a conversation of subtype that helps narrow the playing field to help focus their attention? And I feel like a lot of times when we just generically talk about the nine ego types, there's just so much content. You can only say so much about each number. And there are some kind of funny one-liners that you can give for each ego type. But there is something you talked about in your book that there is a counter subtype for each number. Can you tell us what you mean by that?
[10:48] Joe: Yes, like, for example, Ego Type Six has a counter type that puts them out there as being... looking like people who are not afraid. Evil Knievel was said to have fought his fears by looking like a person and acting like a person who was fearless. So with his motorcycle, he jumped over 24 cars. There's such a fight to not let fear take over, that he in his subtype is counter to the other two subtypes which cower under fear.
[11:29] Barrett: So every number has a counter subtype?
[11:33] Joe: Yes, everyone, and I've spelled them out in the book.
[11:37] Barrett: Yes. And that's why people can look across the room and have the same ego type, and it just looks so wholeheartedly different, because someone might be exhibiting the counter type, or they just really don't look like that Six. They don't even act like that Six, or sound like that Six, but they know inherently they are because of their counter subtype.
[11:58] Joe: Absolutely. And the thing about it is to modulate that, I'm all for healing and wholeness, to modulate the unhealthy aspects of that counter type, instead of running our passion through that subtype, we run our virtues through it.
So if you are a Three, and you run deceit through whatever your subtype is - social, sexual, synteny, or self-preservative - you will get into trouble. But if you begin transformation, you will replace deceit for truth with truthfulness. And that takes you from being an unhealthy self-preservative Three to being a healthy, self-preservative Three, and they are in... look entirely different.
[13:04] Barrett: Yeah, that's a wonderful distinction between them. So I have learned in my personal journey, that I know that I'm a very extroverted person. I gravitate and get a lot of energy around being with people. And so I thought for a long time that my subtype was social.
It was in your book where I learned stacking that I realized I do have social and it's the second highest. Deep, deep down, it's very important to me when I walk into the room that the most powerful person knows me. And that has become an unconscious kind of reality that I've seen emerge, and that I am known by this one person.
It could be an attractive person, or it could be the most powerful person, but there, I will identify someone in the room that I'm like, I need that person to know me. And by the end of the night, they will. And so... and whatever that circumstance looks like. So I have learned that is what you mean by sexual. It's not physical intimacy. So how would you describe the sexual one-on-one-nesss?
[14:20] Joe: Well, it can be physical when you look at it. If somebody has the spin of romance and the beloved. It can also... if the beloved is the divine, that puts another sort of connotation to it, Barrett, because that's all that you're focused on, is that one divine entity.
And we've had a lot of the saints who have done that, but to your point, yeah, we we all have a subtype. It is in a wider connotation. It is the one-to-one relationship, the most important one-on-one relationships that you hyper focus on.
[15:10] Barrett: I mean, hearing you say that it just brings up so many thoughts and memories, and I try as actively as I can to be self-conscious, to be self-aware, to raise my consciousness of what's happening internally and then who I am and presenting myself to be in the world. And it constantly is a fight between Is this a matter of responding out of ego or soul?
So what would you tell people who are really doing deep inner work? What is the benefit of investigating these deep subtypes?
[15:44] Joe: They help us know what our false self is and what our true nature is, because our true nature is not the distortion of our self-preservative, sexual or social inclinations. When those are distorted, self-preservative becomes selfishness. Sexual, this sexual subtype becomes Hedonism, and the social subtype becomes popularity.
But when we flip into soul, the self preservatives become preservationists of all life, not just their own. Those who are interested in sexual synchrony become interested in intimacy with all the souls that they are privileged to come in contact with, on whatever level, such intimacy can be derived. And on the social realm, that subtype in soul becomes the body of Christ. Or for people who don't follow Christianity necessarily, it becomes the sacred community. Those are quite different from the egocentric takes on self-preservation, sexual synchrony, and social.
[17:24] Barrett: And that's such a good point that you're raising here because once you identify your subtype, it doesn't just magically disappear. It stays with you, but it can be transformed. And it becomes a trigger in your own kind of internal investigation of if I'm acting healthy or not.
And so, if I as an Ego Type Three with a sexual subtype, if I can genuinely see the other who is in the room with me with worth and see their essence, than I know that I'm filtering kind of my behavior. My life is being led by my soul and not the ego.
[18:10] Joe: Yes, because you are putting veracity or truthfulness through your subtype instead of deceit.
[18:20] Barrett: Right.
[18:21] Joe: So the veils drop. The veils drop, and you not only see the other person, but you are with the other person. You're present to them. And in presence, the soul is able to connect.
[18:42] Barrett: And I could have this conversation with you for the next six hours, Joe, but we are out of time for our podcast today. But to you I say a deep thank you with so much gratitude for your wisdom that you share with us. And to our listeners, I say thank you for listening today. We hope you are interested in learning more.
You can always learn more about us at theicb.org or on social media like Facebook, and we ask that you keep listening to our podcast, The Real Enneagram each week. We hope that you have heard something today that sinks in a little deeper into your heart, your mind and your soul. And we hope that you will join us again soon. Thank you, Dr. Howell.
[19:26] Outro: That wraps up another episode of The Real Enneagram, brought to you by the Institute for Conscious Being. If you're interested in furthering these conversations, please reach out to us through our Instagram, @therealenneagram. Or if you're interested in our upcoming trainings or other resources, please visit our website, www.instituteforconsciousbeing.org. Thanks for listening.