Latest / The Resilience Project / The Enneagram for Adoptees: Untangling Who You Are From Who You Became to Survive with Jennifer Hiltebeitel

Transcript

The Enneagram for Adoptees: Untangling Who You Are From Who You Became to Survive with Jennifer Hiltebeitel · The Resilience Project

0:00
SPEAKER_00: Hi y'all, I'm Julie.
0:02
SPEAKER_00: I'm a trauma-informed adoptee coach and somatic healing guide.
0:06
SPEAKER_00: After overcoming deep abandonment wounds, I now help adult adoptees move from feeling lost and disconnected to experiencing profound self-belonging.
0:19
SPEAKER_00: I know what it is like to carry the weight of abandonment, to feel stuck in patterns of longing, adapting, and searching for belonging.
0:30
SPEAKER_00: To have tried every healing modality available and come up empty.
0:36
SPEAKER_00: My own healing has taught me this.
0:38
SPEAKER_00: The answers aren't out there.
0:40
SPEAKER_00: They're buried within me.
0:42
SPEAKER_00: And I'm here to guide you home to yourself.
0:45
SPEAKER_00: The Resilience Project Podcast brings voice, visibility, and validation to the parts of adoption society rarely names, but all of us feel.
0:57
SPEAKER_00: Through an trauma-informed somatic lens, I explore the lived experiences of the entire adoption constellation with a tender emphasis on the adoptee experience.
1:11
SPEAKER_00: This podcast goes beyond storytelling into soul telling.
1:15
SPEAKER_00: It offers embodied insight, compassionate education, and a path towards awareness, hope, and strength.
1:25
SPEAKER_00: Each episode invites listeners to understand adoption more deeply, not just with the mind, but with the nervous system.
1:33
SPEAKER_00: And to reconnect with the truth, identity, and belonging that were always yours to come home to.
2:30
SPEAKER_00: So Jennifer Hiltebeitel is a certified Enneagram coach and a fellow adoptee.
2:36
SPEAKER_00: She was adopted through the county foster care system in Pennsylvania in the early 1970s, like me.
2:42
SPEAKER_00: She met her biological mother at 17 and her biological father at 21 before the internet existed.
2:50
SPEAKER_00: Yes, y'all, we're a little older.
2:53
SPEAKER_00: And she obtained her original birth certificate in 2023.
2:57
SPEAKER_00: She holds a master's in multicultural education.
3:00
SPEAKER_00: She is a parent through both birth and adoption.
3:04
SPEAKER_00: And she has spent the past couple of years helping adoptees process their stories through the lens of the Enneagram.
3:11
SPEAKER_00: And here's what I love most about how Jennifer works.
3:17
SPEAKER_00: She doesn't use the Enneagram to label people or box them in.
3:21
SPEAKER_00: She uses it to reveal the patterns, the motivations, the survival strategies that have shaped how we move through the world as adopted people.
3:30
SPEAKER_00: And if you have been with me through the Five Conditions series that I did, you'll remember that clarity is not certainty.
3:38
SPEAKER_00: Clarity is awareness.
3:40
SPEAKER_00: And I think of the Enneagram in Jennifer's hands as one of the most powerful clarity tools I've encountered.
3:48
SPEAKER_00: It's a way of moving from what's wrong with me to, oh, of course, that makes sense.
3:53
SPEAKER_00: And Jennifer also believes that healing happens in community just like me and through the telling of our stories, which, if you know this podcast, you know the water that we swim in here.
4:05
SPEAKER_00: So let's get into it, Jennifer.
4:07
SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the podcast.
4:08
SPEAKER_00: It's so good to have you.
4:09
SPEAKER_00: Thanks, Julie.
4:10
SPEAKER_00: It's an honor to be here.
4:12
SPEAKER_00: Ugh, I just enjoy you, your energy.
4:16
SPEAKER_00: It's so grounding, it's so chill.
4:18
SPEAKER_00: And I need that in my life.
4:20
SPEAKER_00: So thank you for being here.
4:23
SPEAKER_00: Oh my goodness.
4:24
SPEAKER_00: Uh okay.
4:25
SPEAKER_00: So before we talk about the Enneagram as a tool, I'd love for listeners to know you.
4:31
SPEAKER_00: So can you share your story however you feel comfortable sharing it, whatever parts feel right to share today?
4:37
SPEAKER_01: Sure.
4:38
SPEAKER_01: I was born during the baby scoop era, but I was not scooped.
4:44
SPEAKER_01: I was with my biological parents, and both of them chose to abandon me and my younger brother when I was two and a half.
4:53
SPEAKER_01: So we entered the foster care system, and my brother went directly to our adoptive parents.
4:58
SPEAKER_01: I was in a couple other foster homes, and my parents wanted to adopt him.
5:03
SPEAKER_01: And because he was a baby, I was an older child.
5:07
SPEAKER_01: And they were told that there was a biological grandmother who wanted the children to stay together.
5:13
SPEAKER_01: So they took me on a trial basis, was the language I grew up hearing.
5:17
SPEAKER_01: And because I was well behaved, they decided to keep me too so they could have my baby brother.
5:22
SPEAKER_01: So we were adopted.
5:23
SPEAKER_01: I remember the adoption day.
5:25
SPEAKER_01: So I never had to be told, uh, even though my brother and I are very, very, very fair with red hair.
5:31
SPEAKER_01: Our parents were olive skinned with black hair.
5:34
SPEAKER_01: So we got a lot of questions growing up.
5:36
SPEAKER_01: Um but adoption was never talked about.
5:39
SPEAKER_01: My my dad, we would be asked in a grocery store, where'd you get your red hair?
5:43
SPEAKER_01: And my dad would say, Oh, my dad had it when he was younger, which was true, but uh didn't apply to us.
5:49
SPEAKER_01: And I learned pretty early on that I could shut down the conversation by blurting out, we're adopted.
5:54
SPEAKER_01: And it was a taboo subject for most of my life.
5:58
SPEAKER_01: So when I was, we didn't have a happy childhood.
6:03
SPEAKER_01: It was a very, my parents never healed from their own wounds and didn't know how to parent children with trauma.
6:12
SPEAKER_01: They didn't have the tools for that.
6:15
SPEAKER_01: And we were there to be seen and not heard.
