Niklas 0:00
As an image type, we can have an idea of actually being emotional, in some sense, but there's a huge difference between this and what comes up from here. You know, it's really profound to me that there was a time at which I actually discovered there's an autonomous heart organism within myself, that is, that is, you know, apart from all the stuff that I imagine myself to be,
Josh Lavine 0:27
welcome to another episode of what it's like to be you. I am Josh Lavine, your host today. My guest is Nicholas Wilkins, and this show was just amazing to record. It was pretty mind blowing for me from the point of view of view of just learning about what it's really like to be a two, I've never heard a two speak with such a high degree of precision about their own inner world, and from a place of having worked through enough of his stuff to be able to see it with very high fidelity, one orienting idea about type Two for the newbies out there is that type two, the passion of type two is pride. And what I mean by that is not a sense of like I'm so cool, or a sense of taking pride in the work I do, or anything like that. That's more three territory. The pride of two is more I'm here for you and any aspect of myself that doesn't conform to a self image of being perfectly selfless altruistic, offering everything from pure motivations of love that is suppressed out of my consciousness and I can only see the part of me that is loving, and it takes the virtue of the two humility to welcome and See and accept all of the other parts of me, which my my ulterior motives and my shadow and all these kinds of things. One other distinction that's going to be important for this episode, if you're new, is the idea of object relations. And I'm not going to give a very long thing on this, but the fundamental principle is that object relations is the most basic arrangements of the ego structure, as the Enneagram defines it, there are three types of object relation, attachment, frustration and rejection. Basically the why it's called Object relations is, when you're a baby, you the subject, have a relationship with the primary objects of your life, usually the parents or other adult figures that are taking care of you, and that relationship between subject object can take on certain qualities or affects. One is attachment, one is frustration. One is rejection. Attachment is the fundamental idea that I am trying to adapt myself to get mom or dad's attention, frustration is, Mom, you're kind of not doing it right. Dad, you're not doing it right. And if only I push the right button or convince you or squirm around enough, then maybe you'll do it right. And rejection is is basically, I need something for mom, but she's not doing it for me correctly. And so instead of being frustrated, I basically just cauterize myself from needing it at all. It's like I cease to believe that what I what I once needed, is on the table, and so I fundamentally surrender to a reality in which it's not available. Type Two is a rejection type, and that piece of the Enneagram has always been interesting and a bit of a head scratcher for me, because seems to me that they're sort of adapting in an attachment way to going out and meeting other people. And so that's something that we explore a lot in this conversation. And it was really, really revealing. Nicholas has some really amazing stories about this, how he woke up to these patterns in himself, and I think this conversation really speaks for itself, so I'm gonna leave it here. And without further ado, please welcome my friend Nicholas. Welcome everyone to another interview. I'm here with my new friend, Nicholas. And Nicholas is a humanistic death psychologist who lives in Germany. He's been exploring the Enneagram for 14 years, and he uses it in his work with clients. And I think I'm just going to leave it there, actually, for now, because we have a lot to dig into. So welcome. Hi. My favorite question up front is, what's it like to be introduced?
Niklas 4:22
It's always a little funny, because the orientation points you mentioned are a direction, but they never represent who I am in total, and that's fine, and so I'm just glad people know kind of broadly what to expect?
Josh Lavine 4:43
Yeah, cool. So when I, I started doing the show not too long ago, and you reached out to me on Facebook and said, basically, Hey, I've been working with the Enneagram for 14 years. I'm a psychologist. I can talk about being a two in high resolution and. And our first conversation was amazing, and you delivered on your promise. So I'm really excited to to dig in and thinks about being a two as a projection type and all these kinds of things. But I'd love to start with just, can you share with us your Enneagram origin story, including all of the, all of the the ways that you thought you were other types, and how you discovered you were two, and everything, all the whole story,
Niklas 5:29
all right, okay, um, I discovered the Enneagram within a course for non violent communication, which is an approach to foster human connection within oneself and to other people and actually find and create intelligent solutions for differences. And those people had my trust, so I was open to an approach that upfront would have seemed to me like something, pigeon holing people and reducing them to certain stereotypes. And I wouldn't have liked that if, if there wouldn't have been that background. And on one afternoon in California, I had this experience of being pointed out in certain qualities people have, and differences and and it was for the first time that I actually could be believed, that People could see the world and themselves from a different angle. Up until then, I would have probably thought that they were lying if they didn't have the same problems as I had, no I had this I had this idea in this image, that actually everybody has these image problems, and everybody has, you know, everybody hides behind a mask and they don't really show up for who they actually are. Within my teenage years, I had been a fan of a radio show that's local to the area around my hometown, where people could call in the night from 1am to 2am and talk about everything anonymized. And that was something that, to me, seemed real. And in this realness was that that's where I got the Jews from. And actually I assumed everybody is actually looking for that, and and, but they all never admit to it. And for with the Enneagram, it was plausible for me that there could be other type structures that actually create a different experience of oneself and the world. So that was the beginning. And I have a long journey of switching between perspectives on my type, and I have arrived on two around two years ago. And I think in the beginning I thought it was six, which is my hat fix, and then I thought four for a while, and then five, and I stuck with five for about 11 years, or something.
Josh Lavine 8:37
That's on a lot, that's a long time,
Niklas 8:39
that's a long time, right? Yeah, and, and then the the the two came up within a therapy session where I where I read a section from Suzanne stabiles book to a client of mine about the two, and when the client left the practice, I started to weep because she had Suzanne stabile had, had described the experience with, uh, she's a to herself, so that's got something to do with it, probably. But she did it with a compassion and with a clarity that I hadn't heard anywhere else. And and the funny thing is also that from the perspective of my mistypings, when I looked at the Enneagram and how all these different types felt to me, the two was the one that I which is a tell. I didn't think this is a type. I thought the two is what humans are actually like.
Josh Lavine 9:50
Wow, interesting. Yeah, okay, I relate to this actually being a three from the three point. Okay, totally get Yes, yes, so
Niklas 9:58
I couldn't get. My head around what the two structure would be, apart from what I took to be basic description of human nature.
Josh Lavine 10:10
So good, yeah, I totally get what you're saying. Yeah, yeah.
