In this Episode, Sandra, Em and special guest Melissa Corkum discuss how the 9 Enneagram types show up in our parenting. This is part 3 of a 3 part series.
Our topic of the day covers:
- Enneagram types Seven, Eight & Nine. We talk about each type’s focus, each type’s passion, or dark side, and how these defense mechanisms may have been activated in childhood. And then we go into how each type shows up in our parenting.
- Special guest Melissa Corkum joins us and tells us more about these Enneagram types, including their stress paths, their growth paths, and their orientation to time.
About Melissa:
Melissa Corkum is certified as a life coach, Enneagram coach, essential oil specialist, and Empowered to Connect parent trainer. She’s helped dozens of parents shift to a brain-based view of behaviors so they can find more effective solutions besides threatening and punishing and become confident parents. She’s a mom to six kids by birth and adoption. They’ve taught her a lot about what creates thriving parent-child relationships…and what doesn’t. You can find her destressing at the end of every day by crunching on the half-popped kernels at the bottom of the popcorn bowl and binging something on Netflix. She also co-hosts the podcast, The Adoption Connection.
Links and references:
Melissa’s free e-Book for Family Personalities listeners
Melissa’s Instagram
The Adoption Connection Podcast with Melissa
Listen to Sandra and Em share embarrassing and funny stories on episode 45 of The Fancy Free Podcast
Email us at familypersonalitiespod@gmail.com
Follow us on Instagram @FamilyPersonalities
Follow us on Facebook @FamilyPersonalities
Check out our website
Leave us a review on iTunes/Apple Podcasts
To do personality type work with Sandra E-mail her at Sandra@FamilyPersonalities.com or check out more on her website: www.familypersonalities.com
Full show notes:
What’s new with Sandra & Em
Em talks about Oregon “opening up” again a bit after the last couple of months of shut down. She shares that her husband’s 97 year old grandma fell a few days ago and that trying to deal with getting her what she needs in the hospital has been difficult.
Sandra is excited that it’s sprinkler season again and the kids are loving running in the sprinklers. They each share their mother’s day experiences in isolation this year.
Sandra announces the impending end of Season 1 of the podcast. They plan to have a final celebration episode where they will play some games. Send us any questions you have for us to answer on that episode: familypersonalitiespod@gmail.com
Share us on social media (don’t forget to tag us so we can see your share!) and leave an iTunes/Apple Podcast review – the number of shares and reviews we get = the number of sips we take of our adult beverages during the recording!
Instagram
Facebook
Apple Podcasts
Topic of the Day: How the 9 Enneagram types show up in our parenting (Types 7, 8 & 9)
- Melissa tells us her Enneagram journey and that she was first introduced to it while listening to a podcast. In her parent coaching she uses brain science. She has a background in engineering and she loves that the Enneagram gives simple words and puts a system to our personalities.
- Sandra reminds the listeners of the metaphor we like to use. Myers-Briggs is your house (natural wiring, most comfortable way of being) and Enneagram is the guard (defense mechanism activated in childhood)
- Go back and listen to episode 5 and episode 7 for more about Enneagram and to hear us talk about types One through Six
- Sandra’s references for this episode are Pat Wyman “The Three Keys to Self-Understanding” Beatrice Chestnut’s “The Complete Enneagram”. They joke that these are not good starter books for Enneagram.
- Enneagram 7:
- Focus: Their inner needs & thoughts, glass half-full, best-case scenarios, future possibilities, avoid pain, feel good and stay upbeat, pleasure-seeking.
- Melissa thought for over a year that she was One rather than a Seven. She says Seven’s stress path is One and because she was going through a really stressful time with adoption, etc that she resonated with One tendencies.
- Sandra brings up that each type has a Stress Path and a Growth Path – which is another type whose behaviors they may take on during times of Stress or Growth
- Melissa says the “holy grail” of Enneagram growth is when you actually take on the more positive traits of the type that is usually your stress path
- Passion: Gluttony – not for food, but for an insatiable hunger for stimulating experiences (good meals, interacting conversations, exciting travel plans etc).