6:17
SPEAKER_01: So my very big feelings and very big personality was not welcomed and it was rough.
6:26
SPEAKER_01: And in high school, I had a guidance counselor way before his time, or way, way before our times.
6:32
SPEAKER_01: He was very attuned to the individual student.
6:36
SPEAKER_01: And it's through him and a social worker friend of his that I ended up connecting with my biological mother first.
6:45
SPEAKER_01: And then several years later, through her, even though they were divorced, I was able to meet my biological father and his side of the family.
6:55
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
6:55
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so a couple of things here that really stood out to me.
6:59
SPEAKER_00: You talked about being told that you were being kept on a trial basis.
7:06
SPEAKER_00: What was that like for you?
7:08
SPEAKER_00: Can you describe what you experienced, how you felt?
7:13
SPEAKER_01: I grew up and I and I still wrestle with this, although I know it not to be true any longer.
7:18
SPEAKER_01: It's still it's still um part of my personality and pr part of my experience is that I wasn't wanted by my first parents or they wouldn't have left us.
7:31
SPEAKER_01: And I wasn't wanted by my second set of parents either.
7:36
SPEAKER_01: And that uh put me out on my own, even though I was sheltered and I had food.
7:41
SPEAKER_01: I knew that I was pretty much on my own as far as my dealing with my own emotions and feelings.
7:48
SPEAKER_01: My biological brother, the baby, has had a lifelong wrestle with mental illness and addiction.
7:56
SPEAKER_01: And so I am the child who has and is caring for um our mom in her last chapter.
8:07
SPEAKER_01: And each week I have to sort of wrestle with my I'm choosing to go, I'm choosing to care.
8:12
SPEAKER_01: And yet sometimes I just want to say, and I I have said it, where would you be, mom?
8:17
SPEAKER_01: If you if you didn't, and now she's very grateful.
8:20
SPEAKER_01: She's grateful for what I do for her.
8:23
SPEAKER_01: But I was never loved by my parents for who I was as a daughter.
8:29
SPEAKER_01: It was about what I could do for them.
8:31
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I hear that story all the time, actually, from a lot of adopted people, and it's heartbreaking to me.
8:39
SPEAKER_00: So they, your biological mother and biological father, you said we're together.
8:44
SPEAKER_00: We're actually married.
8:46
SPEAKER_00: Is that correct?
8:47
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
8:48
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
8:49
SPEAKER_00: So do you yeah, so do you have any other siblings from them?
8:54
SPEAKER_01: So not from the two of them together.
8:57
SPEAKER_01: Got it.
8:58
SPEAKER_01: My biological mother had a daughter, and my half-sister was five when I was born.
9:04
SPEAKER_01: She's five years older.
9:05
SPEAKER_01: And then she went on to have two other children with different men.
9:09
SPEAKER_01: So I think we have, I think she has five children for four fathers.
9:15
SPEAKER_00: Oh my goodness, that's a lot.
9:17
SPEAKER_00: So honestly, 17 and 21 are pretty young to hold that information.
9:24
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm curious, what do you remember about who you were then?
9:31
SPEAKER_01: I was a rebel with a cause, right?
9:33
SPEAKER_01: I am seriously.
9:35
SPEAKER_01: I was a typical teenager, only in the fact that I thought that I knew everything.
9:41
SPEAKER_01: So I thought that if I met my biological family, that hole in my heart would fill up and I would be whole.
9:49
SPEAKER_01: I thought that all I needed to do was meet them and then I would know all the answers.
9:56
SPEAKER_01: Um, this was in the late 80s and the early 90s.
10:01
SPEAKER_01: Therapy for teenagers and college students was not a regular thing like it is now.
10:08
SPEAKER_01: It wasn't common.
10:09
SPEAKER_01: We didn't obviously have the internet.
10:11
SPEAKER_01: I didn't have access to books.
10:13
SPEAKER_01: I found out last year when I read The Journey to Wholeness by Betty Dean Lifton that it was written in 1995.
10:20
SPEAKER_01: And I thought, wow, I I could have really used that in 1995.
10:24
SPEAKER_01: But I uh we we find we find the resources at the time in our life oftentimes that we need them.
10:30
SPEAKER_01: So so last year was a good time to find that book.
10:33
SPEAKER_01: But what I remember was was that I was drowning.
10:37
SPEAKER_01: And I there wasn't anyone to help me make sense of it.
10:43
SPEAKER_01: My freshman roommate got late night, uh, we had a lot of late-night conversations, and her family was a gift to me that that year because I met my biological mother right before uh right at graduation, high school graduation, and leaving for college.
10:56
SPEAKER_01: So, but she didn't know anything about adoption or trauma and loss and grief of the adoptee.
11:01
SPEAKER_01: So, what I remember about my 17-year-old self is that I thought this was going to fix everything and it didn't.
11:08
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, understandably.
11:11
SPEAKER_00: Oh, okay.
11:13
SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you for sharing that.
11:14
SPEAKER_00: I I think that's really important because it's a message that I share all the time that belonging isn't found in other people, isn't found in our biological family, is not found outside of ourselves.
11:25
SPEAKER_00: It's actually found finding ourselves within ourselves.
11:29
SPEAKER_00: And so I see that that's pretty much what happened for you.
11:33
SPEAKER_00: However, we all search for it.
11:34
SPEAKER_00: We search for it outside of ourselves all the time.
11:37
SPEAKER_00: And with that, we search for who we were, the connections to our culture that we didn't have or our history.
11:44
SPEAKER_00: And you were able to get your original birth certificate in 2023, which a lot of us, depending upon the state that we're in, are not able to do that, that we were born in.
11:54
SPEAKER_00: So I'm curious, what was that like for you?
11:56
SPEAKER_00: Because I know it's a little different for you.
11:59
SPEAKER_01: It's a little different in the fact that I already knew my birth name and I knew the names of my biological mother and father.
12:06
SPEAKER_01: It is through community with adoptees where I learned in 2023 that from another adoptee that Pennsylvania had opened up original birth certificates for adoptees in 2017, and she was shocked that I didn't know and that I hadn't requested mine.
12:27
SPEAKER_01: And I thought, oh, what does it matter at this point?
12:31
SPEAKER_01: And then I thought, no, it's mine, it belongs to me.
