David Gray 0:00
What is it like to be introduced? Um, well, I mean, I can, you know, watching myself be in line, I kind of know what to look for as it's happening, so to speak. Um, it's um, it's unusual. To sort of be specifically located. You might say,
Josh Lavine 0:27
welcome to another episode of what it's like to be you. My name is Josh Lavine. I'm your host today. I'm speaking with David Gray, my friends and a very brilliant and fascinating Enneagram type nine. There are a couple things in this conversation that are somewhat advanced and from an Enneagram point of view. So I want to just give a couple of orienting ideas up front. First is that the Enneagram nine types are based on your centers of intelligence. Those are the body, heart and mind. Now, if you're new to the Enneagram, what's very important to understand is that these are not Woo, woo, intellectual abstractions that live in some ethereal place. They're actually very real, lived experiential realities, like, for example, right now, you are having a bodily experience, whether you're watching this video or listening to this podcast, when you're whether you're aware of it or not, you're having a bodily experience. Sensations are alive in you. You're also having an experience in your heart sensor, meaning you're having emotional experience or a sense of your self image and self worth. You're also having experience in your mental center, meaning you're having thoughts that are arising without your with or without your conscious awareness. Thoughts are happening in your mental center. The Enneagram, nine types are fundamentally based on how we are inhabiting each of our centers, or how we use each of our centers in an unconscious way. The body center is about boundaries and our autonomy and sovereignty as a physical organism. The Heart Center is about our identity and self image and sense of self worth, and how we see ourselves and how other people see how we'd like for other people to see us. The mental center is about how we navigate life, how we way find, how we decide or determine what is trustworthy and true. Type nine is a body type, and in the body sensor, we have types eight, nine and one. And as we learned last week, type eight has a kind of over solidity or density in the body sensor. And type nine, you might say, is the opposite. There's a sense of diffuseness. And can lean, can can sort of unconsciously become boundarylessness, the passion of the nine in the Enneagram is sloth. And I think of sloth in terms of, I think of sloth as a kind of preemptive exhaustion in a heavy heart. It's not like laziness where, which is where, how it's most commonly understood. It's more like a way of slipping into autopilot and not fully having my hands on the wheel of my own life, kind of being a little bit seaweed in the tides of my own life, not really bringing my not fully self inhabiting and being self possessed and making decisions to move my life forward in a way that needs I want it to move forward, more like kind of going with the flow. By contrast, the virtue was engagement, which is the opposite. It's basically having my hands on the wheel of my life, taking initiative, going after my life's highest priorities, and actually funneling life force into the things that are most important to me. So in this conversation, we explore what it's like for David to be a nine, and we also get into one of his concepts, or not his concept originally, but a concept that he's really shepherded forward in a profound way, the tri fix, meaning that you have not just your core type, which is going to be a type in each in one of the centers, you also have a type in each of the centers. So for example, even if you're a type nine like David, you also have a way that you show up in your heart center and a way that you show up in your mental center. And mental center. And so three, the constellation of your three, your body type, heart type and mental type, is the tri fix. And David's tri fix is 974, so we discuss a little bit of what that means for him. One other thing I want to share up front is that my conversation with David had an effect on me in a body way. It's kind of like as a three, my own inner engine is revving me up to kind of go, go, go. And as a type nine, David's energy is settling him down, and that actually had an effect on me. So throughout the conversation, I found myself settling and landing and kind of equilibrating to his harmonious chill vibe, and I'm curious if you experience that. I found it very beautiful. So without further ado, let's get into it. Please meet my friend David. Welcome everyone to another interview. I'm very excited here to be with my friend David today. David is a has been in the Enneagram world for a really long time. He's an Enneagram OG. And my experience of you is that you've had a lot of really interesting, original insights about the Enneagram and like for example, you discovered this collage typing system for the instincts, which I'm interested to get into a little. Bit here. I also know that you are interested in some pretty esoteric stuff, like you've mapped the instincts to a symbol called the baba chakra, which we might get into as well. You also have a website called eniacite.com where you have that's kind of like your own material, which is really interesting. And your writing style sort of shines through Well, obviously, because it's your own stuff, and there's also any grammar.com which you're part of, that whole team that does typing services and is also producing kind of fresh, interesting content, modern, fresh content on the Enneagram. So I'd love to start with one of my favorite questions, which is, what is it like to be introduced?