- Childhood source: Usually Sevens report having a happy childhood, though their recollection may be rosier than the actual reality. Often there was a scary event that happened, and in order to cope, they retreat to an earlier, younger, happier stage in their development when everything felt safer. They may also have had an authoritarian parent whose sternness was interpreted as lovelessness, thus leading Sevens to dislike limitation and authority. Their survival strategy is to pull back from distressing realities by seeking pleasurable thoughts, fantasies, plans and experiences. “Why choose to be sad when you could be happy?”
- Sandra recalls previous guest Megan Welch from episode 3 who is an Enneagram 7 and cannot relate to Sandra and her other friends actually choosing and enjoying therapy because the process seems so painful to her
- Melissa can’t point to a specific instance in her childhood. She said many experts say you were born as your Enneagram type and they hear certain messages in their childhood based on their type.
- Melissa says her coping mechanism as a Seven during social distancing is learning new things, ordering new things in the mail etc. She says monotony is the enemy of all Sevens
- Sandra says that a lot of Sevens are Ns (Intuition) in the Myers-Briggs model, and those with the Intuition preference have that same difficulty with monotony and sameness
- As a parent:
- Connect deeply with kids
- Want to create lasting memories
- Love having fun & playin with kids
- Struggle with the mundane tasks of parenthood
- Melissa says the last thing she ever wants to do is chores. She reminds us that Sevens go to Ones in stress and that in her own life she feels like she wants to get things done “the right way” like a One but it’s so that she can get it done faster and get back to having fun
- She talks about how understanding your Stress path can help by being a warning sign for you that you need to relieve the pressure valve
- Adventurous & spontaneous
- Sandra talks about how her Seven mom likes to come up with lots of solutions to issues and how it drives her crazy for her to keep giving solutions after Sandra has already decided. She knows this is a natural way of being for ENFPs (her mom’s Myers-Briggs type) but wonders if this is a trait of all Sevens as well
- Melissa thinks this is a Time Orientation thing and talks about how types Three, Seven and Eight are future focused. She said Fours, Fives and Nines are passed focused.
- Em says she feels more future focused and wonders if it’s because of her Three wing
- Sandra brings up that Intuitives on the Myers-Briggs are more future oriented so she has a hard time understanding how to tie this element of Enneagram to Myers-Briggs since there are N types who are types other than Threes Sevens and Eights.
- Melissa says Ones, Twos and Sixes are present-oriented.
- Melissa’s advice for Seven parents is to take the time to ask their children how they’re doing and really listen, because Sevens have a tendency to quickly reframe things in the positive
- Focus: Their inner needs & thoughts, glass half-full, best-case scenarios, future possibilities, avoid pain, feel good and stay upbeat, pleasure-seeking.
- Enneagram 8:
- Focus: Power, control, injustice (love to champion the underdog), deny vulnerability – do not want to feel weak, imposing their authority, seeking stimulation and pleasure.
- Passion: Lust – not limited to sex though physical contact could be included. Hunger for intensity and stimulation (e.g. good food, breaking of taboos, material comforts)
- Melissa says Eights are putting on a tough outer shell but are often protecting a smooshy core. She says Eights are not afraid of pain like Sevens are. They can show vulnerability but they want to be in control over that vulnerability.
- Melissa says she is a Seven with an Eight wing and she has had people tell her that they used to be terrified of her. She says a Seven with a Six wing will be softer and more cautious. An Eight with a Seven wing is going to be more afraid of pain and an Eight with a Nine wing is going to have some push-pull because of the mediating qualities of a Nine.
- Sandra explains that wings are the type that you lean toward on either side of your number. For example, if you are a Three your wing is either a Two or a Four, and you take on some of the characteristics of that type.
- Melissa explains that your wing can actually change over time and that the goal over time is to balance those wings out – so that you lean on them equally.
- Childhood source: Grown up in a combative or conflict-heavy environment where they had to grow up fast. Usually there is violence or neglect. Often Eight was the youngest or smallest child in a big family. They take on a bigger, tougher persona to help them deal with a world that did not provide the love, care or protection that they needed. They develop a coping strategy of being strong and taking control. Their mantra is:“The best defense is a good offence”. They become big and powerful and make their own rules, ignoring limitations that others place on them.