12:36
SPEAKER_01: And so I paid my$20 and it arrived in the mail, and it was a bit surreal because I think, what if I had had that all along?
12:46
SPEAKER_01: And I did discover middle names of my my birth parents, but it was more of a I need to do this for all adoptees.
12:56
SPEAKER_01: For those of you in California who were born in California and other states that don't have access, I need to get this and it's mine, and I should have it.
13:07
SPEAKER_00: Yes, and I'm so glad that you did.
13:09
SPEAKER_00: As you're telling that part of your story, I'm curious, was there a place that you noticed?
13:14
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was just a few years ago, in your body where that lived when you opened it.
13:20
SPEAKER_00: What did you notice?
13:21
SPEAKER_00: Was there anything that happened in your body?
13:24
SPEAKER_00: Attention, a release?
13:26
SPEAKER_00: Do you remember?
13:27
SPEAKER_01: I don't remember that, but what I'm feeling right now that's surprising me as I talk about it is a tightness in my chest.
13:34
SPEAKER_01: So I'm firmly planted in the my dominant center of intelligence.
13:39
SPEAKER_01: We have three centers of intelligence our gut, our body, our head, and our heart.
13:44
SPEAKER_01: And ideally, we're accessing all three, but we all have a dominant type.
13:47
SPEAKER_01: And my dominant center of intelligence is the heart.
13:51
SPEAKER_01: And when I talk about my story or I listen to other people's stories, or I'm feeling that I literally can feel like tightness in my chest.
13:59
SPEAKER_01: And that's what I'm experiencing now, even though I don't feel any emotion, right?
14:03
SPEAKER_01: I'm talking, I'm conscious of the fact that I'm on a podcast.
14:06
SPEAKER_01: And so I'm not feeling emotional, but there is a tightness in my chest.
14:13
SPEAKER_01: And so I think my guess is that a lot of what I hold, what my body holds for me, is held in my heart, or not literally in the muscles of my heart, but in my chest area.
14:24
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, in your chest center is what I would call it.
14:28
SPEAKER_00: And yeah, it's interesting because in the work that I do, that is the center of love and the center of grief.
14:36
SPEAKER_00: And we hold a lot there as adopted people.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: So it would make sense.
14:40
SPEAKER_00: So I appreciate you sharing that.
14:42
SPEAKER_00: And I think it also says or speaks to the whole fact that our body remembers what our mind does not as adopted people.
14:49
SPEAKER_00: We hold a lot in our body.
14:51
SPEAKER_00: So thank you so much for sharing that, Jennifer.
14:54
SPEAKER_00: Sure.
14:56
SPEAKER_00: So I'm curious, shifting gears a little bit here, how did the Enneagram find you?
15:03
SPEAKER_00: Was there a moment where it clicked as an adoption healing tool, if that's what you would call it, not just a personality framework?
15:10
SPEAKER_01: The Enneagram first found me in 2017 when it seemed like all the podcasts were talking about it.
15:17
SPEAKER_01: And I am not a bandwagon girl.
15:19
SPEAKER_01: Uh, I couldn't even pronounce Enneagram.
15:21
SPEAKER_01: I was like, oh, there's that Enias something again.
15:23
SPEAKER_01: What's that about?
15:26
SPEAKER_01: And simultaneously, my oldest daughter was in high school, my youngest was in middle school, and something which was changing in our relationships, in our dynamics.
15:35
SPEAKER_01: And because of my childhood, I had set out to do things very differently than what had been done for me as a parent and as a mom.
15:43
SPEAKER_01: So in 2018, when I was looking ahead to the year, I thought, I really want to figure out what this ENIA thing is.
15:51
SPEAKER_01: And I wonder, I'm curious if it's something that would help me in my relationship with my daughters.
15:57
SPEAKER_01: And so 2018, I just started in a deep dive.
16:00
SPEAKER_01: I'm a student by nature, I was a teacher by profession once upon a time.
16:05
SPEAKER_01: And so it's my nature to, if I'm going to read about something, I'm going to do it 100%.
16:10
SPEAKER_01: And so as the year went on, I realized it was shifting the way that I was acting, thinking, and doing in all of my closest relationships, including my with my husband and with both daughters.
16:25
SPEAKER_01: It wasn't fixing anything, but I was changing.
16:30
SPEAKER_01: And I thought, oh wow, there's something to this Enneagram wisdom.
16:35
SPEAKER_01: Only to discover, of course, it's been around for many, many decades.
16:39
SPEAKER_01: I just discovered it.
16:41
SPEAKER_01: I'm a late bloomer.
16:42
SPEAKER_01: And so as those relationships started to shift, or my perspective on those, my parenting strategies changed, I realized that again, I was parenting both of my daughters the way that I wish that I had been parented.
16:58
SPEAKER_00: Yep, totally get that.
17:00
SPEAKER_01: That worked up until a certain point.
17:02
SPEAKER_01: And then as they were becoming their own individuals, it was no longer working.
17:08
SPEAKER_01: And so fast forward a few years, um, I became certified, kept doing my research.
17:15
SPEAKER_01: And after the initial surge of the pandemic, I discovered the wonderful world of Zoom and discovered Adoptive Voices, the Adopte Mentoring Society, and started having Zoom conversations with adult adoptees for the first time in my life.
17:31
SPEAKER_01: I had worked with providing my youngest daughter with as many contacts with peers for her because it's something I was missing when I was a child.
17:41
SPEAKER_01: But I didn't even know to look for community for myself.
17:45
SPEAKER_01: And so as I'm listening to other adoptees share their stories, both on Zoom and on podcasts, I was starting to see themes of adoption being mirrored back to me while also holding this quote unquote newfound knowledge for me of the Enneagram and looking at the way that our personality responds to our experiences, particularly in those early developmental years, was huge.
18:18
SPEAKER_01: And so two of my passions merged.
18:21
SPEAKER_01: And here we are at the intersection of the Adopte journey and the Enneagram.
18:27
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
18:28
SPEAKER_00: And I love what you post.
18:29
SPEAKER_00: I am so fascinated by the Enneagram myself.
18:32
SPEAKER_00: I've similar to you, I stumbled upon it later and became enamored with figuring things out.
18:38
SPEAKER_00: I read a couple of books about it, just exploring how fascinating it was.
