[Buddha-l] Enneagram and Buddhism

[Erik Hoogcarspel]

jkirk schreef:
> Well, I took the little test, and I share Mike's concern. 
>
> Back in the 1940s, the psychologist William Herbert Sheldon
> created another mind/body classification of so-called
> somatotypes, the ecto-, endo-, and mesomorphs, that associated
> body types with temperaments.  This system became a pop party
> game, but soon lost credibility. A google search on it just now
> produced a whole bunch of body building websites, so I guess it
> has moved into that realm.  Somatotyping, like enneagramography,
> no doubt leads to un-insightful labeling.
>
> Vicente is right--the practice of dharma doesn't need personality
> typing. While some people find it to be useful in helping them
> toward insight, it might also be misguiding. And, one can fiddle
> around with the questionnaire. Has any psychoanalyst or
> psychiatrist written a critique of the enneagram system?  
>  
> There's another issue: a psychoanalyst like Sudhir Kakar of
> India, has shown that Indian personality/temperament is quite
> different from what we find in the USA, according to his clinical
> practice and research, anyway. So if we find that enneatypes
> "work" here in the US, how would enneatypes work in the various
> Asian contexts, Buddhist or otherwise? Probably wouldn't.
>
> Joanna
>   
I don't mind people spending time and money on personality typing, I personally don't see any use of it and I'm convinced it's value is more in imagebuilding than personal development. On this side of the ocean a scientist who's into enneagrams or scientology or astrology (Chinese, Tibetan or western) is not taken very seriously. Popper has still to much influence. I remember professor Vetter's visible irritation when students with this kind of bias visited his lectures. You might want to look at http://skepdic.com/enneagr.html
Buddhists who value this kind of thing are Tibetan lamas. I know that Norbu Rche and Sogyal Rche are very much into astrology and it cannot be difficult to compose some sort of theory that can be used as an interface between this and enneagrams. 

Erik

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