Niklas 10:14
So the mistyping has an influence on what you think the value of the Enneagram could be. Because if you think what, what? The whole time, I always thought, Okay, if I am a five, there are certain aspects of it that that work, and the Enneagram can elucidate that, and can describe who I am. And I think the way it did that was to describe the rejection dynamic, okay. And apart from that, it's not very useful, or not that useful, and only when I discovered that I am a two I could see the whole power of it. I could feel it, because then I could believe, okay, if two is actually a type structure, then it's not a description of basic human nature, but just an aspect of it. And then the other types are really, really different from that, and, in that is basically the journey that that you have, that I went through, towards something where I could see, okay, if this is a type structure, what is basic human nature, then you know that. And I cannot answer that question, but that's sure that's open, yeah.
Josh Lavine 11:44
Was that question disorienting for you, or is it even now,
Niklas 11:52
the question what human nature is?
Josh Lavine 11:54
Yeah, like, let me say it differently. This point you're making, I think, is really profound from the point of view of when we discover our type, in a sense that that itself is what reveals that typology is real, because it exactly yeah, because it cuts out from the to use a cliche, sort of the pie of human consciousness, like your own slice. And it's like, oh yes, it's actually possible to be another type, yes, where I totally relate to what you're saying when I you know, even, even in the days after I discovered I was a three, still, I think sneakily, had a suspicion that everyone actually related to precisely my experience, and was really hiding themselves in a certain way, like I had been. But then, you know, to talk to an eight, for example, and just to realize that that's just not their issue, you know at all. It's like 30 whole years away. It's fascinating. And then that question of basic human nature becomes, this is not an Enneagram question. I'm just curious, from your point of view, does that did that become just that become disappointing?
Niklas 13:05
No, not really, because there are a couple of things that I learned from non violent communication that still help me orient myself today, and there are a couple of other frameworks that help, among them, integral theory and various developmental theories that that kind of frame how people relate to their basic human needs and values. And I think those needs and values are something that are that is universal, independent from type structure. But the way we approach them, the way we relate to our needs and values, the way we what we do to meet them or to to protect what we have those that can be very different, yeah, and diverse, yeah. So that orientation still stands, and discovering too helped me, in a sense, to wake up from bullshitting myself, that this is the only way things can be and and there are a couple of other things that I stopped. I had to stop bullshitting myself about because those are core to the two type structure, like, what? Well, I couldn't convince myself anymore that everything I do is just out of selfless love, and that was really hard, because I Because believing in that image has a very stabilizing effect, and when you stop believing, when you notice that. That this is bullshit or this is just a partial truth, then the stability falls away for a while, and when I discovered my type and I started weeping, I actually didn't stop until the end of the weekend, and that was about three to four days, and I was shaking because of this shit. I don't know what, where's my foundation now, and another aspect was that I had convinced myself I am, in a way, so special and a part that people need to be special themselves in order to be able to help me or nourish me, right? And in a sense, that is still true, because my sensitivity to what's going on is sometimes very challenging to people, and within the framework of my own family, I've been very difficult sometimes to to get along because, I mean, I on, on the one hand, I get along very well with people, but that's within my type structure, And when I want to break out of that, I confront people with with what I observe and what I don't like and and that can be very challenging, because it's usually something that people would have to start reflect on themselves so they can give me an answer that is actually sufficient. You know, it's stuff like you looked you looked satisfied there, but I don't think you really were what's actually going on. So, you know, probing questions that that have to do with my six fix, where I start to doubt, or I express my doubts about what's actually going on, and try to get a clear perception of the situation. And, yeah, so I need somebody who's able to meet me there. And but that played into the two structure, in the sense that my needs are somehow special, and people need to go way longer than usual in order to meet me. And there was a certain kind of pride in that too. You know, I am able to provide that for other people, but they are not able to provide that for me. And there's a profound sadness in that, which is also something that came up when I realized it, because it's very isolated in a way.
Josh Lavine 17:59
Yeah, this is, this is, we're getting into the territory of two as a rejection type. I just want to name that. And real quick, can you just, can you frame up your whole typing? Social self press, go ahead.
Niklas 18:13
I'm social self press, right, two, wing three is probably the heavier wing, and the tri fix is 269,
Josh Lavine 18:21
yeah, okay. And so this idea of being a rejection type, this is something that was really fascinating to me in our original conversation around maybe just to frame up my own point of confusion, because I think it might be instructive, is it's like, how is the two not an attachment type? It's like they're trying to get in there with people. You know what I mean? And, and, and there's and they're reading needs and stuff like that, in in a way that I sort of think on the surface, that I can relate to. You know, I'm also reading people. And this is partly the social lens. This is also being an image type and being sensitive to how people are reading me and all that stuff. But some distinctions you made around, like, actually, I'd love for you to just your language is really precise about this. So love just hand the mic over to you. How do you how do you experience being a rejection
Niklas 19:18
site? Well, the the interesting paradox I perceive about too is that the whole awareness circles around love, while actually not being able to connect, which also could be construed as attachment to disconnect. And I've been, I've been wondering about this too. You know, especially when I see my traffic with six and nine in it, and, okay, there is a lot of attachment in it, yeah. But the difference is, as I see it is when, as a two I relate to people, I focus. Focus on, where is the juice, where is the vulnerability in the other person? What can I offer to that vulnerability? And it gets really interesting when I meet other twos, because that doesn't work there, you know, because they do the same thing, and they project also an image of somebody who's really interested in love and in connecting to my stuff, and at the same time not being really there. Or, as I like to put it there is a wall and that that only becomes apparent when you actually try to get close to the two. When you get to a certain close closeness, then you then something shuts off, and there's a numbness to it also. And, the numbness has to do with, well, at least, I can speak for myself with being scared of the experience of not having any resonance. So when I if I were to open my heart, if I were to express what's inside and what's vulnerable within me, the expectation is there's nobody. There, nobody home. I talk, I express, I relate, and the other person is practically not there. And in my within my inner work, I've come so far as to recognize that that must have been my experience as a child. And I kind of, I must have decided that I won't go there anymore. Yeah, and and rather focus on serving the vulnerabilities of the other person and letting warmth and love flow there and the secret hope is that the flow of love will be reflected back to me.