18:42
SPEAKER_00: So I love that it led you to do what you are doing now.
18:46
SPEAKER_00: And a lot of people encounter the Enneagram, they call it a personality assessment, which I don't really see it as that.
18:53
SPEAKER_00: I see it as more of a spiritual growth tool, uh, especially when you read about how it was founded.
18:58
SPEAKER_00: But it's not really a party trick or a label.
19:01
SPEAKER_00: It is something that you handle very, very differently and very, very gently.
19:07
SPEAKER_00: You I I remember in the time that you spoke in Revolution, you didn't like people going, I'm a four or you're a seven, or doing that stuff.
19:14
SPEAKER_00: So how do you hold it differently?
19:16
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, as soon as people find out that my work is within the Enneagram and using the Ennegram as a tool for growth, they're like, oh, I I heard about that and I took a test and and I and I typed such and such.
19:27
SPEAKER_01: And I never know quite what to how to respond to that.
19:30
SPEAKER_01: I want to say, so how has that helped you become a healthier individual?
19:35
SPEAKER_01: But I don't.
19:36
SPEAKER_01: I usually I usually just smile.
19:37
SPEAKER_01: Um, and if they want to know more, I could I I see the the responses.
19:42
SPEAKER_01: I don't think that a test can identify your motivations.
19:46
SPEAKER_01: And the Enneagram is different in the way that it gives you a map of your personality and it gives you places, a way to grow.
19:59
SPEAKER_01: It identifies not who you are, but the coping mechanisms or the strategies you've developed that you thought you needed or you did actually need to survive.
20:12
SPEAKER_01: And so for me, I love helping individuals identify their dominant type.
20:18
SPEAKER_01: That is important in a typing session to figure out if you don't know what your dominant Enneagram type is, so you know where to go on the map.
20:25
SPEAKER_01: However, most of my clients come to me having already dabbled in the Enneagram, thinking they know their type.
20:33
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes they're very sure of their type.
20:36
SPEAKER_01: And our sessions are around the patterns of thinking, acting, and feeling that are no longer working for them.
20:46
SPEAKER_01: And then what?
20:47
SPEAKER_01: So what?
20:48
SPEAKER_01: I often say, if if I'm feeling particularly sassy and someone says, Oh, hi, yeah, I'm a so-and-so, I'll say, so what now?
20:56
SPEAKER_01: Because just knowing a number doesn't help you on your journey.
21:01
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't help you take steps towards healing.
21:04
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's what are you gonna do with that knowledge, right?
21:07
SPEAKER_00: What, how are you going to grow forward?
21:09
SPEAKER_00: I love that.
21:10
SPEAKER_00: So you've said the Enneagram builds understanding and compassion for our whole selves.
21:17
SPEAKER_00: What does that mean for adopted people specifically?
21:21
SPEAKER_00: People who often feel like their story has missing chapters and is fragmented.
21:26
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think many of us as adoptees confuse who we are with who we became to survive what what happened to us.
21:37
SPEAKER_01: So we get that mixed up.
21:39
SPEAKER_01: Um, the Enneagram cannot fill in the missing chapters, they are loaded with loss and grief and trauma.
21:47
SPEAKER_01: And the Enneagram can't quote unquote fix all that.
21:50
SPEAKER_01: But what it can do is help us see adaptive patterns that we built to survive.
21:58
SPEAKER_01: And it when When we can identify the mask, right?
22:03
SPEAKER_01: Personality comes from the Latin word persona.
22:08
SPEAKER_01: When we can identify the masks that we're wearing and we can remove them, then we start to see and experience who we are meant to be.
22:19
SPEAKER_01: Unfortunately, it's not a once and done thing.
22:21
SPEAKER_01: It's like any journey.
22:23
SPEAKER_01: It's cyclical.
22:25
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's beautiful.
22:26
SPEAKER_00: And I love that you do that work with people because adoptees often develop those survival strategies that you were talking about.
22:33
SPEAKER_00: The people pleasing, the hyper-vigilance, shape shifting, self-abandonment.
22:38
SPEAKER_00: I was so good at all of those.
22:39
SPEAKER_00: How does the Enneagram help somebody see those adaptations without shame?
22:45
SPEAKER_00: Well, anything I've learned about shame, I've learned from Brene Brown.
22:48
SPEAKER_01: Right.
22:48
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, me too! She's my fave.
22:52
SPEAKER_01: She says that shame cannot survive being spoken.
22:57
SPEAKER_01: So when we can name our coping strategies, our survival strategies, we naming them brings them into the light, and shame can't live where it's been spoken.
23:10
SPEAKER_01: I often ask my clients to spend a week initially after our first or second session to look objectively at themselves, almost like a bird's eye view for a week.
23:26
SPEAKER_01: And I often say to them, I want you to look with compassion almost as if you're a third person looking at yourself or in third person.
23:36
SPEAKER_01: I because when we really look at ourselves, if we don't do it with compassion, then it's just self-judgment.
23:44
SPEAKER_01: So I I repeat my and this gets it's it's probably a Jenniferism at this point, but I don't know who the original author is.
23:50
SPEAKER_01: But self self-awareness without self-compassion is just self-judgment.
23:58
SPEAKER_01: And that is not the purpose of the Enneagram.
24:01
SPEAKER_01: As we take a look into what patterns are we trying to dissolve here.
24:06
SPEAKER_00: Hey, before we keep going with the episode, I want to tell you about something I'm doing today.
24:11
SPEAKER_00: It's called Bring Your Burden, a free live gathering on Zoom, Thursday, August 27th at 6:30 p.m.
24:19
SPEAKER_00: Mountain Time, 8.30 Eastern Time.
24:22
SPEAKER_00: No slides, no teaching, none of that.
24:25
SPEAKER_00: Just a room for adoptees to bring the questions you've never said out loud.
24:31
SPEAKER_00: The ones that live in your body, the ones you don't say to your adoptive family, or maybe even to your therapist yet.
24:38
SPEAKER_00: I'll be there as a fellow adoptee, not a teacher.
24:41
SPEAKER_00: We're going to sit in it together for an hour.
24:44
SPEAKER_00: If you've been carrying something alone for a long time, I built this room for you.
24:49
SPEAKER_00: It's free, it's live, and I would love to see you there.
