[Traditional Enneagram] Enneagram and Meditation

[Hawthorne]

Wait, can you expound on this? Sounds pretty insightful.

it was partially a joke, but for the part that wasn't...

my inability to focus on anything for an extended amount of time makes it harder for me to latch on to sticky thoughts/feelings or them to me. i've never been one to dwell. i don't suddenly get struck and paralyzed by remembered regrets and concerns. things pop up and float away on their own without much redirection or effort on my part which makes it (one-pointedness?) easier.

"because i'm always distracted, i'm never distracted" or something pithy like that. or maybe i'm just better accustomed to managing distraction.

 

[Yama]

I've never meditated. I don't think I could. There's always something on my mind

 

[Betty Blue]

Something I hugely struggle with. Even with 1-2-1 tuition I found the relaxation part of yoga difficult. The only times I find I can relax enough to let thought flow in a meditative way are when I am in the sauna. I'm not sure if it's because I need a sedative to remain calm, I am pretty highly strung and often needs multiple things going on at once. I find some types of massage also help...

I think many people who find peace difficult/uncomfortable will have a hard time with meditation. The types of people who need background noise to sleep will probably be in the same space.

 

[Thalassa]

I started trying to meditate with a simple mantra meditation for 25 minutes at a time, and it was comical. My mind constantly wandered and I got bored. That's the closest thing to Transcendental Meditation, and I think presuming just anyone can learn that without guidance or teachers is absurd.

Yoga, specifically vinyasa, helped me tremendously as a moving meditation. Then I started picking up saying mantras if I was walking, showering or at the beach.

Finally I started doing those kind of recorded guided meditations for relaxation, love, money, religion, etc (there are different ones) and those help me a lot. I did one of them so much I actually started falling asleep during, which is absolutely unheard of for me.

I also just take deep breaths during the day or "check in" briefly.

I still don't see the charm in sitting still for a half an hour saying one word over and over.

The restless mind could be either E6 or E7 for different reasons, and I'm 6w7. Honestly I thought my need for moving meditation had more to do with Se, but even the guided meditation. ..I still need that, unless I'm outdoors.

My therapist has me work through issues with brief visualizations and they're pretty effective for how simple they are.

 

[Dr Mobius]

I'm interested to hear how the good people of Typology Central experience meditation and how they feel their enneagram type affects this experience (if at all). So, for those of you who meditate or have meditated or have ever tried to meditate, what do you hope to get out of it? Are you targeting any particular issues?

Interesting apparently I've been unintentionally and unconsciously meditating for years. Or rather I've reached a state with all the necessary attributes.

What's your preferred style of meditation? How did you come across it? Did you adapt it to fit you better and if so, how? Or do you experiment with different styles?

It's just a product of deep thought for me. I'll starting focusing on a particular topic, my eyes will inevitably hook onto an object in view. Next thing I know ten, twenty minutes have passed, and I feel oddly tranquil.

What are the biggest challenges you face while meditating? (e.g. easily distracted, can't sit still, get bored, get overwhelmed, etc.)

Doing it consciously would be the biggest obstacle I imagine......

Do you feel these relate to your enneagram or tritype? How?

Hard to say, potentially there is a cross over between e7's ADD/ADHD hyper-focus and meditation. Perhaps a positive correlation between the positive outlook triad and successful mediation? I can see both reactive and competency both having various issues with it.

 

[Nijntje]

I am so, SO bad at meditating, i get distracted so easily. TBH, the closest I've come to a meditative state is when I'm in a great amount of pain. Like when i got my scarification done, i felt pretty fucking zen getting that done.

Im not sure anymore if I'm a 9 or a 4, but i think being easily distracted is possibly more a 4 thing. HELP ME WITH MY ENNE LOVEMUFFIN.

 

[senza tema]

I am so, SO bad at meditating, i get distracted so easily. TBH, the closest I've come to a meditative state is when I'm in a great amount of pain. Like when i got my scarification done, i felt pretty fucking zen getting that done.

Im not sure anymore if I'm a 9 or a 4, but i think being easily distracted is possibly more a 4 thing. HELP ME WITH MY ENNE LOVEMUFFIN.

4w5 with a 7 fix. LIKE MEEEEEEEE

 

[Nijntje]

4w5 with a 7 fix. LIKE MEEEEEEEE

Heck yeah!

 

[Kaizer]

Tagged I was, and therefore write I must

I have never formally meditated. The closest I think i have come to it though was when i was running 5-6 days a week. The warm-up walk, the run, and the final cooling down were the 3 kinds/levels of collation &/or sifting &/or correlation of thoughts; and the effects of and the resulting clarity itself ranged from short term satisfaction & relief to at most a medium term level of the clearing up of the haze / smoothness. The essential elements were the same as always i.e. cutting out external noise and focus without spending mental energy i.e. a non-sedentary/stimulated steady state.

 

[Starry]

I can't meditate senza. That...or I'm always meditating and just don't know. But my suspicion is that it is the former.

 

[Kas]

I have never learned any meditation technics.