David Gray 5:46
What is it like to be introduced? Um, well, I mean, I can, you know, watching myself be in line, I kind of know what to look for as it's happening, so to speak, it's, it's unusual to sort of be specifically located, you might say, if that makes sense. I mean, that's an abstract statement, but, but to, yeah, I'm, my consciousness, if you will, is, I mean, I'm, I consider myself a pretty self absorbed person on One level, but at the same time, you know, I guess my energetic sense of myself is sort of as having a wide field and, and I'm not particularly, I guess, you'd say consciously identified into and some of this stuff could even be, like, cognitive type stuff, but I'm not as identified into like, here's where I live, here's what happened to me in my life, and here's what it did to me, and here's what you know, how I frame up, you know, all my different experiences into me, I'm sort of more in an abstract space consciously. As far as you know, my sense of myself is like to me. What what's more interesting would be, whatever concepts and ideas I might have or that are new, original, interesting, fresh and haven't been seen before. So, so, and it's a quality as a nine that I have, the sense that, on one level, you know, I have an ego about what I've discovered, sure, but also at the same time, it's kind of like anybody could have found it, you know what I mean. So to the degree that you're localizing me, so to speak, into David Gray, who did X, Y and Z. That's, it's a weird just sort of, I don't know, I don't fully know how to place it and hold it
Josh Lavine 8:30
really. That's, it's, this is so interesting to me. Could you share us with us? What is your Enneagram origin story? How did you land on it, and what spoke to you about it. And
David Gray 8:44
so I'm a musician. Yeah, I'm a musician. I've been playing guitar since I was 13, and music's really important to me. When I was in my early 20s, I think I was 22 we had a woman, actually was our drummer who was really fascinating, interesting person, a social self, Pres four with a five wing. And I was talking to her and my other bandmate, we were a trio at the time, about numerology, and I was talking about the number four coming up for me a lot. This is very typical of my tri fix 974, it's very mystical, magical, right? I was having all these coincidences with the number four popping up too many times kind of thing, right? Like something's coming at me, some kind of message or something, and I mentioned it to her, and for, for whatever reason, to her it, she was, had gotten into the Enneagram over the last few years. You know, this is way back 30 years ago, um and uh. And she loaned me an Enneagram book, and I just assumed that the intention there was for me to look at type four, because I was having all this four stuff, right? And so I looked at that. And, you know, there was some stuff that was I could see. But then when I read the nine chapter that was obviously the one that was me. And so that started the journey. And it was, you know, it was I caught on fire with it at that time. And sort of, yeah, I found every other Enneagram book that I could that was out at the time, and started devouring it. And
Josh Lavine 10:48
you are and obviously over the years, you've developed your own insights about the Enneagram and your own perspective, your own kind of subjective way of encapsulating it. And you are writing something, are you writing? Still writing your book?
David Gray 11:04
I am. I'm still working on the book. I've got good framework and, well, really, I've got like 500 pages. I'm gonna chop it down. That's but that's about just, realistically, that's about 250 pages of text. My My stuff is requires, my ideas require, in my opinion, a lot of visual components in order to express certain things. Because partly being a body type, being a gut type, I'm some of my concepts relate to things that have kind of movement happening in them. And so you need to just depict, depict that visually, rather than trying to describe, you know, this goes to here and so forth, or this is connected this way and so on. So, right, right? But, yeah, yeah. Um,
Josh Lavine 11:59
so one thing, one thing we talked about in part in the context of the book too. We were, we had those calls. We were kind of like shepherding this book into existence together in some way. And it was fascinating to me to kind of play in that sandbox with you, from the point of view that it's like this, this abstract inner space that you inhabit as a kind of way of being was running into the issue of actually localizing and constellating itself in the form of a book. And the process of writing the book, the process of getting it on paper and giving it a structure, was and maybe still is a challenge for you. And I wonder if you could talk about that, what that's like, and why that's hard and and actually, if you even agree with my phrasing of it, if you put your own texture,
David Gray 12:55
uh, yeah. I mean, that's a good way to frame it up. Um, the main difficulty, and this is a, perhaps a nine difficulty, and it might even, I might even bring in my seven fix, in my try fix into this. But one of the main difficulties is that the various concepts that I've come up with that are unique to me are connected all in different ways and or they have some overlap to them. And so then, where do you start on a given thing, and which things are the baseline elements to lay out for everybody, so that I can build towards some of the more complex. And not that it's particularly complicated or whatever, but you just need to have some baseline elements and and in, in one case, it's, it's literally the elements, because one of the things that's, I'll call it a discovery or an association that I've made is with the instincts and the classical four elements of fire, water, air and earth, right? And laying that out and relating those to the instincts, social is air, self preservation is Earth and sexual as both fire and water. And there's a whole universe of stuff that spills out from using those symbols in that way, and it just pings so many different things. You know that then I. You start internally, you know, just wanting to ping around to all of them all the time. You know, as I'm maybe trying to lay out a baseline, I start going to all the other stuff, right? So it's, it's partly 70. And I think there's a thing with nine. I think nine is actually a kind of add, you know, in quotes, in its own way, because it's because it's, well, it's partly that non localization thing, where you're you're spread around, sort of energetically. So it's so coming back into this central something to do X in a straightforward way, it's difficult to gather yourself,