24:53
SPEAKER_00: The link is in the show notes, and I'll see you on Thursday, the 27th.
24:56
SPEAKER_00: My gosh, that's so good.
24:58
SPEAKER_00: It's interesting because that's actually a couple of the phases in my own blueprint.
25:02
SPEAKER_00: It starts with self-awareness and self-compassion as the third.
25:05
SPEAKER_00: I feel like they're so unbelievably important.
25:08
SPEAKER_00: So is there a difference between our type and our trauma?
25:13
SPEAKER_00: I know you help clients untangle this whole, this is my personality thing, and this is what I learned to stay safe.
25:22
SPEAKER_00: How would you help them understand the difference between the type and trauma?
25:26
SPEAKER_01: Well, first of all, I want to repeat that I'm not a therapist.
25:29
SPEAKER_01: I'm not a licensed counselor.
25:31
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
25:31
SPEAKER_01: So I do say that to clients early on, and then sometimes it gets repeated.
25:36
SPEAKER_01: And that's that's a good thing for you to talk about with your therapist.
25:40
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, totally.
25:41
SPEAKER_01: I think that adoptee consciousness names the trauma of what happened to us, and the Enneagram is naming the coping strategies that we built in survival.
25:54
SPEAKER_01: So an Enneagram type three could be an adoptee, and so their personality formed out of grief and loss over relinquishment and adoption.
26:05
SPEAKER_01: But you can have a type three who had a healthy childhood too.
26:10
SPEAKER_01: So it's trauma and type are different and need different tools, but type, Enneagram type was formed out of survival and they're separate, but they're magnetic almost, I want to say, in that way.
26:28
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I actually really like how you describe that.
26:31
SPEAKER_00: I think you've talked about working with your clients.
26:34
SPEAKER_00: I'm curious in a coaching session, when somebody begins to recognize these patterns that you identify, and well, actually, you help them identify.
26:43
SPEAKER_00: You're empowering them to do that for the first time.
26:46
SPEAKER_00: What do you see shift in them?
26:48
SPEAKER_00: What do you notice?
26:49
SPEAKER_01: There's often this almost a light bulb moment, sort of this exhale.
26:54
SPEAKER_01: That's why I do what I do.
26:57
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes there's almost a head bow, and I can almost see the shame.
27:03
SPEAKER_01: And then that's where I jump in with remember, we're developing self-awareness with self-compassion.
27:10
SPEAKER_01: This is not, this is not make you a bad person.
27:13
SPEAKER_01: This doesn't make me a bad person.
27:15
SPEAKER_01: This is something to identify, something to name and to say, is this still working for me?
27:22
SPEAKER_01: Is this pattern still working for me?
27:23
SPEAKER_01: And then, of course, we're also looking at our assets.
27:26
SPEAKER_01: Um, my friend Jackie Contessa talks a lot about instead of strengths and weaknesses, assets and liabilities.
27:32
SPEAKER_01: And so we don't spend all of our time in coaching sessions talking about our the liabilities of our personalities.
27:39
SPEAKER_01: We want to also make sure that we're seeing the gifts underneath that mask of our true self.
27:47
SPEAKER_00: So beautiful.
27:48
SPEAKER_00: And I even love how you described the reaction in the body.
27:52
SPEAKER_00: You did it so well, specifically the shame one, the head going down.
27:56
SPEAKER_00: That's what I do.
27:57
SPEAKER_00: I you know how Brene talks about the cry and hides or the mean nasties.
28:01
SPEAKER_00: Do you remember that's how she described it?
28:03
SPEAKER_00: I'm a cry and hider.
28:05
SPEAKER_00: So, so when whenever shame comes on me, you will see me physically almost recoil.
28:12
SPEAKER_00: And so your description about that was so, so good.
28:14
SPEAKER_00: And when you see that, it's so beautiful to be able to let somebody know listen, there's no judgment coming from me.
28:22
SPEAKER_00: So let's not judge ourselves.
28:24
SPEAKER_00: Let's my word is be curious, because curious really does stop, interrupt that whole judgment idea.
28:31
SPEAKER_00: And you bring that to them.
28:32
SPEAKER_00: And I love that so much.
28:34
SPEAKER_00: And so for a listener or viewer who has never actually explored the Enneagram before, they're really new to it, where would you invite them to begin?
28:44
SPEAKER_00: What would be a gentle first step?
28:46
SPEAKER_01: I have two resources that I recommend to clients or people interested in the Enneagram.
28:50
SPEAKER_01: The one is if you're a podcast person, to start with uh the Around the Circles series called Start Here.
28:58
SPEAKER_01: And we can, I can get you that link maybe for you put in the show notes.
29:02
SPEAKER_01: It goes through each Enneagram type with people who've identified as that Enneagram type.
29:06
SPEAKER_01: And that is the, in my way, the narrative way of experiencing or discovering what your dominant type is.
29:15
SPEAKER_01: Also, there is a a friend of mine, she's known as the Aligned Soul Company, I think, on Instagram.
29:23
SPEAKER_01: She just a few months ago, after a long time of writing, came up with a$9, I would call it, I don't I don't want to butcher her work, but uh a toolkit basically where you can discover a very in-depth deep dive to your type that's not an not a test, but more more educational.
29:44
SPEAKER_01: I have not been through it yet at this point, but I've recommended it to a couple of clients as a as a tool to start, a place to start.
29:51
SPEAKER_00: That's so great.
29:51
SPEAKER_00: I would love that link too, if if possible.
29:54
SPEAKER_00: Uh I think that would be very, very beneficial.
29:56
SPEAKER_00: It is not an easy thing.
29:58
SPEAKER_00: An assessment, unless it's really studied, there's one that I've I think I've brought up to you that I have recommended to people because it's been peer-reviewed.
30:07
SPEAKER_00: It's called the Ready Assessment.
30:09
SPEAKER_00: I uh you've probably heard of that, but it's involved, man, and it takes time.
30:13
SPEAKER_00: And one of the things the most beneficial way that I've been able to find it is by just being curious about myself and learning the different Enneagram types to figure out which one really, you know what did it for me?
30:27
SPEAKER_00: Was there was one book that I read, The Road Back to You.
30:30
SPEAKER_00: So I read that book and it was talking about the Enneagram one.