- Sandra talks about her Eight dad and how he grew up in a home with corporal punishment and violence between siblings. She feels understanding the childhood source of how they activated their defense mechanism in order to come off as bigger and stronger than they are it gives you a lot of empathy for them
- As a parent:
- Decisive & confident
- Firm with discipline
- Teacher responsibility & accountability
- See sensitivity in children as a weakness
- Shy away from vulnerability
- Melissa talks about how Eights’ stress path is going toward Fives which makes them tone down their energy and become withdrawn. Their growth path, or how they are around those they are most secure is a Two – and that may look like them trying to help out without great boundaries
- Enneagram 9:
- Focus: Avoid conflict, Create harmony, focus on the environment and other people instead of on themselves, often are mediator for their family/friends
- Passion: Laziness – not a reluctance to do things, but lazy in paying attention to themselves: deadening of feeling, inability to know what they want and hesitance to exert their will in the world.
- Sandra wonders if the “laziness” in Nines comes out as being hard working and getting a lot done but avoiding the actual important thing that needs to get done
- Melissa says that those in the Nine triad are “Thinking Repressed” meaning they do not use thinking to move them forward
- Childhood source: Grew up being overpowered, in a family where their opinions weren’t heard, others were more forceful in expressing their opinions. They have an unmet need of having a feeling of belonging or connectedness with others who would see and affirm their individuality or meet their wishes and preferences. Their coping strategy became to give up on asserting themselves and instead forget themselves and go along with others as a way of finding peace and avoiding conflict. Can’t tolerate conflict because it feels like separation. May be mediators in their family to reduce tension and maintain the sense of connection that feels crucial to their survival.
- Melissa says that because they are so focused on everyone else and what their dynamics are, they lose who they are, when exploring the Enneagram they can see themselves in all of the numbers. The flip side, is that Fours do not see themselves in any of the numbers.
- Em talks about Emily McDowell who makes stationary and has a card that says: “Finding yourself is not really how it works. You aren’t a 10 dollar bill in last winter’s coat. You are also not lost. Your true self is right there, buried under cultural conditioning, other people’s opinions and inaccurate conclusions you drew as a kid that became your beliefs about who you are. Finding yourself is returning to yourself – an unlearning, an excavation, a remembering of who you were before the world got its hands on you.” and says she thinks of Nines when she thinks of that quote.
- Melissa says one of the messages Nines tell themselves is that it’s not okay to assert yourself or think too much of yourself and what they are longing to hear is that “your presence matters, who you are matters”
- As a parent:
- Agreeable & laid-back
- Empathize deeply with children
- Role of mediator / counselor in the family
- Hard time saying no
- Sandra recalls that many Nine parents on her Instagram did not resonate with having a hard time saying no. Melissa says that it depends on what the “no” is – that they maybe have more of a hard time putting themselves ahead of their kids, giving themselves permission to still have their own life outside of their kids
- Allow children to be who they are
- Melissa says Nines act more like Sixes under stress – more stressed, anxious, irritable. She says maybe this even could be why some Nines can say “no” more – because they’re going more toward Six and shutting things down. They go to Three in growth, and might need more validation or become more uncharacteristically braggy around people they are most comfortable with. In health they can draw from what Threes have which is recognizing themselves as known and worthy.
Action / Challenge: How does your Enneagram type show up in your parenting? What are the positive ways it shows up? What are the negative ways it shows up?
E-mail Call-out: If you are a type Seven, Eight or Nine, what resonated today? Anything we missed? I would love to hear if you can identify what your situation was in childhood compared with your Enneagram type.
familypersonalitypod@gmail.com
Melissa’s links:
Melissa’s free e-Book for Family Personalities listeners
Melissa’s Instagram
The Adoption Connection Podcast with Melissa
Next episode: What does the Thinking vs Feeling Myers-Briggs preference pair look like in children?
Rate, Review, Subscribe, Share – Leave a review with your personality type