Josh Lavine 15:51
yeah? Gathering the gap, yeah. That's a good word for it. Gather. So what helps? Yeah,
David Gray 15:59
um. What helps us to simply start writing, for example, and, and and, and putting down some bullet points. You know, just before I say, start writing a paragraph or several paragraphs of what am I saying right now? Like, I have to remember what I'm saying, like, or, you know what I mean, or why I'm even starting to write this, because I'll just start going, yeah, yeah. It just starts turning into meandering something, right? Yeah. So no, what am I saying? Okay, what am I saying? Okay, yeah, go back to this, that, that kind of thing so and then I mean, and that's a piece of of nine, is that kind of rambling Ness, where you start going, getting into your own rhythm of this path that you're going down, you know, in written form, and you're just grooving on this sort of inwardly Speaking bodily motion that you're going towards, right? You're it's a kind of internal because I'm a gut type, I'm a body type, but a withdrawn gut type, right? And so withdrawn means I'm sort of doing body internally a lot, all the time, which is the sense of this, I'm just going, I'm just going, right now, internally, right So, and it has this kind of So, in the context of the introverted space, I guess you'd say of writing, you know, it has that kind of rambling, kind of like it could be a forever saga, right? Yes, yeah, yeah. Well,
Josh Lavine 18:06
one thing I'm curious about you, about what the from the perspective of being a nine, is that there is this way that nine sometimes gets painted as, like the the harmonious, all containing sunny type that sort of is embracing all things, and I see that in you, but I also see there's a way that your kind of aura or essence is shrouded in some kind of mystery. And there's like, like, when I first met you, you were wearing, like a almost all black, and there was a way that there was like a self containedness to you as well. And so mixed with what I experienced from you is the kind of the grounded, kind of friendly, welcomingness that is nine, which is almost surprising given the initial impact of your impression on me. Do you have a way of First of all, what's it like to hear that for me? And also, what's your inner experience of that? How do you reconcile that?
David Gray 19:14
What's it like to hear that from you? Well, just you're describing me. So it just, I mean, I don't There's nothing bad, or you know what I mean, or it resonates what you're saying, and that's other people's experience of me. So, yeah, no, and I sometimes attract some attention because of that sort of mysterious piece, you know, well, I mean, you're partly describing, you know, intentionally or not, the fact that I'm my instinctual stuff. Tracking is self preservation, sexual, so I'm social, blind, yeah, and then I've got seven and four fixes, and, you know, the four likes, that kind of hidden, half hidden mystery, and you're not going to get all of me, and that's going to pull people in kind of quality, and it's going to be dark. You know what? I mean, it's and spsx is dark again, using my elements. Social is air. Air gets you in the sky and sunlight, right? So you take away, you take nine, which is this big, wide, open thing, generally Sunny, right? And put a social, blind, social last, instinctual stacking, and it is somewhat of a significant, a significantly different nine in a certain way, because, because I'm kind of not connecting on a lot of the social I don't know buttons, so to speak, I'm just not, I'm just not tracking a lot of most social stuff. Yeah, so yeah. And then, because I've got seven and four, seven and four as types, are very self involved types, and so that's another aspect to me, is you'd even say with seven and four, they're self indulgent. And other ideas along those lines and and almost like decadently self indulgent, you might say, and so to be a nine wanting harmony, which is a reflex for me, for sure, but with those fixes, it's just a it's a different kind of coloring and a different kind of way that it comes out. And yeah, it does. It creates a different kind of nine from somebody who'd have other stuff in their full typological mix, right? I don't know. Just answered all your questions. It
Josh Lavine 22:24
does. And just to give some context for people who don't know what we're talking about, try, try the fixations. You're talking about 974, it's like you have a body type of mental type and a heart type in your tri fixation. And so you're saying nine is your body type, seven is your mental type four is your heart type, and that constellation gives a particular flavor. And then you add that with the instinctual stacking, which is self preservation, sexual for you, social, last. And so that was, that's a whole other universe of thing, which we could potentially get into, but that also adds a flavor to the way that sure a person is Yeah,
David Gray 22:58
and and you could say about the try fixes, such as mine, 974 that those are, that's almost kind of like what you're alluding to. It's, it's somewhat of a whole set of types you know unto itself, or not exactly unto itself. But it's, it's they, they, they, they make a certain kind of archetypal they congeal into a certain style, or good files, you know, yeah, yeah.
