What are Boundaries? When we let people know what we will and what we won’t accept in relationships, then we are setting boundaries. Hopefully, we can all agree that we don’t accept verbal or physical abuse and make that clear with our friends and partners. In addition, there are varying levels of boundaries that involve privacy, time, possessions, work or space. The multiple layers of interactions that we encounter in our relationships make them complicated and require us to skillfully navigate them if we are to be successful in our interactions with others. We need to protect our emotions, body, time, and space when necessary, but doing so with the appropriate amount of emotional energy.
In addition to blocking behavior that we won’t tolerate; we need to be receptive to behavior that is in our self-interest. Kindness, caring, love, sharing, physical contact, loving acts, and many others make our lives more enjoyable. So our boundaries need to be constructed in a way that allows the “good” in and keeps the “bad” out. Skillfully setting boundaries implies that we can accomplish both of these actions. Walls that keep everything out may be protective, but they limit our opportunities. A lack of walls may give us lots of opportunities but also subject us to behavior in others that is not in our best self-interest.
So, how do we set boundaries with the many people in our lives? The most helpful single word is “No”. Do you want to go to the movies on Friday? No. That is sufficient.
With our most intimate relationships, there may need to be more discussion, but we should honor our partner’s boundaries and they should honor ours. My wife does a meditation everyday from 4:00 to 5:00. In the 18 years of our marriage I have never interrupted her. I think the only justification would be if the house is on fire. I respect her boundaries.
Unfortunately with all of our myriad relationships and the different levels of intimacy from none to long term intimate partner or child, we need different levels of response. With purely transactional
relationships the boundaries should be clear and enforced. That is, with someone doing work on your house or selling you a product, then it is fair to declare “these are the boundaries I need for us to both participate in this transaction”. If they can’t honor those boundaries, then look for another vendor.
On the other hand, with our children, we should try and make the boundaries clear, but there are many grey areas that cloud our decision making. Therefore it is going to require more thought and negotiation about where our respective boundaries begin and end. The boundaries still need to be defined and enforced for the sake of both child and parent, but are surely more negotiable.
Why do we struggle setting boundaries with others? What do we think the cost is of protecting our boundaries in a relationship? I would suggest that we are fearful that the person we are setting boundaries with will not like us or love us, and maybe they will abandon us. Or maybe we believe they will stay in the relationship but be angry and verbally or emotionally abusive.
Our perception of how setting boundaries will be perceived is frequently based on our childhood experiences. If our parents didn’t respect or encourage us to set boundaries, we probably don’t believe that we have the right or ability to set boundaries as an adult. Maybe our parents threatened to abandon us if we tried to enforce boundaries or they simply overwhelmed us using the power discrepancy between parent and child. In many cases, we have given up our own power in the hopes of getting our emotional neediness met. Unfortunately, we frequently give up our rights regarding boundaries and still do not receive the hoped for emotional support.
Skillfully setting boundaries requires practice and awareness of our emotional needs that are injected into the process. If this is a difficult area for you, then I suggest starting with people who do not carry emotional significance, such as a stranger. There are more opportunities than you might realize.
Lastly, the responsibility for setting boundaries is yours. People will act with different levels of self-awareness, and it is up to you to make them aware of your boundaries. Gently at first, but more forcefully if needed.
Our lives are an opportunity to improve and deepen our relationships with others and setting boundaries is a very important skill set. I look forward to interacting with you in a respectful, loving, and self-aware fashion to the benefit of both of us.
Sincerely,
Steve Purdom
“The best political, social and spiritual work we can do is to withdraw the projection of our own Shadow onto others.” — Carl Jung
Carl Jung is an historic figure in the study of human psychology and has contributed immensely to the understanding of the unconscious aspects of ourselves. He was the first to use the word “Shadow” to describe the human unconsciousness. He felt that conflict between individuals, groups and countries was a failure to resolve the issue of our own Shadow.