Josh Lavine 22:30
Yeah, but there's a paradox I think I just want to put my finger on here, because it's, it's like this, this very preciously held desire for love and connection, and also the absolute uh, I'm gonna use the word suspicion. It's just not strong enough though you know that that it could exist at all. It's like, this is, this is part of the rejection dynamic, I think, is not just not actually believing that it's on the table exactly, but, but there's this, there's this funny hope, fullness, or something in the two. Or at least it's, it seems that way. It's like, this is part of the two's automaticity. It's like, I still go out to you anyway. I don't believe that it's possible, but I'm gonna just go out actually. Just go out anyway.
Niklas 23:23
Yes, yes, yes. That's the paradox. And within my internal space, I like to call this the hope machine.
Josh Lavine 23:36
Okay, yeah. And the
Niklas 23:38
hope machine is is sucking up every, every part of hint or evidence that could point to this can actually this could actually happen this connection, but it's more like a gather evidence and evidence and evidence, but I don't start to open up myself to actually be able to experience it, right until I become consciously aware of that. Yeah, yeah. So up until the point where I think I mean becoming aware of my, my type structure was very important for this, because without grasping this, this paradox, it was actually not possible to talk about this. I you know, if you had to ask me, So what's your relationship to love and connection, then I would have said, I'm all for it. I'm the expert. And I recall, you know, I am in a long process with a woman that touched me very deeply at this at this spot, without me having no clue how she did it, and I and the journey is about finding that out too. And I recall a point at which she comes. Fronted me, and I, I really, I actually said, you know, I think I'm the expert. I know how this works. I know how you address needs and how you try to figure out, you know, using non violent communication, for example, how can we resolve differences and all that, but I overlooked the the difficulty I have with receiving it, and also people who are in that position of trying to show me their love can feel very insecure because of that, because the resonance doesn't happen, and then they do not sense that they actually arrived here. And when that creates insecurities, my type structure can react with pushing in more love and, you know, pouring it more, and it's all like a desperate attempt to create this reflection that I was referring to. It's you, you pour out love, and then something comes back. Yeah?
Josh Lavine 26:14
One thing that comes back? Or, sorry, I don't mean to interrupt if you're on,
Niklas 26:18
yeah, well, but, but that's the point. What comes back is, hopefully the same kind of love that I poured out, yeah, with the with the advantage, from the point of view of the touch structure, the advantage is I don't have to notice my own pain around this, this, this issue, okay, it's it circumvents my the need for actually opening up. And that's what twos avoid. Okay, they avoid to to confront the the hopelessness and despair about not really believing that love and connection are actually possible. Yeah,
Josh Lavine 27:08
it's that makes a lot of sense to me. Yeah, sounds horrifying.
Niklas 27:14
It's horrifying. It is and and therefore the it can be, it can feel like an addiction to love other people. It can feel like, Oh, I just want to, I just want to get to the juice. I just want to see your sweet vulnerability and cater to that and and help you discover it and help you love it too, because that way I can feel the juice without having to go into my own despair. Yeah,
Josh Lavine 27:42
this brings a lot of clarity to why. I mean just speaking to the the the difficulty of receiving someone else's love, it's like if someone, if someone pierces through that membrane or image, or whatever you would call it, that protects that inner space. It just feels like even the slightest touch of that would be overwhelming from the point of view of, I mean, it just shatters the entire worldview that this is impossible. You know what I'm saying and Exactly, yeah, not only that, but also to get through that membrane itself, you have to push through the what. There's some word that it's like, it's like, schematically, almost, here's where I'm at. It's like, there's this, there's this very deeply, unconsciously have belief that this is impossible. Someone pushes through the membrane to get inside and runs, by necessity, runs up against that pain, that hopelessness, and so the very act of someone else loving you triggers that hopelessness and and to get past it, you have to kind of, I don't know what like, what's it like? What's it like for you, if someone, when someone gets past it, or the process, the process of someone even trying,
Niklas 29:15
I love that question. I
I've I've run into big trouble time and again when that happened because the the unconsciously helped believe that love and connection are impossible also protects me from feeling that despair, yeah, and when somebody manages, however that happened, and sometimes, or most of the time, I really didn't notice it, or I couldn't actually grasp it, and that was disorienting too. But when that happens, what I need is. Is attention, awareness, empathy for the pain. It's like, okay, now you have penetrated the membrane. Now I am actually in touch with what's behind it, and now this is like an explosion of feeling, of anger, of disappointment, of yearning, of sometimes lust, too. And where, where do I get the space where this can be held?
Josh Lavine 30:38
Yeah, and
Niklas 30:41
the instinctive reaction would be, please help me hold that to the other person sure who actually managed to penetrate the membrane. Yeah, so this would be the first person that I would address with that, and usually they were not prepared for that. So that was really tricky, because, you know, it was again, this disappointment of, okay, now you see me, now you now I actually get to feel myself. And again, there's no space for me to to unpack this and to actually discover it and feel it and name it and and this has been the the theme within my own therapy that I do for my own development, where, where, slowly, this space, this conscious space, could be expanded so that I can do that myself, okay, that I am not dependent on the person who penetrates the membrane to also hold the space for everything that's behind it, uh huh. But that's been a difficult journey, as you can imagine.
Josh Lavine 32:08
I can imagine, yeah, I just want to name a couple things I'm that I'm resonating with as an image type. For me, there's also, like, if someone penetrates through, it's a different quality of image or energy that I'm projecting that someone has to, has to kind of penetrate through, to see into that gooey, exposed, single heart nerve that if someone touches it, It's like, it feels like some infant part of me that that's so sensitive. I mean, it's more sensitive than anything else in me. I mean, if you think about like a parts work system, it's like, this is the, I don't know, four month old baby or something that is. It's just so utterly raw and and I also relate to if someone shatters through the image and then exposes that, and then there I am. If they don't have the capacity to be with me in that state, then it actually re triggers the whole type structure, and then the whole like, what was shattered reconstitutes and glues itself back together, and then there am, I mean, and it may might take an hour, because having been shattered takes a minute to reconstitute, but it almost feels like there's Something just absolutely existential and essential that kind of wants to happen there from the point of view of that relationship, and what I mean so, and I'm curious to hear your point of view from this as a as a therapist, it's like, it kind of feels like, yeah, on the one hand, there's the relationship I have to that Part. There's also the the continued disappointment that someone else can't be there with me while that part is triggered or can't be with that part. And I've had conversations with, for example, other coaches or therapists who I've gotten really close to as friends. And it's this funny thing that happens in coaching, coach, Coach friendships are very funny because, you know, sometimes we accidentally slip into coach mode with each other, and we're kind of open to it in a certain sense. Or at least, maybe here's a way to put it, making this about me. Now, I'll go ahead and keep going for a second. It's like, as a three I have this image of, oh, I'm a person who does inner work. And so if someone presents to me like a coaching prompt, then in that moment, if I'm not watchful of myself, I sort of slip into like, Oh, I'm a good I'm a good patient mode. And then boom, this thing is shattered. What's happened in a couple of situations is i. Um, if the person keeps pushing, and I've been and I've been shattered, um, then it actually ends up being trust destructive for me. And, yeah, you know. And I've had to have conversations with people where, if, if that happens, if I go there, then I need you to be I need you to pump the brakes and just like, hold me. Yes, you know, yes. And so there's something about like, there's some deep therapeutic point I'm trying to make here around on the one hand, there's the relationship I have with their own part, but there's also the hope, or the the potential, the therapeutic potential, of having someone else be there with me too.
