Typology

This week, we're going deep! With the help of the author of The Enneagram for Spiritual Formation, we discuss the various ways the Enneagram can be used narcissistically, and how to avoid those pitfalls.

Then, we discuss spiritual bypassing, or the ways each type can end up evading the essential personal work they need to do to grow as an individual.

AJ Sherrill (DMin, Fuller Theological Seminary) has more than twenty years of experience as a pastor, including as lead pastor at Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He is now lead pastor at St. Peter's Church in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina. He is an adjunct professor at Fuller Theological Seminary, where he teaches popular courses on transformational preaching and the Enneagram. Sherrill leads Enneagram workshops across the country and is the author of The Enneagram for Spiritual Formation and Being with God.

In the span of a few years, Shauna Niequest found herself experiencing a series of changes and heartbreaks that left her feeling like a completely different person. But in the end, she found herself more easily feeling empathy for those who were going through grief themselves.

In this episode, Shauna and and I discuss the importance of finding the right geographical place for who you are, the various practices that can help us work through our grief, and how our attempts to outrun grief will always catch up with us.

Shauna Niequist is the New York Times bestselling author of Present Over Perfect and I Guess I Haven't Learned That Yet. She is married to Aaron, and they live in New York City with their sons, Henry and Mac. Shauna is a bookworm, a storyteller, and a passionate gatherer of people, especially around the table.

When her husband discovered Julie Solomon's thirty thousand dollars of credit card debt, she became acutely aware of how her narrative about herself had failed her. But that moment also kicked off a mutual journey of growth in her marriage. In this episode, Julie explains how being an Enneagram 3 can be a burden as well as a gift, how growing up in a lower-income household led to a complicated relationship with money, and how being married to an Enneagram 4 taught her not to have all the answers. Julie Solomon is a Speaker, Business Coach, Host of the top rated The Influencer Podcast, and Author of the book, Get What You Want: How to Go From Unseen to Unstoppable (HarperCollins Leadership, June 7, 2022). Get What You Want teaches you how to shake off outdated ideas of what is possible and use your newfound belief to make anything you want happen. Julie has launched several successful online programs including Pitch It Perfect, The Influencer Academy, and SHINE Mastermind, which teach clients how to master the skill sets needed to take a personal brand idea and turn it into a profitable, sustainable. In her weekly podcast, The Influencer Podcast, Julie offers up real-time coaching, straight talk, and conversations to her millions of listeners worldwide.

For Jeanne Stevens, it didn't take long to see herself in her Enneagram type. But it took the experience of facing three deep losses in a short period of time to finally learn how to process—and ultimately let go—of grief, freeing her up to truly live in the present.

In today's episode, Jeanne shares how a childhood experience led her to believe a narrative about her life that no longer serves her. She also shares the ways she's learned to live in the present through noticing and naming what's happening around her, asking and answering the all-important question: "What's Here Now?"

Jeanne Stevens is the founding and co-lead pastor of Soul City Church in Chicago, one of America's fastest growing urban churches. Prior to starting Soul City Church, Stevens was on the pastoral staff at Willow Creek Community Church and North Point Community Church. A sought-after speaker, leader, and writer, Jeanne's passion is to help people wake up to their purpose as they pursue a life of wholehearted freedom. She lives in Chicago with her husband, Jarrett, and their two children.

Known for exuding energy, joy, and laughter, former Miss Kentucky and three-time contestant of The Amazing Race, Mallory Ervin reveals her fear of being average and how her hunger to achieve publicly resulted in a big wake-up call.

In today's episode, we explore her personal story of overcoming the unhealthy and damaging patterns in her life, the turning point that made her go to treatment, and how her time in recovery helped unmask and reveal her true self, allowing her to "live fully."

Mallory Ervin is a Kentucky-grown, Nashville-living dreamer who had a roundabout way of arriving at today. From her time in the Miss America pageant to being a three-time contestant on The Amazing Race, Mallory turned her passion for sharing her love of fashion, beauty, and life into a platform for impact. Today she runs a global lifestyle brand she founded in 2016, hosts the Living Fully podcast where she encourages and inspires her dedicated following to seek joy and live fully, and appears across platforms ranging from Instagram to YouTube sharing her life and message of living fully.

What is the life that you want to live? The final step of S.O.A.R. is to rewrite your old story and write a new one that is fulfilling and true to who you are. The goal is to challenge the old, taken for granted, broken beliefs of your old story and lean into what the future looks like. So how do you do that?

In today's episode, I'll walk you through a few proactive approaches you can take for lasting transformation.

For more exercises, reflection prompts, and guided questions, pick up a copy of The Story of You Workbook.

This week, we're talking about Step 3 of S.O.A.R. and what it means to awaken. We'll explore mindfulness practice, why all of us need to develop this muscle, and we will share a few more tips for rewriting your story.

This is just the sort of work I lead you through in my new The Story of You Workbook. Get your copy here.

What has your broken narrative cost you? This week, we're moving on to step 2 of the acronym S.O.A.R. from The Story of You, which is to 'own' your story. I explain what it means to 'own' your story and why this step is essential on your journey toward transformation.

For more exercises, reflection prompts, and guided questions that can help you make lasting changes, pick up a copy of The Story of You Workbook.

For the next four weeks, I'm going to walk you through each step of the acronym S.O.A.R. to help you identify and rewrite your origin story. The S.O.A.R. acronym is four simple steps you can begin to journey through in order to relax your grip on the old story and craft a new one.

In this episode, I explain the first step of S.O.A.R. which is to 'see' how you became who you are today. In order to narrate a new story, we must first explore and accept our history. I share a few questions to get you started on this journey.

For more exercises, reflection prompts, and guided questions that can help you transform your life, check out The Story of You Workbook (available now for pre-order).

When growing in self-awareness, it's important to be able to recognize, or identify, what your triggers are. If you're a regular listener, you've heard me talk about how critical meditation and journaling are to strengthen your ability to respond to life rather than react. But, how we treat our bodies is also important.

When I notice I feel anxious, envious, or irritable, I like to pause and notice how I'm feeling physically. I ask myself, "how did I sleep last night?", "do I need to go for a walk?" or "what have I eaten today?" At times, simply drinking some water or having a good, healthy meal helps me process what I'm truly feeling.

How you eat not only fuels your body but also fuels your mind. It allows you to pause and reflect, and make intentional decisions.

In today's episode, health and science journalist, Max Lugavere joins me for a conversation about the connection between food and cognitive health. Tune into this interesting discussion on how to feed your brain to live a more full life…no matter your Enneagram type.

Max Lugavere is a filmmaker, health and science journalist and the author of the New York Times bestseller Genius Foods: Become Smarter, Happier, and More Productive While Protecting Your Brain for Life. He's also the host of the #1 iTunes health podcast, The Genius Life and regularly appears on the Dr. Oz Show, The Rachael Ray Show, and The Doctors.

For more on Max, visit https://geniuskitchenbook.com