30:33
SPEAKER_00: And one of the things that it said was, Do you monitor people who load your dishwasher?
30:39
SPEAKER_00: And I laughed out loud.
30:41
SPEAKER_00: I was like, oh my gosh, yeah, I totally do that.
30:44
SPEAKER_00: They have to load it a specific way.
30:46
SPEAKER_00: And it just, and I liked that I laughed at it, right?
30:49
SPEAKER_00: Because old me would have probably judged myself, like, oh my gosh, you're a horrible person.
30:54
SPEAKER_00: You make people feel uncomfortable with that crazy.
30:57
SPEAKER_00: But that was a big indicator for me.
30:58
SPEAKER_00: It was when I realized, oh my gosh, you see me.
31:02
SPEAKER_00: And so it's kind of that whole that is a was a coping strategy for me, was let me co control everything around me in order for me to feel safe.
31:09
SPEAKER_00: So really, really fascinating to me.
31:11
SPEAKER_00: I'm sure we could go down a rabbit hole there.
31:13
SPEAKER_00: But with that, even in mind, are there common mistypes or traps that adoptees fall into when they first explore this work?
31:21
SPEAKER_01: For sure.
31:22
SPEAKER_01: There's lots of mistyping, and I couldn't possibly go through every scenario of mistyping.
31:28
SPEAKER_01: I think it's what we've already talked about, Julie, where people take a test and then they take what the test said and they're like, yep, I'm a type seven.
31:38
SPEAKER_01: Okay, good, good, good talk.
31:41
SPEAKER_01: Instead of staying curious and learning about the much uh the the depthier parts of the Enneagram, where do, where do I, how do I respond in stress?
31:53
SPEAKER_01: How what is my what are my coping strategies?
31:57
SPEAKER_01: What does, you know, all the different triads, groups of threes that give us more information, more naming of of why we do what we do?
32:07
SPEAKER_01: They look at, I think that a lot of the misuse of the Enneagram is looking at behavior only.
32:14
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
32:15
SPEAKER_01: And not at the motivations of why we react instead of responding.
32:20
SPEAKER_01: Why do we find ourselves in the same pattern loop of thinking, acting, and doing?
32:27
SPEAKER_01: And how might I shift the way that I respond in the world?
32:31
SPEAKER_01: My natural, we we can't turn off the way that we were naturally created to be.
32:37
SPEAKER_01: But what masks are we wearing?
32:39
SPEAKER_01: And so there's where I feel a lot of the misuse of the Enneagram happens.
32:43
SPEAKER_01: It's a meme on Instagram.
32:46
SPEAKER_01: It's a lot of pointing at other people.
32:49
SPEAKER_01: You annoy me, so you must be at XYZ.
32:52
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
32:53
SPEAKER_01: Instead of what where's the path to healing with this tool?
33:00
SPEAKER_01: Where could it take me in growth?
33:04
SPEAKER_01: Or is it just a number?
33:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I totally, totally hear that.
33:08
SPEAKER_00: It's really interesting too, because I have a very dear friend of mine who for a long time mistyped herself as a one.
33:13
SPEAKER_00: And I remember thinking, I'm a one and she ain't like me.
33:17
SPEAKER_00: This is very, very odd.
33:18
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
33:19
SPEAKER_00: But it was one of those situations where she had done an assessment and had just believed it versus really doing the deep work.
33:26
SPEAKER_00: And once she started doing the deep work, she realized she was actually a nine.
33:30
SPEAKER_00: So it was just, and I was like, oh yeah, that totally fits you way more than what you were trying, trying to identify as.
33:37
SPEAKER_00: So interesting.
33:39
SPEAKER_00: We really, and she's not an adopted person, but all of us need so much to have something to hold on to that identifies who we are, especially when we've been through trauma.
33:48
SPEAKER_00: And so this is such a wonderful tool to go curiously deeper into the layers, because there are many.
33:55
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
33:56
SPEAKER_01: I have a friend who mistyped um knowingly for a long time.
34:03
SPEAKER_01: It was multiple years.
34:04
SPEAKER_01: And what was discovered was that when she discovered the Enneagram, she was in the midst of extreme stress, including trauma.
34:14
SPEAKER_01: And that's why oftentimes if I feel that, or if I notice in conversation in a consult that someone's trauma is is fresh or current, my first recommendation is therapy because I don't want an individual to mistype because they're responding differently and how they see themselves is different when we're under stress or um in the midst of trauma.
34:42
SPEAKER_00: Or absolutely absolutely.
34:44
SPEAKER_00: I know for me, when I'm in stress, I go to a four.
34:47
SPEAKER_00: And so I am not the same person as I am when I'm typically just me.
34:53
SPEAKER_00: When I'm stressed, I can be so I have, I literally have those characteristics.
34:58
SPEAKER_00: Now, if I were to have tried to type myself in the middle of stress, I probably would have typed as a four, mistyped as a four, because potentially could be whatever, but so, so, so interesting.
35:09
SPEAKER_00: And you're right.
35:10
SPEAKER_00: I think it's so, so important to really.
35:12
SPEAKER_00: That's why the type and trauma question existed, because I was curious about that.
35:17
SPEAKER_00: So thank you so much for sharing that.
35:19
SPEAKER_01: I would just encourage you, Julie, because I we there is language that says I go to a certain number in stress.
35:28
SPEAKER_01: Because you've done so much work individually and internally, and you're on a path to health.
35:34
SPEAKER_01: I want you to just stay curious about the levels of health for a type four because you also have a move to type four.
35:42
SPEAKER_01: You can choose to to uh bring on the the, you don't become a four, but you can bring on the strengths and the beauty that a type four has to offer, not just it previous teachings said, oh yeah, we only have access to that number in our in our stress move.
36:02
SPEAKER_01: And I love that teachers are shifting that language.
36:04
SPEAKER_01: That's why just only studying your dominant type doesn't help you forward on your on your your path to healing.
36:14
SPEAKER_00: Totally agree with that.
36:15
SPEAKER_00: And I so appreciate you.
36:16
SPEAKER_00: This is what's so important is watching the language that we use.
36:20
SPEAKER_00: So that's really, really good because there are amazing qualities about a four.
36:25
SPEAKER_00: And so it's learning, and I know them because I've done a lot of research myself similar to you.
