I begin this article with the ongoing conversation and insights of my friend and fellow Enneagram student, Amaranth:
A blind spot is a bane for people who can see it, but for the one who is blind, it might be a defense against fear, a defense that they hope will save them. For example, the fears might be of rejection, loss, or abandonment. To ensure they don't get that kind of attention, they reframe the situation like in your examples. It's a false idea. A child develops these strategies from an unconscious belief that this will keep their place. It is a re-action, repeated over and over. She leaves out the truth about herself so others won't leave her. This is not reasonable. These are behaviors at lower levels of development. These are childish strategies that are old as sin. Deep down, she must recognize her motivation: to lie to belong and have peace! But the price! Everybody is cheated.
What response could have some potential of opening the aperture of understanding? A response that comes from a higher level of development has the best chance. It's where truth and love kiss. Differentiate. Reject the omission of truth without rejecting the person. That's the opposite of what she expects. Nothing is left out. Everything matters, including her. The scales may fall from her eyes. This may not satisfy a sense of justice, but it may heal the blind. And maybe it won't.
We had a recent teaching with Jessica Dibb, who somehow, intuitively, wove this topic into her own. There were several takeaways, but the one that aligns with Amaranth's illustration above was that for those who so desperately try to be "good" and "moral," if they are brought to their knees with an error, where tears run free, and the other accepts them as human beings; they are elevated to their highest being despite imperfections and mistakes. I see this. I see this.
So, what does it take to accept that it was not the self in higher levels who transgressed and would later omit? Does it take being in the higher levels to recognize that it was a person operating in the lower levels who would later omit what they could not accept as their transgression?
And where's the line between higher-level acceptance and lower-level doormat?
Holly Margl is the award-winning author of Witnessing Grief; Inviting Trauma and Loss to Our Coaching Conversations, An Enneagram Perspective, coach, coach mentor, and trainer specializing in grief, trauma, and the Enneagram.