Building on Carl Jung’s work, Robert Johnson wrote a book called Owning Your Own Shadow: Understanding the Dark Side of the Human Psyche. Robert Johnson describes the reconciliation of opposites as the integration of Shadow and Ego, and describes this process as not only leading to wholeness but to spirituality.
Robert Bly wrote A Little Book on the Human Shadow and describes the same process of integration that Robert Johnson does. In addition, Robert Bly uses the metaphor of “dragging a bag behind us that is weighted down with neglected parts of our unconscious”.
Debbie Ford wrote The Dark Side of the Light Chasers: Reclaiming your Power, Creativity, Brilliance and Dreams. There are numerous other authors with the same message, including Dr. James Hollis, Connie Zwieg and even Marianne Williamson.
So what is Shadow? Dr. Jung’s simple definition is that Shadow is the unconscious part of ourselves. How can it be that we have a large part of our psyche and our psychic energy that we are not conscious of? I believe the process starts very early in life. I believe that we are born with a personality type which we use to interact with others and that we also use our personality to defend ourselves from emotional wounding. If we are born in to a kind, loving family, then we have less need for our personality type and therefore are less rigid and more expansive in our interactions with others. If we are born into a more difficult birth family that is not as capable of protecting and loving us as children, then we become more rigid and tightly cling to defensive aspects of our personality type. All of us put some aspects of ourselves into Shadow no matter the environment that we experience as children, but some of us relegate a larger portion of our potential to Shadow and cling desperately to our personality type in order to defend ourselves.
We individually choose to send aspects of ourselves that we do not think are useful into Shadow. For those who know the enneagram, those disowned parts of ourselves are type specific and the purpose of disowning parts of ourselves is to solidify who we are with no uncertainty. For type 3, I am Successful and just so that it is clear, I do not even acknowledge the possibility that I am or could ever be unsuccessful. Obviously, this is a false position, but this process is true for every enneagram type.
In addition to us choosing to push parts of ourselves into Shadow, our family and society ask us to disown parts of ourselves. For instance, anger, sexuality, hyperactivity, selfishness, and arrogance might be deemed unacceptable by our parents, and they can insist that we disown these parts of ourselves. When we enter school, our teachers point out behavior that they want us to push into Shadow, and perhaps our Church and peer groups do as well. With all of these powerful entities asking us to disown parts of who we are, sometimes we lose our own authenticity.
What happens to the parts of ourselves that we place in Shadow? Not only do they not disappear, they also retain their energy. They want to be acknowledged, invited back into our lives and even honored for the role they play in shaping who we are. I believe that there is value in all aspects of our Shadow. Anger carries energy and may be used to protect ourselves or correct an injustice. However, if we acknowledge and honor our anger, then we should not export it indiscriminately onto others. The ultimate resolution of Shadow is to bring all of Shadow to consciousness and to view Shadow objectively and with compassion. Wholeness lies in the union of Ego (personality type) and Shadow.
One of my metaphors for Shadow is that when we disown part of our psychic energy, we place it in a storage unit. The energy is bouncing around inside the unit, banging into walls and trying to escape. One of the escape valves in human psychology is projection of the disowned emotional characteristics of ourselves onto others. If I do not want to recognize my own arrogance, then I find someone who has some degree of arrogance and I add my arrogance to the burden that he is already carrying. Psychological projection is a defense mechanism in which we attribute to others aspects of ourselves that we are unwilling to acknowledge as belonging to us.
Another release for Shadow is to act out the energy of Shadow unconsciously. I am convinced that the attraction of Raves (organized dance parties that are frequently associated with drug and alcohol usage and perhaps promiscuity) is that these settings give permission for the unbridled release of our socially unacceptable behavior. Likewise, Cage Fighting between two men or two women is socially sanctioned violence. By watching, we dissipate the energy associated with our own aggressive impulses. Why should we embrace Shadow and acknowledge its presence in our life and society? Shadow burns energy, and if we don’t acknowledge it for ourselves, we will be spending our energy guarding the storage unit to make sure that Shadow does not escape. We also run the risk of acting out Shadow or making decisions based on misunderstandings of our options to deal with our Shadow. In addition, projections can lead to disastrous consequences for other people. Burning witches at the stake is an example of projecting negative anima (negative femininity) onto females. Also, if we don’t acknowledge Shadow, we are missing opportunities for brilliance, creativity and even our own power (Debbie Ford’s book “The Light Chasers”).
“Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.” — Carl Jung
To summarize, Shadow is the unconscious parts of ourselves. It is just as important as our personality type, which we see as our conscious self. If we do not acknowledge Shadow it will express itself in inappropriate behavior or projection of the suppressed energy on to others.
Projection is a potentially hurtful defense mechanism. Racism, homophobia, and geniophobia are all examples of projection. Fortunately, most examples of projection are less destructive but still harmful. When we project our unconscious aspects of ourselves on to others, we miss the opportunity to incorporate them into our wholeness. In addition, projecting our own arrogance or laziness or aggressive behavior onto another individual has consequences for them also.
We can recognize and deal with Shadow appropriately by using two exercises.
Exercise number 1: “I am/I am not” (see attachment). We are both “I am” and “I am not”. This exercise simply helps us to visualize the aspects of ourselves that we deny.
Exercise number 2 is as follows. Without identifying the person by name, fill in the blanks in the following sentence:
I dislike ____________________________ because (he/she/they) are so __________________________.
My own personal example would be: “I dislike this poker player because he is so arrogant.”
Using this simple exercise, you can continue writing as many statements as needed to identify the unconscious parts of your Shadow that you have projected on to others.
***
With Love and Compassion,
Steve Purdom
Relationships are the most important and complicated human endeavor. Two people who bring their Personality Type, Instinctual Subtype, Neediness, Emotional Reactivity and difficulties with Boundaries to a dialogue that goes on twenty-four hours per day are going to have conflict. In addition, we have cultural differences, different childhood environments and perhaps different nationalities. All of this is mixed into a combustible interaction that is not fully conscious for either partner. It is easy to see why relationships are so difficult to navigate and why it’s sometimes not so easy to resolve the conflicts.
So how can you MYELW (See previous article on Making Yourself Easier to Live With) and benefit yourself, your partner and your relationship? Of paramount importance is acknowledging and addressing your own personal issues. By studying the Enneagram, you can identify your fears and motivations.
Once you define who you are, then you can find who you are not, (those aspects stored in your Shadow). Example, for type 3 the belief “I am competent”, means that incompetency is in shadow. You may find yourself emotionally reactive to your partner and others when you define their behavior as “incompetent”. Identifying these parts of ourselves that we have disowned is a great place to begin recognizing what the driver is for our emotional reactivity. Self Observation is key to the discovery of our Shadow side.
You also need other tools in order to access your unconsciousness. Inner Child and Shadow work are the best tools that I have found, to identify this largely unexplored world that is US. We are not just the persona that we present to the world; we are much more.
Our personal work is a lifetime adventure and we are almost always concomitantly in a relationship. The question then becomes: what can we gift to the relationship while still doing our personal work? There are a few guidelines:
First – This needs to be a gift with no expectations and no attachments
Second – We need to understand that resolving our partner’s emotional issues is not our job but that we can provide an environment that feels safe and supportive.
Third – We can modify our behavior and our language so that both are more readily received.
And Fourth – We need to be careful that we don’t extend support and understanding to the point of enabling or manipulation. Sometimes this can be a fine line.
Please join me on October 4, 2018 for a discussion on how to best support our partners and our relationships.
The concept of MYELW is that the only person you can change is yourself. The only person that you can make healthier is yourself. In addition, you cannot get your emotional neediness met from anyone else on a continuous and unconditional basis. There will be moments when your partner is totally focused on what it is that you need emotionally, but that moment will pass. They will go to work or to watch a sporting event or be distracted by the children’s needs or just become more focused on their own neediness.
