Communication is everything. I hear this said fairly often in the business world and many of those times it’s coming from my own mouth. It’s tough to keep everyone informed all of the time and to encourage others in the workplace or home to do the same. On top of that, the world is so busy these days that it seems no one can remember anything and that everyone has to be sent email reminders for everything: I know it helps me.
One thing we can do to alleviate confusion and absorb information more effectively is to learn to slow down and be present. Listening is a skill that many of us do not have. Those that do have the ability to listen, risk operating at subpar potential because of our hectic, fast-paced culture. Some days I think we are all just trying to survive.
A tool that takes listening to the next level is the Enneagram. The Enneagram is an ancient personality typing system and tool for spiritual transformation thought to have been created by the Sufi religion (the mystical arm of Islam). It is an in-depth, complex system that does not box people into categories, but allows for the individuality of every person.
One of the Enneagram’s greatest gifts is perspective. At its core, the Enneagram helps us understand that each person is coming from a different place, from his or her own place, but that there are 9 primary approaches to coping with life that we adopt. Once you identify your type and begin to understand your own point of view and coping mechanisms, then you can expand to understand that another gets his or her motivation from a different place. When we cultivate the gift of understanding another’s views, if we simply honor the fact that others see things differently than we do, we breed compassion and healing in the world.
Consider the person who works down the hall, the one that seems always to be yelling at other people. What might you think if you knew that she is just expressing her needs in a normal fashion? What if you knew that she wonders why you always cringe when she talks? If you could step outside of yourself and be curious about how maybe this is a person whose style is loud and boisterous, how would that affect your responses?
Try it sometime. Try listening to the words that person is saying and try assuming that he or she is just trying to communicate with you in the best way he or she knows how. See if you have a shift in perspective and then read more about the Enneagram and the ways we each cope with the world.
Communication is everything. If we don’t understand something about where others are coming from, we tend to assign our own meaning to our perceptions of them and cut ourselves off from potential relationship and community. When we listen we create healthy communication with compassion and understanding.
Communication is everything. I hear this said fairly often in the business world and many of those times it’s coming from my own mouth. It’s tough to keep everyone informed all of the time and to encourage others in the workplace or home to do the same. On top of that, the world is so busy these days that it seems no one can remember anything and that everyone has to be sent email reminders for everything: I know it helps me.
One thing we can do to alleviate confusion and absorb information more effectively is to learn to slow down and be present. Listening is a skill that many of us do not have. Those that do have the ability to listen, risk operating at subpar potential because of our hectic, fast-paced culture. Some days I think we are all just trying to survive.
A tool that takes listening to the next level is the Enneagram. The Enneagram is an ancient personality typing system and tool for spiritual transformation thought to have been created by the Sufi religion (the mystical arm of Islam). It is an in-depth, complex system that does not box people into categories, but allows for the individuality of every person.
One of the Enneagram’s greatest gifts is perspective. At its core, the Enneagram helps us understand that each person is coming from a different place, from his or her own place, but that there are 9 primary approaches to coping with life that we adopt. Once you identify your type and begin to understand your own point of view and coping mechanisms, then you can expand to understand that another gets his or her motivation from a different place. When we cultivate the gift of understanding another’s views, if we simply honor the fact that others see things differently than we do, we breed compassion and healing in the world.
Consider the person who works down the hall, the one that seems always to be yelling at other people. What might you think if you knew that she is just expressing her needs in a normal fashion? What if you knew that she wonders why you always cringe when she talks? If you could step outside of yourself and be curious about how maybe this is a person whose style is loud and boisterous, how would that affect your responses?
Try it sometime. Try listening to the words that person is saying and try assuming that he or she is just trying to communicate with you in the best way he or she knows how. See if you have a shift in perspective and then read more about the Enneagram and the ways we each cope with the world.
Communication is everything. If we don’t understand something about where others are coming from, we tend to assign our own meaning to our perceptions of them and cut ourselves off from potential relationship and community. When we listen we create healthy communication with compassion and understanding.
Post contributed by Carrie Graves. Carrie is a graduate of Sewanee School of Theology’s Education for Ministry program. She is a writer, and has 15 year’s experience as a bookseller working with authors, publishers and books. Believing that inner work is essential to the soul’s journey, Carrie is passionate about bringing dream work, creativity, and theological education into the lives of others.
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