Josh Lavine 23:31
And actually, on your any site, com, you have your own sort of framing of this. And it's, it's different, but sort of, I don't know it plays nicely with the way that you also are part of the big hormone Enneagram podcast, and you guys came up with your own language around the tri fixations. But it's kind of separate from your thing, the any site, com thing, and anyway, so just letting people know that's another way to interact with you to see your stuff there? Sure,
David Gray 24:00
yeah, and there's a, there's a booklet that I put out, just a, it's mostly a visual kind of guide. It's got some verbiage. It's where I'm putting little verb, little phrases and things for each of the combinations. Like, in the context of 974, you know, there's the line that's connecting nine and seven. So what happens when nine and seven are together that makes a certain set of qualities, and I'm describing that. And then what happens with seven and four? What does that mixture produce? And then nine and four and so forth, and so then, when you put it all together, you can kind of get a picture of what this style, how it expresses, and so forth.
Josh Lavine 24:51
One thing that's interesting to me is that this is not that widely understood or accepted as a reality in. Grim world, the idea of the tri fixation. I mean, it was any Chaz original work, but it's not really taught by any of the quote, unquote, major schools. I experience it as a reality, and you have developed all this original content around it. Can you talk about just what? How did you start doing that, and what made you go down that hole, that rabbit hole?
David Gray 25:22
Yeah, well, it was just having the sense that it was true. I mean, maybe, you know, being an intuitive person and being pretty self directed and so forth, it just resonated as making sense. I mean, one way to say it is if the Enneagram is real, if it's an actual, organic truth about human beings. And there are people that are core types, you know their main type is in each of those centers. It makes sense that each of those centers, in some sense, would only be able to stylize per in the way of the numbers in each center, like the heart center, is only going to be either two, three or four, and and so forth, and the heads 567, etc, so. And then every human being, of course, has a heart, head and gut center and so then, besides whatever your core type is and whichever center it's in, it's going to have a way that it stylizes in those other centers, the ancillary centers, or whatever you'd want to call them. So it just, it just resonated. And when I, when I first, you know, heard about the idea of it, well, it was another one where it just was obvious to me which ones would be mine. You know that I would be seven and I would be four. So, yeah, yeah, and, and because it, because it wasn't, I guess, difficult to find, or whatever, it resonated really quickly. And so it just, it was like, Oh, okay. And, and it, it just makes, well, human beings are so varied, it just makes sense that there would be, you know, a lot of options for how a given core type could manifest. And you know that there could be all of these different kinds of nines with all these other possibilities of try fixes and and with the instinctual stackings that make means you multiply all those times six, because there's six different instinctual stackings And and so forth. So it's it accounts for a lot of the variation in human beings. Yeah,
Josh Lavine 28:19
um, one thing that I want to dig into with you is your use of language itself, which I experience as having a kind of artistry. And there's a like, it's it feels to me like just observing you that words are a thing for you, like the way that a word feels, or something like that, and I wonder what's, what's your experience because, and also, the reason I'm bringing this up is because your descriptions of the try fixes, or even just your language here or on the podcast or wherever you're speaking, it has a kind of felt sense of resonance with whatever it is that you're describing, and I wonder if you could talk about that as a prompt. Yeah,
David Gray 29:09
I'm not sure if so. Where I go with that question is, I'm not sure if this is where you're intending necessarily, but probably, let's see, um, well, going in multiple directions internally. Uh,
I'm, first of all, I think with my type, my core type nine with a one wing, I think a lot of people, a lot of writers, are nines with a one wing. There's a fair number of famous writers. So there's a thing around words, you know, in part of the the underlying impulse there, I think, is a. Around harmony in the sense of, and then it's perfection with the one wing. So it's, you know, creating some kind of experiential landscape, right? Is a harmonizing effect, right? So, if all of my readers, if I'm a fiction writer, you know, there's a fair number of fiction writers that are lines with a one wing, you know, if everybody's sort of coming into this world that I created, that's a sort of harmony that I'm creating, I'm, you know, or it's at least, even if the world itself isn't harmonious, it's still we're all inside this circle kind of thing, and it forms an ecosystem. So but I think one thing you're describing about my writing, which is perhaps similar to other nines, I don't know, but is I'm wanting people to have a an experience in their body, of whatever I'm trying to say I and I'm wanting them to find it in their own bodies, and what that means is