However, if you do your own personal work and become aware that what you are seeking is actually coming from unfulfilled needs of childhood, then you can refocus your efforts from trying to obtain these needs outside yourself to re-parenting yourself. You are the one person who can love yourself continuously and unconditionally. You are the one person who can understand yourself, affirm yourself, protect yourself, support yourself and even initiate playful activities for yourself. That child that didn’t get all the things they needed in their birth family can get all things from their adult version of themselves.
When you move your neediness from your partner to yourself, then your partner will change. They will not feel so drained by your neediness and will actually, in many cases, begin to meet those needs. They will have the energy to be more loving, attentive, affirming, and supportive. Most of us are not getting those needs met with our current strategies, so perhaps trying a new strategy does not entail much risk.
So how do we start this process? We begin with a dialogue with our Inner Child. Close your eyes, breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth, feet solidly on the floor and comfortable in your chair. Now visualize your child and note what age they are and ask them what they want to be called. I would take the child to a safe, pleasant place and begin the conversation. I would start with stating explicitly that you love that child unconditionally and that they are the most precious thing in your life. What do you need from me? How can I reassure you that I will provide ___________ for you? What can I do right now to demonstrate my commitment to meeting your needs? When the conversation is over, then tell your child that you are always available and that you will return soon for another conversation.
Whenever you are angry, fearful, or sad then visualize your Inner Child and ask them what is wrong. Why are you afraid? Why are you angry? Why are you sad? What can I do to ease your pain?
This process is the beginning of a journey that should last the rest of your lifetime. Always returning to that precious, precocious child that knows what you and she need. Each time you acknowledge that her unresolved pain has been triggered by an event outside of both of you and that you want to know why she is in pain, what is the real source of the pain, then you get closer to a resolution of the childhood pain that you still feel inside of you.
Written with love and kindness and hopefully from thoughtfulness, caring and authenticity.
Sincerely,
Steve Purdom
I believe that each of us is born into this world with a Personality Type in place. For me, the easiest visualization is that it is genetically determined and when confronted with the normal issues of powerlessness as a child and subsequent separation from our Mother primarily but also our Father we use the defenses of our Personality Type to defend ourselves. If we are lucky enough to have a supportive, emotionally healthy family then our attachment to our defense mechanisms softens but in less supportive and more dysfunctional families our attachment increases in proportion to the physical and emotional abuse that we perceive as happening.
The defense mechanisms of Type 5 are Isolation and Compartmentalization. So in the face of abusive parents the Type 5 will withdraw as much as possible and also compartmentalize emotions and social interactions. The safe place for Type 5 is in their head. So they withdraw to their room, if possible, and frequently pace back and forth and talk to themselves. Other ways to withdraw are into books, video games, math puzzles, science experiments, etc. Anything that limits social interactions with unreliable human beings is embraced. Not only do they compartmentalize their emotions and separate thinking from feeling but they also compartmentalize all of their relationships. That is, family, friends, coworkers, fellow students, fellow hobbyists etc are not commingled. That would complicated the interactions which is difficult for Type 5 to handle.
So Type 5 is born with a world view of Scarcity and how does this influence their behavior. First, they reduce their needs to conserve their resources. They hoard time, energy, emotions, information, and material resources ( food, books, money etc. ). They are frugal. They view every interaction as an opportunity for someone to abscond with their resources, not as an opportunity to replenish or expand their resources. They are the minimalists in our society. “Live lightly on the earth” is a type 5 quotation.
Type 5 gives up on emotional interactions to some extent in order to avoid making themselves vulnerable to the emotional neediness of others. Emotionally needy people take resources that are scarce already. Type 5 live in their head where there is order, such as the study of mathematics or science or computer technology, not in the exterior world which consists of complex social interactions with bartering and sharing and emotional vulnerability. That exterior world is simply to complex and too scary.
Unfortunately, viewing the world through the lens of thought and not feelings can inhibit our relationships with others. One of my Type 5 friends said that if your pickup line starts with “ have you seen the latest statistics on birth rates?” that you are probably a type 5.
