Conversations with Christine
Conversations with Christine, Chapter 3: Woundings
Photo by Patrick Robinson on Unsplash
Christine and I often visited a beach near the Fauntleroy Ferry on these hot summer evenings. Brett had inflated a rubber raft that we had picked up at a garage sale the Saturday before, and he was cooling off in Puget Sound as Christine and I sat along the water’s edge.
A Washington State Ferry en-route from Vashon Island to West Seattle passed by and the waves started to hit the shore. We both stood for a while and lifted our chairs, trying to avoid getting our backsides soaked.
My sister and I would often reflect on the beliefs we formed in our early childhood years during our conversations. It was always surprising to learn how certain events affected her and how she had totally different childhood experiences because of her personality, birth order and having gone to Catholic School.
Sometimes those conversations would get a bit heated. I’d have to keep reminding her, “I’m not saying that what you experienced didn’t happen Christine, but for me, I experienced something totally different.” Conversations like this allowed us to talk about hard topics without getting caught in the weeds of rigid beliefs. We were able to see and hear each other’s experience as the other described it through their unique woundings without attachment.
Once the waves from the ferry had settled, Christine continued discussing our family’s timeline, specifically about the time of my own conception and time in utero. “As a small child you were observing all the activities around you and your wee little brain was trying to make sense of it all. You learned how to behave and act based on those beliefs. With Ken being born, Mom’s ninth child, the family dynamics would have started to shift. You would have started to formulate ideas about the world based on those earliest memories.”
“How long did you say this early development stage lasts? I asked, “Did you say until 5-7 years of age?”
The tide was coming in as the sun started to become less intense. We positioned our chairs a little closer to the water’s edge as Christine continued. “Yes, for early childhood development, that is what I understand.”
“After studying the teachings of Father Richard Rohr, I became curious about the work of different psychologists and other Enneagram teachers. One of them you might know, for he is a Stanford University professor. Have you heard of Dr. David Daniels?”
The Enneagram was introduced to the West in 1912 by an Armenian mystic by the name of G.I. Gurdjieff. He had developed a system that mapped nine different personality types of the psyche.
A scholar by the name of Claudio Naranjo studied this system in Santiago, Chile, under Oscar Ichazo at the Arica Institute. In 1970, Naranjo brought the teachings back to California and began teaching at the Esalen Institute in Big Sur. In 1971, by integrating these teachings with modern Western psychology and psychoanalysis, Naranjo helped lay the foundations for the modern Enneagram in the United States.
Several Jesuit priests within the Catholic Church studied this system and started using it for spiritual direction. Father Richard Rohr, a Franciscan priest, benefited from these initial, entirely private instructions.
In the 1990s, Father Richard Rohr opened a retreat center and school in Albuquerque, New Mexico called The Center for Action and Contemplation. Father Richard and his staff began conducting classes in the Enneagram.
My parents had lent me a series of lectures on cassette tape when Father Richard Rohr was teaching the Enneagram in the early 1990s, and I soon found myself using this system to help understand myself, my family, and my employees.
Using Enneagram language such as core childhood wounds, fixations of the mind and passions of the heart soon became a shortcut for my sister and I to unpack our childhood experiences, for she too had been studying the system.
“Didn’t Dr. David Daniels write The Essential Enneagram?” I asked.
“Yes.” Christine replied. “The other psychologist I’ve been studying, CG Jung isn’t connected to the Enneagram but has parallel ways in which he describes the stages of development of the psyche. Both great minds described the journey of a human as bringing together the fractured parts of the false self or as Jung says, the small “I,” that forms from those early childhood wounds.”
“Back-up for a moment.” I interrupted. “What exactly are we talking about here? Are we talking theology or are we talking psychology? Why is any of this work even important? I haven’t met many people who even know what the ego or false self even is, let alone understanding why it is important to even work on this stuff.”
“I know, right?” Christine answered. “As I dove into comparative world religions, many cultures outside of Christianity talk about the journey of the soul and more importantly, they provide steps on how to reach liberation, consciousness or awakening. The Eightfold Path of Buddhism is a step-by-step guide on how to gain enlightenment. This isn’t intended just for the likes of the Buddha, Jesus or their disciples, this is intended for all of us.”
Something about this conversation made me squirm a bit. I could hear a voice in my head stating, “Who are you to think this is even possible!” Then I remembered a paper I had read from a team of researchers, one of them being Dr. David Daniels.
“Alright, let’s keep following the thread about Dr. David Daniels and CG Jung.” I continued before she moved on. “I had come across a white paper written for the Journal of Adult Development that Dr. Daniels had co-authored with a team of others. It introduced me to the Loevinger theory of ego development. I had no idea that there was such a thing as developmental categories. I think this is what you are referring when you say we just don’t know that higher states of awareness are possible. Most of us are stuck in the world of reactivity based on our earliest childhood wounds.”
I pulled out my notebook and started to draw a chart. “Dr. Daniels’ paper showed a chart illustrating the various stages of humanity. Ten percent of the population are in the developmental stage of impulse and self-protection, eighty percent in the conformist, self-aware, conscientious and the final ten percent in the individualist, autonomous, construct-aware, and unitive. I don’t really understand what all those stages mean, but I can understand the percentages! Only ten percent of the population reaches these higher states of awareness? Why is that? I think that if we understood there is a better way to be, a better way to live our lives, and be more free, joyful and have less suffering, wouldn’t we all do this work?”
“The psyche is really trying to keep us safe.” Christine quickly responded. “It is natural that we would want to forget, and in some cases, the brain files certain things so deeply that we truly are completely unconscious, such as your somatic reaction to us talking about your in-utero experience while there was so much stress in our home. That is the true definition of trauma. When you aren’t even able to remember those hard childhood wounds. The ego or personality is tricky and clever. Jung addresses this through shadow work.”
“I sort of understand what you are talking about in regard to enlightenment,” I chimed in. “At Father Richard Rohr center they highlight various mystics, prophets and saints, but I often wonder if those individuals weren’t just everyday humans that had done the ego development work that Dr. David Daniels and his team wrote about in his white paper.”
“It isn’t just the people of our past, such as the mystics and saints.” Christine responded. “These are normal human beings doing the most humbling of work. They are people amongst us in all walks of our lives. This is an exciting time because trauma work, ego work and the blending of the sciences and spirituality are becoming more discussed.”
Christine continued after a bit of a pause. “Science and spirituality are the focus of many philosophers, psychologists and theologians. Hopefully, it will only be a matter of time before we all embrace this ego work as essential.”
I always knew when it was time to wrap-up our conversation. My sister would go quiet and just stare off at the mountains. She was entering into another place that was peaceful and quiet. Brett sensed this too and started to pack up the car so we could take my sister home.
Conversations with Christine Series
Becky has been exploring creativity, spirituality, and the patterns that shape us through her ongoing series, Conversations with Christine. The series imagines two sisters in deep conversation about life’s larger questions, who we are, what shapes us, and why we are here.
Chapter 1: Archetypes, Symbols and Talismans ·
Chapter 2: Defining the Ego ·
Chapter 3: Woundings ·
Chapter 4: Vices and Virtues ·
Chapter 5: The Spiritual Practice of Journaling ·
Chapter 6: Redefining God ·
Chapter 7: Trinities
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