Niklas 35:37
Yes, I I would like to respond with an image I like to use for for these kind of processes where intense emotions come up, and there's this sort of holding capacity that we have for what's coming up. And this capacity is not fixed. I think it's both subject to development. It can grow, and according to our daily state, it can vary as well. And when somebody penetrates that, that membrane, as we said, and probes into the both juicy and vulnerable and sometimes undefined stuff that comes up. Sure, then there is a there's a limitation of what we can digest at a time, yeah, and if somebody doesn't respect that limitation, and by respect, I also mean is aware of, you know, I I've been in the situation you've been you just talked about, yeah, both as a coach and a coachee, where, where I went beyond that threshold and pushed and pushed because I wanted to make a point or I wanted to get things clearer. And I've also been on the other side where, where there was an agenda in my counterpart, and that went beyond what I was able to digest at the moment. So and the digestion is when, when the actual, real emotions come up. And I I say that within the framework of an image type, because as an image type, we can have an idea of actually being emotional, in some sense, but there's a huge difference. And what comes up from here. You know, it's really profound to me that there was a time at which I actually discovered there's an autonomous heart, organism within myself, amazing that is, that is, you know, apart from all the stuff that I imagined myself to be, oh,
Josh Lavine 38:13
my god, totally Yeah, it's great, yeah. That's a beautiful, yeah. It's beautiful language for
Niklas 38:18
it. And in one, one instance where this came up was with birthdays. I have a lot of trouble organizing my birthdays because birthdays, I don't have to offer anything on birthdays other than myself. So within the framework of rejection time, we can say this is a, I don't know what to do with that. And the last time I was talking about this to a very good friend of mine, and he he is a therapist as well, so we have that kind of relationship. You were talking about, yeah, and, and he wanted to be with me on my birthday, and he pushed me to actually get clear on what I want there. And he was so charming because he started with, okay, so if I hear you correctly, you you would actually want to use the motto I'm not there on your birthday. Yeah. And I noticed, okay, my heart says yes to that, yeah, yeah, that would be great. I'm not there. I don't want to be there. So and from there, I could actually feel into how it feels like to to be valued and cherished for being myself, and that people are willing to come just because of that, and what I've discovered throughout the years is that this is so scary to me, because on my birthdays, when people do not come, or have any kind of reason for not coming, it feel it really feels like a rejection from our. Side and I'm vulnerable. I cannot protect myself anymore because I cannot tell myself there's something else going on. I make this immediately about me, and I don't want to experience that, and that's why I don't like birthdays. And the emotion that comes up on those instances is way different from what I usually experience. It's, it's raw and it's intense. And there are, you know, there are aspects to it that I don't know how to name. And so it's, it's overwhelming, and in within a therapeutic context, it's very important to keep track of that, to keep track of how much is the conscious awareness right now, able, willing and ready to digest? Yeah, yeah, because there's a limit to it.
Josh Lavine 40:53
Yeah. Well said, yeah. Okay. Slightly different question, but similar topic, one of the things that I'm curious about how you relate to as a two and as a two in a as a two therapist is, how do you experience the two impulse or compulsion, you might say, to go in and sort of get be inside the psychological space of other people. And let's see. The question I'm really trying to ask is, what do you need to watch and yourself to be careful of? Yeah,
Niklas 41:41
there's, there's one issue around being a therapist that helped me a lot with that, and that is, I'm trying to get the the English word I have the German in mind. It's like, you have to get an assignment from somebody you have to have. They have to have a give you. They have to tell you what they want. And this has to be conscious, because when the client doesn't tell me what this is about, my type, structure, agenda might take over, and then the only thing that I care about is where the juice is okay. So I meet this person as a therapist, I get the permission to explore the psychological space. And if there's, if there's not a clear agenda on the part of the client, I'll use my own agenda as orientation, yeah, and that is to get as much juice out of it as possible. And, yeah, yeah, go ahead. I Yeah, that's a good question. I mean, you know, when you see people's vulnerabilities they use, you see their in some sense, you see their beauty, yeah, because this this fragility, this, this, it matters how we treat each other. It matters whether we are careful, whether we are honest, whether we are mindful of the needs that everybody has that matters. And I've I'm thinking about somebody asked me, you know, we are vulnerable in spaces where it makes a difference whether we are treated with love or not, and this connection that comes up that is possible when, when I see your vulnerability, and I noticed that the way I treat you matters to you, that that nourishes my heart. This mattering nourishes my heart. And I yeah, I put it, put it next to the alternative of of a world where people are numb and stabilize themselves by by cutting things off by dissociating. And in this world, this doesn't matter so much, because people are numbed off and you cannot reach them, okay, but this connection, where it matters how I treat somebody that gives me juice. That gives me nourishment, yeah, and that's what I'm looking for. But the thing, when I don't have the agenda on my screen, what the other person is actually here for, and what the limitations are of what we just talked about, of this space, how much of themselves can they actually bear then I might, you know, I might go somewhere where they are not prepared to go, and that's what I have to watch,
Josh Lavine 45:30
and what happens when, I mean, I don't know a lot of people that have the clarity or courage to be able to say what they need,
Niklas 45:38
right? And that is a that is an issue, but I've come to I've come to learn how to discern that there are unconscious agendas, and there are people who have no agenda, or who are not ready for the work. And I discern that by feeling tension within myself when, when you come into my practice, and I notice there is an issue, I can feel it through a certain kind of vital tension that I can feel here in this space. Sure, and I might not know what it is, I usually don't, but I've come to trust this sense. Okay, okay. And so when I tell people that I'm interested in why they are coming, then I also offer that it might be that they have no clue, but we can explore it together, because, according to my sense, there is something there. And, um, and there are times where this is not the case. So it's not just my projection of, ah, there needs to be something so I can get to work. But there are times in which people,
well, it's like it feels flat. It feels like there is no they're good, or they're not interested, or they're that their aliveness is somewhere else, on other topics, or on practicing something. I mean, this can happen after a while, after a good deal of therapy, and then we come to a plateau, and then we notice, okay, what we've been talking about is kind of resolved, and what's going on now, and, oh, it's actually fine. We can stop here. So those are the possibilities. And now that I'm talking about it, I have another answer to your question. What I need to watch? Yeah, okay.