in a you know, ironically, in a non verbal place in themselves. Even though I'm using words, I'm wanting them to experience the resonance of my experience of my ideas, you know, in themselves, and for those experiences, along with my words or Yeah, ideas to be kind of like seeds that can do their own thing and live under themselves, inside each person, and become all kinds of things that I never imagined seeing. Or you know what I mean? I'm wanting people to see this stuff for themselves. I'm not particularly it's flattering to have people that follow me and are interested in my work, and I have deep appreciation for that, but I want people to have their own really, ideally creative experiences in a way, right? And creative could mean even in the context of healing themselves, or something like that, or taking these ideas and expanding on them. And you know, some of these ideas are elemental, like the idea of the literal elements applied to the to the instincts and those as I've fleshed out, to some degree, those symbols, They continue to spin out more and more and more revelations about the instincts and so and and it and it, it casts more light and more impressionistic bodily experiences of what's going on with the instincts. And it's another angle to learn the instincts. But again, since I'm often at this sort of elemental level, figuratively speaking, it means, just like everything is made of elements. You know, there's all kinds of other things that are going to come from it that that wouldn't come from me. But here's an idea, you go, go forth and grow this in your garden. And I'd be curious to see what you come back with, what strange new plants that makes, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Josh Lavine 34:22
How much does the Enneagram and your involvement in it and insights in it and all this stuff, like, what percentage of your identity is that?
David Gray 34:40
Identity is a weird word, you know. First of all, it can mean a lot of different things, I guess, or at least several things. You know, just stating a theoretical thing for them for a minute. Uh, in the in the in the concept of try fix. It does matter what order like I'm 974, I could have been, let's say 947, and and that would mean, let's say that the issue of identity would be a little bit more forward and and more present for me. So what you can say is, in some sense, I'm as for, you know the I'm heart last, so I'm identity last, I'm image last, I'm I um, so and, and it as a gut type, it's really strange. I mean, I don't think I'm just speaking from my own experience. It's really strange. The idea of identity. I'm just being whatever I am. I don't know. I don't have a sense of, particularly, having an identity. I mean, on one level, let's see. I mean on the for the most part, is maybe a better way to say it. I understand that I'm associated with the Enneagram. I've had, you know, some prominence online, and now with the podcast and our Facebook group has a
decent number of people in it, and, you know, people, how hold me as some kind of in varying degrees authority. I hesitate to word use the word teacher, because I just don't see myself that way. But I, somewhat incidentally, am a teacher,
but, yeah, I don't, but I do. I would say my thing, so I'm trying to get to it. I'm circling around like a nine to try to zero in on it. I have an ego, I'd say about the ideas that I've found, that I've discovered things, associations I've made, that that have resonated with other people, the particular ideas that like, where a bunch of people went. Oh, my God. This is wow. This is interesting, right? This is so I have some ego about that, having come from me. But again, at the same time, it's pretty elusive as a nine to hold on to it. And really that's even a piece, I'd say, of being social blind too, because social has a lot to do with being in certain roles and and that kind of thing, and identifying into
whatever it is you're known for, or that kind of thing. And I kind of imagine myself as just being able to sort of slide around identity wise, whereas people probably have somewhat of a more solid people have a more solid sense of my identity than I do probably, yeah. Well, also
Josh Lavine 38:38
speaking of your framing earlier about the subjective way that we experience, the Enneagram, or anything life as a social, dominant, three identity, forward person. That's a, that's a really, like, I would be able to tell you the answer to that question. Like, I would be able to give you a challenge. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like, I'd
David Gray 38:58
like, I'd be interested to hear your what is David Gray's identity?
