[Buddha-l] Lukewarm American Buddhists

[Richard Hayes]

On Sat, 2009-01-17 at 08:13 -0700, Perennial Favorites wrote:

> It seems to me that all those questionnaires designed to pigeonhole you are 
> like that, including the Enneagram test.* 

I wish I could remember the source of a sentiment I heard expressed
recently. The basic idea was that the final stage in the disempowerment
of the electorate comes when the only people who pay attention to one's
views are pollsters. With only a few exceptions (and none that I can
think of offhand), most surveys and polls are made up of such poorly
formulated questions that the results are almost perfectly meaningless.
Their only value is recreational. It is worth reflecting on the question
of why polls and surveys have become such a prominent feature of life in
the United States. Is it because no one else is listening?

About the many Enneagram tests that have been devised, none of them is
of more than heuristic value. If one hankers to take more than a casual
interest in the enneagram of personality, there is no substitute for a
lot of reading and careful self-observation and working with groups.

> * I'm a four.  Didn't sound like a very evolved number.... 

None of the personality types sounds very attractive in their more
unhealthy manifestations. The tendency of the unhealthy four is to dwell
on one's victimhood and suffering. Their favorite song is "Nobody knows
the trouble I've seen," and their least favorite is Dylan's "Dear
Landlord," especially the line that goes "I know you've suffered much,
but in this you are not so unique." Bob Dylan, by the way is supposed to
be a Four with a strong Five wing. Does that make you feel any better?
(Imagine how I felt when I discovered that a fairly representative Nine,
my type, was Ronald Reagan. I damn near committed sewerpipes.) 

-- 
Richard Hayes