Sometimes or in, especially in the beginning of my practice, I noticed how I tended to use people for for evidence, for my hope machine.
Josh Lavine 48:10
Wow. Okay, this is that sounds juicy. What do you mean? Okay,
Niklas 48:13
I mean I, I so somebody comes in and it's a different, difficult situation, and there is a huge there are a lot of traumatic backgrounds to it, and I try to prove to myself that this is not a hopeless case. And I do that actually to soothe myself, yeah, because if I don't manage to solve resolve this case, whatever resolving means, but you know, helping this person, then maybe my own situation as a child was hopeless too, and that cannot Be and I cannot accept that. Oh,
Josh Lavine 49:01
that's interesting. That's, that's where you went. I was expecting it to be something like, If you can't resolve it, then it means your, your, your mechanism doesn't work.
Niklas 49:17
That's, that's a step in between. Yes, yeah. So my mechanism doesn't work in that and therefore I cannot expect anybody's mechanism to work.
Josh Lavine 49:30
Yeah? Well, by mechanism, actually, what I'm meaning is, you mean the type structure I what I mean is your your intervention strategy, like, okay, which, by the way I would in this context, given type two, type structure, it's like that is you from the point of view of the type structure, yes, yeah, you know,
Niklas 49:51
I don't work,
Josh Lavine 49:54
yeah, exactly, exactly, yeah. And that's the heart center worthlessness, feeling that
Niklas 49:59
exactly. Who am I if that doesn't work, right? Yes, there you go. Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, yeah. And, if that doesn't work, and that's, I think, behind the type structure is the is the experience of despair and hopelessness that I was talking about, yeah, and, and, and, you know, as a child, we don't have ideas about space and time and about change and about different circumstances. We we don't know how to get different parents. We we have to make make this work how it is. And, therefore, when something doesn't work, it feels like endless despair. And I think at the core of the type structure, it's always this, and I I haven't thought it through for every type, but I find it a safe bet to say, Okay, if my type structure fails, what what remains? That's an interesting question.
Josh Lavine 51:08
Okay, yeah, yeah,
Niklas 51:14
that's probably where we get into a territory of being really present, because then we can okay what comes up, and what do we really have to deal with when that fails?
Josh Lavine 51:26
Have you ever had a moment where you felt truly in contact with the essential quality of love or connection, or however, whatever word you'd put to it? I
Niklas 51:43
Yes, I have, and I would like to to answer with two, two versions of that. There's one version where, where I have this, this, this delusion of grandeur, of, of, we could say, being super Jesus. Okay,
um, where I get a sense of of this, this power of this power of love that is really there, you know, the type structure of two. What it does is it represses everything else. Uh huh. So when twos talk about loving somebody and actually doing this out of selflessness, they are usually honest,
Josh Lavine 52:54
right? This is I love this point, yeah, yeah.
Niklas 52:57
They are honest because that's all they are aware of,
Josh Lavine 53:00
yeah, that's right. That's right. And
Niklas 53:03
I think in our initial conversation, I talked about a client who's a two where I could observe from a distance, this, this split between image and what he's actually doing, because he was, he was suffering from a divorce, and he was so disappointed that all his efforts for the family were not recognized and and he was insisting that this was all safe selfless. And at the same time, he came up with moral indignation about this not being reciprocated. You know, in one half of the sentence, he said the one thing, and in the other half of the sentence he said the other Yeah. And I was like, yeah, what? You know, what? What are you talking about? Don't you notice the contradiction? And he didn't. He really didn't. He was, it was like a split and switching between the one and the other. So what the type structure does, it focuses yourself on, on the power of love, and that fuels the hope machine that I was talking about. And you really, you are really just connected to the impulse to serve and to nourish other people. That's all there is. And it's a beautiful state, okay? It's something you can that's what I why I use the the word addiction. You can really be be intoxicated by that and and then, and with that state, I can get delusions of grandeur where I have the idea, okay, all the stuff that I learned and that I found to be effective with other people, I will find the platform, and I will pour it out to the world. World, and everybody will be happy and take it in and and this will be a merrier place to live. So these things have come up. And in some sense, this can be used as a vision, and it can, you know, it can be authentic, it can lead to somewhere, but it usually didn't, because my insecurities about being disturbed in this image were too great to actually try something. So it stayed. It stayed that way. That is one version and the other version, I would say, has happened when people really did see me and describe how they saw me in a way that encapsulated my vulnerability but also my strength. And that's, that's man, that's the reason to be here. I think,
Josh Lavine 55:59
well, yeah, yeah. It's amazing to hear that, and particularly after we had that whole conversation about what it takes for someone to penetrate through the exactly membrane. And yeah, hmm, I have my experience of you as a human being is that you have remarkable ego transparency, like you have your you have this beautiful language, and the the subject of your interior is object enough that you can sort of move it around and shape it and see and see it from other angles. What helped you? What has helped you with that, how did you arrive there?
Niklas 56:50
I am forever grateful to Marshall Rosenberg, who founded non violent communication, mainly because he he gave me so much courage to actually get transparent. He and and he comes from this stream of humanistic psychology where others like Abraham Maslow or Fritz Perls or Carl Rogers also come from yeah and and the hope and the courage that I gained from him was, however deep I go within myself, I may trust that there will be something reconciling coming up something that is helping me love myself more. And I mean by that, not, you know, flattering myself, but really loving myself in all the strengths and weaknesses and and that is something that has been with me since then, and of course, in the first couple of years, that was more like a rumor to me. I really didn't know that this was true. I hope that he was right. And, you know, for for a time, this was like, kind of like a, like a religion to me, you know, yeah, where I also was a little bit fundamentalistic in trying to persuade people to treat me this way, and this is how you need to treat me and other people too.