Josh Lavine 39:04
Well, actually, one of the so it's funny, we haven't even gotten a percentage yet, and I don't, I don't need one, but it's funny. It's interesting to me that that's the prompt was, what percentage? And that was what we got as an answer from you. And yeah, what's, um,
David Gray 39:17
I see I don't even remember the percentage part. So, right? Yeah, you're doing numbers like, where do I rate? Yeah,
Josh Lavine 39:28
yeah, well, so in the sense that's also a localizing question, right? Which is like it is, which, like, it's almost like it enters a specifier, yeah, it's like it enters your consciousness and just dissolves or just resolved?
Speaker 1 39:41
Yeah, I Yeah, yeah,
Josh Lavine 39:45
um, you got something?
David Gray 39:48
No, no, yeah, I'm just just a remark that I don't even remember that part of the question, right?
Josh Lavine 39:55
That's amazing. Yeah, yeah,
David Gray 39:57
yeah.
Josh Lavine 39:58
So. My apologies to you. No, that's okay. This is, it's what it's like to be you. That's what we're in. That's that's what we're here for. So, um, what else is going on in your life besides the Enneagram?
David Gray 40:13
I have a day job. I'm in the energy business on what's called a land man, which means I do research on land where different energy companies, whether it's solar, wind or oil and gas, wherever they want to do a project I research who owns the land. Because whenever a company does something like that, they're they're going to have to pay whoever the landowners are a certain percentage of the proceeds from the energy produced from that particular land. It's not something I'm particularly designed for, given my proclivities or whatever, but I can do it. It's, it's the kind of thing that that I can set my own schedule. It's totally independent, remote work, online research going into county records of databases and and so I, you know, I zero in for about an hour and a half or so, and then I take two hours break, and then zero in again for an hour and a half, roughly speaking, right? And I put in, you know, six to eight hours a day across, you know, from seven in the morning till 10 o'clock at night. You know what I mean? There's, it ends up being a few hours, and sometimes it's shorter than that, and, and, and I get a day rate and do all that, but yeah, I mean, we're also doing, I don't know if your question included this, but we're also from any grammar.com you know, we're, we're doing typing sessions where people come to us to be Enneagram typed and so. And there's a two other people that I work with on those and and then we do, as an adjunct, you know, Splinter thing off of any grammar. We've got Dark Arts Academy, which is where we're recording videos, where we're with the three of us, and we're typing celebrities and doing like a full typing, you know, their their instinctual stacking, their core type, and their tri fix and and, you know, kind of, it's a it's a personality profile, And you get to see how we approach it, and that's, you know, if you agree with our results, so to speak, of you know, how we see a given celebrity where, you know, it becomes, it's a teaching tool to show people how to type other people.
Josh Lavine 43:18
Yeah, I actually just subscribed after my conversation with Emeka, and I've watched like seven of the videos so far, and they're amazing. They're so interesting. Yeah, they're
David Gray 43:29
really right. You're liking it. Yeah, thanks. Yeah, no. And they're fun and funny. And we're, you know, we're horsing around and stuff. Besides being serious, it's a, it's a combination of being entertaining for ourselves as well as, you know, giving our actual and putting our Enneagram expertise into what we're seeing.
Josh Lavine 43:56
Yeah, and just so people have a sense. I mean, it's a, it's a real process that you guys do with each one. You you pull up the celebrity, you look at images, you kind of grok what your what energy is hitting you from the images. You pull up social media. You watch videos on mute, just to get another bit of energy. Then you watch the video again without with sounds and hear what, what actually the person's talking about. There's a way that, if it's a talk show, there's a dynamic between the host and the person. So there's a lot of information that you're it's it's real and it's grounded. It's not just like, Oh, I think this person is x. So I was, I've been very blown away by them, really, it's really cool.
