A Student/Teacher Enneagram

I’ve extrapolated a student/teacher enneagram based on one that JG Bennett laid out in Enneagram Studies. His had to do with training a professional singer. As Bennett’s enneagram of a gifted pupil working with a dedicated teacher unfolded, I began to see this enneagram applying to a teacher of the Work and his student.

Bennett’s enneagram is looked at in three “terms,” each starting at points of the triangle: 9-1-2; 3-4-5; 6-7- 8. The Receptive Process, the Reconciling Process, and the Affirmative Process, a 2-3-1 triad.

Enneagram Receptive Process

Like the singer who is gifted with a promising voice, a student of the Work discovers they have a magnetic center which draws them to search. Their search (point 9) leads them to connect with a teacher who introduces the work at point 1.

The student may think they are experiencing the work, but nothing has transformed in them yet. Meanwhile, the teacher is assessing the student. If he sees that she is willing to take the work seriously and make efforts, he accepts her as his student.

With the enneagram, we see that the teacher must move from point 1 to point 4 (commitment) to take the student from point 1 to 2 (engagement). Thus, the teacher is really entering the enneagram at point 3, where the inner work begins, initiating the second, reconciling process.

The student, at point 2, has agreed to put herself under the direction of the teacher. She is given tasks and themes and practical work to learn the ideas. The glamor fades, the inner and outer work begins in earnest. The student may get discouraged and even question the teacher although she is still dependent on him.

Enneagram Reconciling Process

When the student finally “tastes” real Work, she enters another phase at point 4. This grants the teacher a move as well, back to point 2. The Work has entered the relationship. Now it can be pursued actively even though the teacher can’t orchestrate it, nor the student attain it by herself.

From point 2, the teacher looks towards point 8. He knows the student can work, but he must assess how far he can take her. Once he does, he brings her to point 5, where the Work can truly enter the student. This is a difficult stage (the dark night of the soul) and needs both the student’s commitment and the teacher’s guidance.

Point 5 is where the student begins to see herself as she is, works with negativity, sheds ego and self-will, and opens the feeling center. She begins to discover what personal work, and “real Will” is.

Enneagram Affirmative Process

At this point in the student/teacher enneagram the roles change. The student needs a broader experience of work. She can no longer be solely dependent on one teacher to grow. The teacher is at point 6, and must allow something outside of himself to enter, the Great Work.

Both the teacher and the student move together from point 5 to 7. If the teacher has done his job, the student now recognizes what work is and knows she cannot “do” it. The teacher realizes he can no longer teach her. However, he has traversed this path and can shine a light and give council as she finds her way.

At 7, the student/teacher relationship is complete. The teacher returns from point 7 to 1, to assess a new student.

At point 8, the former student enters her own work, pursuing her own study, joining or forming other groups or discovering other teachers. Just as the mature singer allows the creativity of her voice to move through her, the practitioner manifests by serving the Work.