Josh Lavine 58:37
That's interesting. Real quick that might, that might be a social self pres thing to or in the sense of, like, this is, these are the rules of engagement. This is how you do it. You know, you're the 10 Commandments. I can present the tablets to you. This is what it is, yeah, yes. So just to name that, but go ahead, yes,
Niklas 58:57
yes. It could be, yeah. It could be related to that and it's, it's the hope is, you deal with it, and then I'll feel better.
I mean, obviously this isn't a childish point of view, and it is what a child actually needs from a parent. You know, you deal with it and I will feel better. Yeah, and, and one way to phrase what psychotherapy can do for us is to become our own mothers and fathers, to have the awareness that we would have needed from our parents for ourselves so we can treat it, treat ourselves this way and so, non violent communication and this, this consciousness, helped me a lot. And through the people who did that, I came to Ken Wilber and integral theory and and. Um that helped me to understand differences better between levels of consciousness, but also between types. And the Enneagram came close to that because, you know, Ken Wilbur also talks about types and as as a fundamental metric of how to differentiate how people are and and understanding where people come from is helpful to me, so that I do not take people's reactions personally and think that them not taking in what I have to offer as a reflection of my worth or value, yeah. So that helped, too. And then I engaged in this program where I got my license as a therapist, yeah, and, and because of the humanistic background of this institute. I felt right at home. I had no struggle to feel belonging there. I had the sense of okay, we are working on the same thing here, and we are more or less open to work with ourselves so we can become transparent to what's actually going on and and within that program, I also had my own therapy, which continues until today, with a psychoanalyst, and it's so amazing. You know, in the beginning, I was way more in the image and in my head, yeah, about everything I was talking about. And throughout time it was, it became possible and easier to just be with my spontaneous emotions while I was in the therapy setting. But there was, there was hard work to get there, because in the beginning, I was way too scared to do that. I wouldn't actually have known how to, you know how to open the membrane so this can come out.
Josh Lavine 1:02:15
That's a profound Yeah. Thing to say, right there is the way that an image type and your your language for it before was really profound too, just that there's an autonomous heart organ exactly separate from this very powerful filtration system that you have around, yes, and actually not more than filtration, it's it actually shapes your emotional life. Is this image that you're the self image you have yourself, right? And so to to get in contact with a present moment emotional process, like any of the process oriented therapies, like parts work or focusing, or somatic based, or whatever like, to actually get in touch with what's quote, unquote, really going on, you know, outside of the purview of that image, that which is, which is, you know, the way you constrain yourself, that feels like a very powerful intervention point. And it sounds like that was, you experienced that in therapy, doing that
Niklas 1:03:16
I did, yeah, and in my analyst, she's very patient and very she. She never pushed for anything. She's curious. She She also asked me whether what the parts of me are that do not trust her or that are actually thinking, What would she do if I were to come out, you know, beyond this filtration system, if she were overwhelmed by that or somehow insulted or offended in some way and and to be able to talk about that allows me to to just to be there without being vigilant of the result of of what I how I show up. Yeah, and this is probably good description of an image types proclivity is, you're always vigilant. Yes, you're always vigilant. And even as we are talking right now, I am vigilant. Yeah, of how the people who will watch this, what kind of image they will create of me in their head and whether this could be dangerous for me? Yes,
Josh Lavine 1:04:44
I have that too. Yeah.
Niklas 1:04:49
I figured, yeah, and, and there is a perspective in which there, there only needs to be one person who. Who's hostile to what's what I present here, and the whole world feels hostile to me. It's like there's a all or nothing thing going on, and it's hard to differentiate. Okay, how dangerous is this really? You know? How what? What can I expect from just one person finding this stupid or or arrogant, or whatever might come up, you know. But a part, a very young part in me, doesn't differentiate that. It just says, fuck, it's dangerous. I need to shut up and shut down. Yeah, you know,
Josh Lavine 1:05:36
Dude, I gotta say it's amazing to me how much of this I'm relating to, it's like, I mean, the whole thing, the parts where you're speaking about, specifically, the two, is a little more distant for me. But I mean, our type structures are overlapping in a pretty significant way, also social. Yes, I also have three, not, well, I'm, you know, 396, and you have all three, yes, your Bermuda adjacent, basically, right as a Exactly,
Niklas 1:06:02
yes, I'm a wobbly Bermuda, yeah.
Josh Lavine 1:06:08
But, man, that whole thing of the vigilance is such a beautiful word for this, and it's a word actually normally associated with six, but words at Slippery meaning, when we talk about the inner world, there is totally a vigilance when it comes to image types. I experience that in a very profound way. And maybe even a, you know, a hyper vigilance with the social dominant thing, because it's like, exactly, I'm just reading like, these very subtle micro expressions. Or even, you know, a word in a sentence can be placed in a certain way. And I can be like, does that person? Does that person like me or not like me? That's that's all just happening in an unconscious level. And there's something interesting too about what happens in when, when that settles down, like in moments of a conversation. I've experienced here too is just speaking with you and being engrossed in the content and just experiencing your energy and just being connected. It's like some of that dies down and exactly yes or a flow state. And that actually maybe is, could be a definition of flow state for image types. It's like when Yes, when you lose sight of the image,
Niklas 1:07:19
yes, and yes. I like that, yeah, yes, yes. And it feels like, Can I trust this flow enough that the rest doesn't matter anymore? And when that happens, then, then I'm in a good connection, right? In a situation like this, you know where, where there's a publicity to it, yes, yeah, yeah. And when I'm just talking one on one, of course, the space that I have to survey is way more limited, and then it's easier to to trust that this is okay. Yeah.