I used to sort of meditate my own way. That was just having some time in silence- when I wanted to concentrate I tried to get aware of surrounding (my poor version of awareness meditation) and when I wanted to calm down and relax I let my thoughts go wherever they wanted. Both I liked. The disadvantage is that I get distracted easily or I felt silly.

 

[Flâneuse]

I've tried mindfulness meditation several times, with most of them being unsuccessful because of my lack of mental control. Unless I really enjoy what I'm doing at a particular moment, my attention tends to drift a lot, so trying to focus on a mantra or just keeping my mind clear for 20-30 minutes at a time is nearly impossible for me at this point. If I put in the time and effort I could probably learn mindfulness through meditation eventually, but these days I'm so busy I can't work it into my life.

Some people might expect Nines to have an easier time with meditation than most because we're supposed to be "the peaceful type", but I think average-to-unhealthy Nines' (aside from not truly being peaceful) have a tendency towards daydreaming and "fuzzy-headedness" that makes it difficult to sustain the level of concentration that meditation requires. My theory is that very healthy Nines would probably be great at meditation because of their real equanimity and clarity of mind, but most Nines are trying to cling to a sense of peace (hence, it is not true peace) through internal avoidance of uncomfortable states, which results in a sort of inner separation from themselves that makes real presentness and inner clarity very difficult to achieve.

 

[Swivelinglight]

I'm supposedly a 3 by some. But I believe I'm more a 6w7... but I'm not certain.

I'll put my two cents on meditation. I've done it off and on for about 3 years. Not very frequently. The four forms of meditation I do are outlined below.

Staring at a candle: It's an actually pretty awesome experience. You kind of get in a trance like state, and things feel heavy. Definitely feel like you're on something like a light dose of painkillers or something.

Repeating a phrase or a humming noise: I easily get distracted in this form of meditation. I sometimes think two things at once; the phrase to repeat along with whatever else I'm thinking about. Time goes by pretty fast in this form of meditation. Usually I can achieve total silence except for the repeated phrase after about 20 minutes or so. That state is pretty calm and a very good feeling. The route to getting their is a bit hard though.

Listening to a sound: This one is where you listen to something like a tick of the clock, and focus only on that noise. It's weird how in tune you get with the environment with this one. On occasion I'll pay attention to something else like a bird, however, in this state it feels so much more real. You're much more in the world and out of your mind in this kind of meditation.

Trying to think of nothing at all: Doesn't work very well. I usually don't think of anything for awhile but then go on a tangent or line of thinking. This is a great creative process though. The kind of lines of thinking that pop up usually are really deep in the subconscious and things you may not have thought about for awhile.


That's my experience with meditation. I'm not sure how it relates to my enneagram, but maybe someone else can do that interpretation for me.

I'm interested to hear how the good people of Typology Central experience meditation and how they feel their enneagram type affects this experience (if at all). So, for those of you who meditate or have meditated or have ever tried to meditate, what do you hope to get out of it? Are you targeting any particular issues?

I mainly like trying new things. Meditation is shown to scientifically alter your brain state. I think that's a pretty amazing tool. I like having that option, and I like seeing what the effects are. When I initially started to meditate it was to get myself out of my head. In traditional terms I was just over thinking, in MBTI terms it was Ti overload. Either way I knew I had to be a bit less logical and a bit more creative, when it came to that dichotomy. In any case I believe meditation helped a lot on that end. I don't meditate for that reason anymore. I usually meditate now for relaxation or if I'm bored. It is still a great tool for creativity, though, I think.

What's your preferred style of meditation? How did you come across it? Did you adapt it to fit you better and if so, how? Or do you experiment with different styles?

I pretty much like all of the forms of meditation that I've outlined above. I usually choose whichever one based on how I'm feeling that day, or what I want to get out of meditating.

What are the biggest challenges you face while meditating? (e.g. easily distracted, can't sit still, get bored, get overwhelmed, etc.) Do you feel these relate to your enneagram or tritype? How?

At first I use to get scared of my own thoughts. I would start thinking about thoughts that frightened me. I'd see frightening images, etc. I think those are related to subconscious fears, and they were kind of being brought to the forefront. I had to take breaks when meditating when that happened. Eventually those passed and I became more calm. However, there was the problem of distracting thoughts and tangental thinking. I still have issues with that, but after a long enough period of meditating they seem to die down. It might have something to do with me becoming more relaxed / tired so my brain stops fighting against itself lol.

I'd just like to note. It took a lot of self control and effort to not distract myself while meditating. It took me quite awhile to successfully get in the 'zone' that is created by meditating.

 

[EJCC]

Meditation for gut fixes: 'Rage Yoga' encourages posing while cursing, drinking, and listening to metal - SFGate

[MENTION=20829]Hard[/MENTION]

 

[á´…eparted]

Meditation for gut fixes: 'Rage Yoga' encourages posing while cursing, drinking, and listening to metal - SFGate

[MENTION=20829]Hard[/MENTION]

HAHA! This is fantastic! What a novel idea!