36:30
SPEAKER_00: It's learning that I can be those two.
36:32
SPEAKER_00: I could choose those two.
36:33
SPEAKER_00: That's cool.
36:34
SPEAKER_00: I really like that you said that.
36:35
SPEAKER_00: So thank you.
36:36
SPEAKER_00: I I really I received that and I appreciate it.
36:39
SPEAKER_00: So how would you say knowing your type affects, interacts with your relationship, any relationship, partner, adoptive family, biological family.
36:51
SPEAKER_00: How does that interact or impact relationship or change relationship?
36:56
SPEAKER_01: I wish that it changed other people.
36:59
SPEAKER_01: It un it unfortunately does not.
37:03
SPEAKER_01: The changing happens within me, right?
37:06
SPEAKER_01: And I'm not saying that just because I've I know my Enneagram type and I've been studying it in depth for a long time and am an Enneagram coach, that doesn't mean that I still don't have survival strategies that pop up and get in the way of communication with the people that I love.
37:26
SPEAKER_01: For me, the biggest mindset shift has been when someone responds to me and I have a reaction.
37:36
SPEAKER_01: I now have a pause.
37:37
SPEAKER_01: Victor Frankel says between stimulation and between response, there's space.
37:43
SPEAKER_01: And so for me, the Enneagram has, you can see my hands, has stretched out that space where I can say, Jennifer, okay, yep, I see you slipping into self-deflation, etc.
37:56
SPEAKER_01: Is that actually true?
37:58
SPEAKER_01: Is this about you or is this about them?
38:02
SPEAKER_01: And the Enneagram has given me healthy practices.
38:08
SPEAKER_01: I also have a move to a type four.
38:10
SPEAKER_01: Um I am very relationship driven, and it used to be that I was okay if you were okay with me.
38:18
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
38:19
SPEAKER_01: And the Enneagram has helped me to be okay with me.
38:24
SPEAKER_01: Not perfectly.
38:27
SPEAKER_01: Not perfectly, but with a lot of compassion.
38:31
SPEAKER_01: I spend more time by myself in order to keep entering into uh the relationships in my adoptive family and my biological family.
38:41
SPEAKER_01: I feel like I have more choice because I was letting my personality un again unknowingly do the talking, do the feeling.
38:50
SPEAKER_01: And I now have a choice to interrupt a cycle that's no longer serving me.
38:56
SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah, see, that's beautiful.
38:58
SPEAKER_00: I you have made space for the pause.
39:01
SPEAKER_00: And I think that's so unbelievably important.
39:03
SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much for sharing that.
39:04
SPEAKER_00: And then also saying, uh, we can't change other people, even though we so much would want to.
39:09
SPEAKER_00: We can change how we choose to respond, and that can change everything.
39:12
SPEAKER_00: And you even said that.
39:13
SPEAKER_00: It helped you in your parenting, it helped how you interacted with your kids, your husband, all of that.
39:17
SPEAKER_00: It's just beautiful.
39:18
SPEAKER_00: I I love that.
39:20
SPEAKER_00: That's the whole point of using a tool for spiritual growth.
39:23
SPEAKER_00: And you know what?
39:24
SPEAKER_01: It is, it has the Enneagram gives us an opportunity to reparent our inner child as well.
39:29
SPEAKER_01: We talk a lot about the parts of us when we're on our adopted journey.
39:35
SPEAKER_01: And for me, I was busy trying to parent my daughters the way that I wanted to be parented, realizing discovering they needed a different kind of parent.
39:47
SPEAKER_01: And I'm working on being the parent that they need and not the one that I wish I had.
39:52
SPEAKER_01: But there are many parts of me that could use that reparenting, the parenting I didn't get.
39:59
SPEAKER_01: And the Enneagram has given me language and skills for that.
40:03
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, totally.
40:04
SPEAKER_00: So such a huge part of what we deal with as adopted people.
40:08
SPEAKER_00: I appreciate you sharing that.
40:09
SPEAKER_00: And I know we've had this conversation.
40:12
SPEAKER_00: I know you believe this.
40:13
SPEAKER_00: I said it in the intro that you believe healing happens in community and through the telling of stories.
40:18
SPEAKER_00: So why do you feel like being witnessed is so essential for us adopted people?
40:24
SPEAKER_00: I think not the deep question.
40:27
SPEAKER_01: Well, you just went oof.
40:29
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
40:30
SPEAKER_01: I I think it goes back to the shame, right?
40:34
SPEAKER_01: When we're not in community, this doesn't only apply to adoptees, but since we're here, sure, right.
40:40
SPEAKER_01: As adoptees, talking to adoptees.
40:44
SPEAKER_01: When we're in community and we hear other people naming their coping strategies or what happened to them, that mirroring helps us heal a little bit.
40:58
SPEAKER_01: That, oh, me too.
41:01
SPEAKER_01: Um, oh wow, our stories are really different, but we both struggle with people pleasing.
41:05
SPEAKER_01: Oh wow, me too.
41:07
SPEAKER_01: There's something about remaining in isolation that keeps us stuck, that keeps us, our perspective is narrow.
41:14
SPEAKER_01: It's only through our lens, no pun intended, name of my business, right, that we see, but when we're in community, we learn that we are not, I don't know how else to say it, but not alone.
41:27
SPEAKER_01: To not be alone on our journey is invaluable.
41:30
SPEAKER_00: Well, and I think that's a powerful thing to remember and state.
41:33
SPEAKER_00: I say it all the time.
41:34
SPEAKER_00: You are not alone.
41:35
SPEAKER_00: You never are, and it's so important for us to know that.
41:38
SPEAKER_00: Uh, so with your own ongoing reunion, these have been long-standing relationships for you.
41:47
SPEAKER_00: Extended biological family that you have met over the years.
41:52
SPEAKER_00: What has all of that taught you that the frameworks couldn't?
41:57
SPEAKER_01: I don't have a relationship with my biological mother or my biological father.
42:02
SPEAKER_01: I see my biological father maybe once a year or so.
42:06
SPEAKER_01: I have relationships with extended family.
42:09
SPEAKER_01: I had a long time, 20 years with my paternal grandmother before she passed away, which was a gift I could never have imagined.