Josh Lavine 1:08:00
One, more concrete question around image this, this conversation is making me think about image slightly differently, or at least, or have a more nuance to it, like, I think the the word image evokes like a picture or a portrait or a frame or something, and there's a there's a sense of an image type, just just the language. It's like there's a way that I think somehow in my head, I've been trying to square, like people have a specific image that they're trying to attend to or prop up, or something like that. And partly what I'm getting is that there is specificity, but also the image, and maybe I'm speaking as a Bermuda type here, but there's a there's a way that the image is not actually in high resolution or definition in my head, but there's a way that if someone, someone's response to me? Could it? Let me say this way, it's very easy for me to sense when someone's response to me threatens the image or doesn't like the image, but if you ask me to find the image, it'd be very difficult. Yes, I'm curious if you relate to that, and it'd be interesting actually, to speak, I'd love to do an image type panel, actually, just to have that kind
Niklas 1:09:27
of Yes, yes, that would be wonderful. Yeah, um, you, at one point you, you mentioned the question, How is to not an attachment type? Yeah, and part of my own answer to that is the image of two is specific to being loving.
Josh Lavine 1:09:59
Yes. Okay. That makes sense. And I don't
Niklas 1:10:01
think that's the case for three or four. Yeah, it could be for three, but only within a context that values being loving, yes, yes,
Josh Lavine 1:10:14
okay, filtiness, yeah, that makes sense.
Niklas 1:10:16
So the context dependency is is specific to attachment types, yeah, and, and for me or I, I as a two, experience this in every context I there is not a context in which I would not want to appear as somebody who, who is, maybe, let's say, I mean, I like the image of a psychotherapist, because, you know, I provide something, and I'm deep, hopefully, and I there's some Wisdom to it. There's some interesting discourse. There's heartfelt connection, there's depth and and I can help other people to discover those qualities within themselves. Yeah, yeah, so my profession really matches the image quite well, but there are parts of my profession that that don't work quite well with that image. For example, I need money. Yeah, yeah. And sometimes, you know, when patients forget to pay me, and then they come and pay me, and I said, Oh, come on, I don't do this for the money. And of course, this self ironic, because, yeah, I mean, I fucking need it anyway, but, but it's not part of the image, okay, yeah, and, and, there are a couple of other things I need to write reports, for example. And I have a very hard time doing that, because I do not get the juice of that. Yeah, and and, and I also have to get into a position that might not be at all loving. It might be more judging and more, you know, how, how do I think will this go? And maybe I could come to the conclusion that this is a hopeless case, and I cannot help them, and I do not want to deal with them, you know, because it's too difficult. And I have, I have enough troubles in my private life, so all these things don't quite fit into the two image, yes, and, and I have trouble admitting those to myself, so in a moment when I'm overwhelmed or when I'm less conscious, it might happen that I go along with stuff that I don't I shouldn't go along with, just because they cater to my two image and so so This, I think, is specific, and when I get into a different context, like a party, for example, then I do not adapt to what they find valuable. I only start to open up when the context in which what I have to offer is does appear as valuable, then I start to talk. So usually, yes, parties are, you know, I do not like them, usually, because the inner life isn't the usual topic on parties. Yes, you know, I mean, there are, there are people, there are hippies, for example, who go on to tantric community events or something, and they like that kind of stuff. And that's where I like to be, because then I don't have to work for this context to appear. But if it isn't there, I usually remain silent and just withdraw a little. And, okay, I don't want to impose myself here, yeah? Because that's, of course, this has happened too, that I imposed myself, and that wasn't pretty. And so, so I could, you know, juice up my image, but and feel secure within the social context, yeah. And so not to do that means I remain silent and and wait till something comes up.
Josh Lavine 1:14:28
Yeah, although that itself is first of all social dominant awareness and also possibly the Bermuda adjacent try fix. I mean, if your traffic was different, you might be more willing to impose yourself or be less? Yes,
Niklas 1:14:41
yes, yes, yeah, if there would be an eight in it or but 7872,
Josh Lavine 1:14:48
yeah, what you're saying in the same in this, there's a kind of reciprocal to so there are parts of your therapy profession that don't fit the image at the same time being a therapist. But outside in the world you know is its own image and right? And you touched on this a little bit, but I'm curious about like, have you found yourself accidentally in situations where you find yourself slipping into therapy mode before it's wanted, or you find yourself offering it to people kind of accidentally,
Niklas 1:15:23
yes, all the time,
Josh Lavine 1:15:26
by the way, I relate to that actually myself as a as a coach, but yeah, the three Well anyway, but yeah, I'm curious from the two point of
Niklas 1:15:36
view. The The thing is, um, there were times where I was quite desperate about this, because it is, you might, you might say it's therapy mode, but to me, it feels like I'm following the flow. I'm following the interest here. Yeah, you know, you tell me something, and then I want to know precisely what you mean. And the first question to towards this precision could also could already be construed as therapy mode, just because I was interested. You know, yeah, and the what's probably a good way to protect myself and others from that is to is to check whether the person's own awareness is broad enough right now to carry the the topic that we're talking about. So you could probably ask me like you are doing now. You ask me about things that are quite deep, but my awareness is broad enough to hold it so you you don't have to be afraid that I fall apart while you follow your
Josh Lavine 1:16:54
interest. Yeah, and there's obviously a receptivity to those questions in this
Niklas 1:16:58
context. Exactly yes, yes. And the context is, yeah, the context has already set the the boundaries and the purpose of why, why we are talking about this. And this kind of orientation is already, you know, it's also, it's reassuring, and in the party context this, this is different. We, you know, we have not set those purposes and boundaries, and then this can, this can derail a conversation or something, right,
Josh Lavine 1:17:38
right? Yeah, is there anything else that we haven't talked about or touched on with the two that you want
Niklas 1:17:51
to bring up?