Withdrawing into ones interior world and specifically into the world of thought is one way to conserve emotional energy but type 5 will withdraw physically also. They can live like hermits or find jobs that are isolating. For instance, they could take a job as fire spotter in an isolated part of a national forest. Or they can stay in the city but work on computer technology in an individual setting rather than a team approach. Another way to withdraw is to become an Observer of life rather than a Participant. They watch people dance and study the behavior rather than participate in the dance.
All of this behavior serves to protect the interior against unwanted and unsolicited intrusions. Type 5 views questions about their emotional life as a breach of boundaries and an invasion of their privacy. Again, this exposes the Type 5 to the loss of emotional energy or if they allow the person into their personal life they might take resources such as information or material resources, including money. The boundary must be defended and the defense mechanism is Withdrawal/Isolation.
To develop their wholeness, Type 5 needs to embrace their shadow aspects. From Beatrice Chestnut’s book “The Complete Enneagram” she describes the shadow of type 5 to be Love, Intimacy, Strength, Power and Aggression. I would agree. I would wish for my Type 5 friends to visualize the messiness of relationships as a way to enrich themselves rather than deplete themselves.
With love and kindness,
Steve Purdom
By Steve Purdom, MD (Type 3, SP/1:1/SC)
Sandra Maitri is a well-respected enneagram teacher. In her book “The Spiritual Dimension of the Enneagram”, she described Japan as a Type 4 country. I understand clearly her reasoning. The Japanese find beauty in everything. However, as I stated in the previous article, I think Japan’s dominant type is type 6 and type 4 is second in importance. The most helpful aspect of determining an individual’s enneagram type is their motivation. That is not possible for a country and therefore I have based my comments on my observations of Japanese behavior over the past 30 years.
So why do I think that Japan’s second most dominant behavior is Type 4? They are consumed with the beauty and elegance in the arts and have expanded the arts to multiple phases of everyday life. Calligraphy is a great example. The simple art of handwriting has been elevated to a high art form.
Then in clothing there is beauty. Formal kimonos and wedding kimonos in particular are an art form.
Japanese workmen’s clothing has its own unique style. The latter has been adopted by western designers.
When Mika and I walk on Omotesando Street, there are numerous young people dressed in long, flowing black clothing. I describe them as “uniquely alike”.
Ikebana, flower arranging, has been studied since the 7th century and, as they have done with numerous other artistic skills, the Japanese have brought out the creativity, meaning, and the interface of nature with humanity. The short description of Ikebana below emphasizes the creativity and meaning of each flower arrangement.
“More than simply putting flowers in a container, ikebana is a disciplined art form in which nature and humanity are brought together. Contrary to the idea of a parti- or multi-colored arrangement of blossoms, ikebana often emphasizes other areas of the plant, such as its stems and leaves, and puts emphasis on shape, line, and form. Though ikebana is an expression of creativity, certain rules govern its form. The artist’s intention behind each arrangement is shown through a piece’s color combinations, natural shapes, graceful lines, and the implied meaning of the arrangement.” (source: Internet)
This photo is at the entrance of La Tour D’Argent, our favorite French restaurant.
The elegance and beauty continues with food presentations and here are two representations of meals that we have had in Japan on this trip. I think they speak for themselves.
There are numerous other examples: from simply wrapping packages to Taxi cab drivers wearing white gloves and decorating their taxis with lace.
I would add that all of the enneagram types are artistic but the search for meaning and spirituality in the presentation is what leads me (and perhaps Sandra Maitri) to describe this as type 4 behavior.
There is of course the drama, longing, and idealization that is part of the type 4 personality in Japan’s culture, but for a non-native it is impossible to capture and characterize. I have therefore limited this article to the beauty and have attributed this obsession and romanticization to type 4 behavior. Japan is a wonderful and exotic country and has lots to contribute to our understanding of each other.
Meiko-san is Japanese and perhaps will share some of her insights at our first meeting on January 18th.
Dewa Mata (see you soon)
Steve
Editor: Illania Edwards