42:18
SPEAKER_01: And being with biological family and hearing different versions of the same event on why I was abandoned gave me confidence to know that what happened to me was about the two adults involved.
42:37
SPEAKER_01: And not because I was unwanted or unlovable.
42:41
SPEAKER_01: I was shocked to discover a very extended family on my biological father's side who not only remembered me but had babysat me, who had who had waited, who remembered how old I was, who were looking for me.
42:57
SPEAKER_01: And so I was not prepared for I was prepared for the secondary rejection that I did receive from both biological parents initially.
43:08
SPEAKER_01: I wasn't prepared for the love and the love and the welcome, and I I I'm hesitating with my words because I've been rejected, I know what it's like, and I know that not all adoptees get this gift.
43:24
SPEAKER_02: Right.
43:25
SPEAKER_01: But to know that I was welcomed and loved just because I was family was huge.
43:33
SPEAKER_01: I did get that from adoptive grandparents and cousins and aunts and uncles as well.
43:37
SPEAKER_01: Again, both all four parents messed it up.
43:41
SPEAKER_01: So my it taught me that long before I knew about personality typing structures.
43:48
SPEAKER_01: And so now with that structure, that personality typing structure, I've come to see the layers of what grew out of belief.
44:00
SPEAKER_01: Being a lie that I wasn't wanted, that I wasn't loved.
44:02
SPEAKER_01: And so I'm thankful that I had the opportunity to hear from people, to know people from my biological family, to still be in relationship with biological family who love me just because I'm connected to them biologically.
44:16
SPEAKER_01: But I will say I had that, I had that in my adoptive extended families as well.
44:21
SPEAKER_01: And I'm close to very close to several cousins, even aunts and uncles.
44:26
SPEAKER_01: But it's been a long road of learning.
44:28
SPEAKER_00: Right.
44:29
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
44:30
SPEAKER_00: And I so appreciate your thoughtful response that you didn't just knee-jerk react, that you took the time to really put together words even though they were hard to find.
44:40
SPEAKER_00: So thank you so much for that.
44:42
SPEAKER_00: That was beautifully done.
44:44
SPEAKER_00: So for the last question, I'd like to ask you if someone is listening and still or viewing and still asking, what is wrong with me?
44:55
SPEAKER_00: What would you want them to hear today?
45:00
SPEAKER_01: We said it, I think.
45:02
SPEAKER_01: When I read uh Dr.
45:03
SPEAKER_01: Bruce Perry and Oprah Winfrey's book, What Happened to You, it shifted the language for me as well.
45:08
SPEAKER_01: And it might have been around the same time I was discovering community with other adoptees.
45:13
SPEAKER_01: But Dr.
45:14
SPEAKER_01: Perry, after years of research, said the question when I when I am helping a child, a young person with intense severe mental illness, I no longer say what's wrong with you.
45:28
SPEAKER_01: I say what happened to this person.
45:31
SPEAKER_01: And I keep coming back to that is I would I would encourage an adoptee to say instead of every time I think what's wrong with me, which I thought for many, many years, could I shift to ask myself a different question?
45:48
SPEAKER_01: Could I shift and say what happened to me?
45:51
SPEAKER_01: And I see coping strategies that are no longer working for me.
45:57
SPEAKER_01: So where can I go from here?
46:00
SPEAKER_01: There's if if there's nothing wrong with me, right?
46:04
SPEAKER_01: Which we want to we want to believe because it's true, then perhaps I'm just asking myself the wrong question.
46:12
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
46:12
SPEAKER_00: Oh gosh, that's so good, Jennifer.
46:14
SPEAKER_00: I thank you so much for that and for this conversation.
46:18
SPEAKER_00: I think even just that last snippet that you just described, switching your perspective from what's wrong with me to what's happened to me is so unbelievably important.
46:26
SPEAKER_00: And then even when you, I'm just gonna say it, called me out a little bit on my language.
46:30
SPEAKER_00: I just felt so and no, I appreciate it.
46:34
SPEAKER_01: No, I wasn't calling you out.
46:36
SPEAKER_01: I was encouraging you because you have a lot of creative creativity.
46:40
SPEAKER_01: You have you have this entrepreneurial spirit, and there are gifts are gifts that we can get from our lines, our movement within the Enneagram map.
46:51
SPEAKER_01: So it's not all, it's not all about our liabilities, right?
46:56
SPEAKER_01: There are assets even in our stress numbers.
46:59
SPEAKER_00: Ugh, yeah, and that was so good for me.
47:01
SPEAKER_00: I needed to hear that today.
47:02
SPEAKER_00: So I very much appreciate that.
47:04
SPEAKER_00: So, friends who are listening and watching, if something in this episode resonated for you, if you heard your own patterns being described, maybe even for the first time, I want you to know that's not an accident.
47:18
SPEAKER_00: That is recognition that you are having.
47:21
SPEAKER_00: That's clarity beginning.
47:23
SPEAKER_00: It's not certainty, it's the beginning of awareness, and awareness is enough for today.
47:28
SPEAKER_00: If you want to go deeper with Jennifer, you can find her on Instagram as What She said through your lens Enneagram.
47:36
SPEAKER_00: And I will obviously have that in the show notes.
47:38
SPEAKER_00: And she offers a 30-minute consultation to explore whether the Enneagram coaching is a good fit for you.
47:44
SPEAKER_00: And all of her links will be there that we talked about.
47:47
SPEAKER_00: And as always, if something came up for you in this episode, you can DM me on any of my socials and you can schedule a conversation with me as well.
47:54
SPEAKER_00: And I'd love to connect with you and talk about where you are and how I can support you as well.
48:00
SPEAKER_00: And if this podcast has meant something to you, a five-star review or a few written words such such as this was great, will go a long way in helping this work reach more adoptees and those who love them and who need to hear that they are not alone, like we talked about, because you're not.
48:16
SPEAKER_00: You're never alone in this.
48:17
SPEAKER_00: And my phrase that I love to use is stop outsourcing your belonging, insource it.
48:23
SPEAKER_00: And I'll see you guys next week.
48:24
SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much, Jennifer, for being with us.
48:26
SPEAKER_01: You're welcome.
48:27
SPEAKER_01: Thanks for having me, Julie.
48:28
SPEAKER_00: Great to have you.