I still feel, feel some juice about this thing that that I mentioned before, that the twos are honest, but unaware of what's what's beyond this idea of love, okay, And because I relate to the experience of being accused of of manipulating. Yeah, I recall a time at which i i made a really thoughtful birthday present to a woman that I was interested in, and she had kept her distance and and when I had found the idea of what I would like to give to her, I felt this kind of intoxication. And I felt this, oh shit, yeah, great. I found it, you know. Now I got her now, now she, she won't be, she won't have any choice but to open her legs and her heart and, and, and it, you know, it's so it's so crazy to to remember how convinced I was of the lovingness of this, yeah, and then I gave the presence to her, and at first she was delighted, and then she noticed, uh, shit, something feels off, and what I got to understand not right away. At first, I was just I was just hurt and embarrassed and all that, and I what I understood. Was that the reason this feels terrible to people, or can feel terrible to people, is that I give so much love into the relationship and force the other person into a position where for reciprocity to occur, this person would have to do the same, okay? And maybe the other person isn't ready to do that for whatever reason. Yeah, so me not taking care or not being aware of this kind of imbalance, yeah, puts the other person on the spot, and that doesn't feel good, generally, right? It's a pressure, yes, yeah. And from within the type two structure, this pressure feels like security,
Josh Lavine 1:21:00
the pressure that you're putting or the pressure that they feel,
Niklas 1:21:03
that they feel, because, you know, without the awareness, without without imagining, okay, how would I like to be pressured into reciprocating without that awareness? This feels like, okay. Now I got something on you. It feels like leverage. Wow,
Josh Lavine 1:21:20
that's amazing. This is, I mean, this is one to eight. You might say exactly
Niklas 1:21:26
yes, and I will never, I mean, within the tap structure, you it would be difficult to impossible to to conceptualize this as leverage, because leverage is the opposite of being loving, that doesn't work, you know, yeah, as an eight, you might be able to sell that to yourself, because you're the boss, or you you know what you're doing and you know, but, but as a two, this you have to hide that from yourself, yes, but you Do it anyway, because it feels like the only thing that guarantees that people stick around, right? Okay, yeah, because, if we could recall, the two does not believe in real love and connection to carry such an interaction. So we have to offer something, yeah. And, and this offering needs to lead to an experience of, I have to reciprocate so that it works, yeah, okay. And this interaction and this this mechanism is not conscious, and that's why twos are honest when they say they do it out of selfless reasons. And at the same time, I think in our initial conversation, I told you how creepy Jews can seem to me, and they seem creepy because of this. They seem creepy because they put you in this position where they have leverage on you, and they don't even admit to it, and you have to find this out for yourself so you can actually name it and say, I do not want this. I want a reciprocal relationship in which we follow the flow of what occurs naturally and not because there is an idea of how this should go and how this should be, where I as the counterpart, I play a role that you have assigned me. I do not want that. That is what's creepy about twos.
Josh Lavine 1:23:37
It's a yes, this is super vivid and high resolution, how you're describing this. And it really, I mean, for me, excuse me, it brings up the point or the question around what it really takes for a two to see this, or what it you know, the the sequence of inner work or development for two feels like you have to, I mean, just, just having this put in your face, like, if someone, if someone, were to name it, you're like, Hey, I see this. You're doing this, you know. Or I don't feel comfortable here, that it's like there's no place for that to exist in the two psyche unless they cultivate in enough capacity to see themselves that it can land somewhere, you know, yes, and that's fascinating to me. And so from the point of view of inner work, or like the first, the first leverage points in its in its whose inner work, I guess it just it brings up a question for me, like, what, what do you do? Or how to, what, what motivates it to, to do inner work and, and what's that? What's that first piece that gets, I don't know, awaken or something like that. I.
Niklas 1:25:05
Uh, well, this experience that I just related was this woman was important enough to me, and still is that I had to figure this out.
Josh Lavine 1:25:21
Yeah, you had to figure it out. Yeah. I had to figure
Niklas 1:25:23
out why she reacted this way, and why this didn't work.
Josh Lavine 1:25:27
So the question arose in you, why didn't this work?
Niklas 1:25:31
Why didn't this work and and at this point, I didn't know about the two yet, but when I, when I discovered it, I recall that this fit perfectly into what the two type two structure does, yeah, and, but she was, she was, she has been both nourishing My heart. She kind of went behind the membrane okay, because she is, she is so transparent to me that I can feel her heart almost instantly, okay, and that, that that is, that is an incentive, you know, right? Yeah, it's very attractive. How can I? How can I to connect with that? Yeah, and um,
and she gave me constantly feedback when I was off, she rejected everything that didn't come from here.
Josh Lavine 1:26:48
Wow, that's amazing. Okay, yeah,
Niklas 1:26:51
and you can imagine how painful that was at times. Yeah, she withdrew sometimes, and she was not available, and she didn't explain things to me, because she had her own issues and but she rejected everything that didn't come from here, and stayed interested anyway.
Josh Lavine 1:27:14
That's, that's like a major statement that you just made right there, and she stayed interested anyway.
Niklas 1:27:19
And she stayed interested, yes, yeah, and I stayed interested too. I think I have a lot to thank for in this relationship that that helped me bring this out, and and it looked at times to be fruitless and hopeless. And you know, why do I care anymore? But, but this point of, who am I here, and why does she get behind the membrane, and what is she referring to when she rejects something and when she accepts something, that's what I wanted to figure out, right? And because there was so much juice and vitality to it, so, so that was the incentive. And then, I mean, I have my different tools that I mentioned. I have my own psychotherapy. And I I, I you know, I could also figure out the the the relationship between what's happening here and what happened with my parents and all that so but, but I think at a certain point, of course, like you just implied, this kind of confrontation would have been too much. You know, I because the whole self image is rests upon this idea of, if I am loving enough, eventually the thing I need will come about, right? And if you take that away from me, then there's just only hopelessness left, right, right? And that's unacceptable, of course, yeah, yeah. Even if I were to recognize this to be true, I wouldn't be able to live with it. So at a certain stage of my development, this would have been the case, right? And then if somebody would have said that to me, I might have left and dismissed the person in some way.
Josh Lavine 1:29:35
Yeah, this is amazing. This conversation is really, really amazing. It's clarified so much for me in terms of the two and yeah, I find your language around the stuff to be so accessible. So I just really thank you. Yeah,
Niklas 1:29:52
thank you.
Josh Lavine 1:29:53
What's this like for you? What or what has this been like for you to have this conversation?
Niklas 1:29:59
Juicy? Well, because I feel the two of us have been in the same space of exploration and excitement, and I notice the difference between the recording and how we do it privately is very well framed with the vigilance. I feel that too interesting. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And that is always something that I need to be aware of when I do something publicly so I can still stay centered and but it's fun. It's great. It's on the edge of what I'm exploring myself, and I am grateful for your questions and being able to make this contribution Cool.
Josh Lavine 1:30:42
Well, thanks again for doing this. I really appreciate it. I'm excited to release this and perhaps have people learn from it.
Niklas 1:30:49
Yes, me, too. You.