David Gray 44:36
Great, great. Glad you're liking it. Yeah,
Josh Lavine 44:42
let's see where to go from here. I'm curious about So, yeah, this, this work pattern that you go into this, like, hour and a half of focus, hour and a half, two hours of break. What happens for you? Like, how. Do you know it's break time, and then when you're on break, how do you know it's like, okay, I can get myself back to work. And what happens on break? What's, what's the
David Gray 45:10
rhythm? Well, I should say, like, break is, you know, the other things that I do is, I mean, I do some long walks. I do, like these six mile walks, and I do, I often go on bike rides a couple times a week that are three to five hours long. So those are some of my breaks. Sometimes that's on the weekend, so it's not really trying to weave it in and out of work, but sometimes I'll do it on a work day and I can just continue working at night, yeah. But as far as you know, like when I'm really bearing down on the work and I can just tell when I start to drift and start to want to look at something else, so to speak. You know what I mean, the work that I'm doing, it's very dry and very factual, and recording basic facts about the history and or lineage of the ownership of a given property in a place, and it's that's just not me at all. So I I just know that about myself and, and it's partly I mean speaking, keeping it in any grammar terms, I am self preservation dominant, and it is about money and, and I want that money, right, and I and because I want everything that that gets me in terms of lifestyle and comforts and extras and all of those kinds of things. And, you know, there's something even to talk about, as far as accessing my blind spot, the social instinct, sure, where I also have to be kind of, I know from experience that I have to give some, what would you call it? I just have to put out, in some ways, socially, in a way, or that conveys, I mean, I really do think of it as conveying some kind of light and wholesomeness and goodness, right? Because that that sort of aspect, and that the common good and that piece of social because it really my tendency is to just completely withdraw and not come back into whatever's going on collectively with a crew of people and I've and that affects my social self pres, that affects my self Preservation, because it it starts to give a negative impression about me, and that threatens my job, which threatens my preservation, right? So anyway, but yeah, I just start to drift. And so I'll unplug, or I'll start to feel tired or sleepy or whatever, and I just, and I'm not, I can't I can see that. I can't concentrate. And so I'll unplug from from the work and go do something else. I'll play guitar. Also is another thing I'll do for an hour or so, and that kind of thing. So, and then, as far as coming back to it, I mean, there's usually some kind of deadline, you know, that's motivating and, and, yeah, the break from the work that burns itself out as well. And, and I do want the feeling of having knocked out a certain amount of work so that it's behind me, and I don't have that pressure feeling, because I don't. I don't want that jitter of having to do X, Y and Z on my project, you know, I want to get it passed. So, right, right, right. Yeah. So that's a motivator.
Josh Lavine 49:43
Um, I'm, I'm, let's see, what do you what do you get out of withdrawing? Like, what's what's yummy about that for you? Like, why is that your natural tendency, that you would left your own devices without other external structures? Go there.
David Gray 50:08
I have no idea.
What do I get out of with drawing? It's it's sort of like asking, What do I get out of breathing air? You know what I mean, what do I get out of withdrawing? I don't know. I'm just, I'm just a internal person. You know what I mean? I mean I ping off of things. I mean, some of the other things that I do that are non work, that are part of, let's say the breaks between work is being on Facebook and and sometimes arguing with people about Enneagram stuff. So it's not, you know, but, but that's somewhat in an introverted space, in this and partly in the sense that I start writing a reply to somebody, and I start getting into my own writing, you know what I mean? And I'm and I'm as much as anything interested in getting my own writing correct to me and articulating things in a certain way. And on some occasions, I don't know, one out of 10 or 20 times I might write something to somebody that I end up saving for my book, you know, that can be thrown into a certain spot. I mean, withdrawing is, you know, it's, it's peace for one thing, I mean to me, to me, human beings are a mess, you know?
You know, it's a way to get my own way without having to speak up to get my own way. I mean, I think, I think a lot of nines are much more withdrawns than fours, and fives are because nines because of what I just said, and it's why a lot of nines mistype, for example, as fives, especially on this withdrawal thing is because nines do need a lot of alone time, and it's because when you're with people, you are totally unintentionally absorbing some amount of their energetic field and any other human being is going to be somewhat of a disruption for you as a and it's and because you're a body type, and nine is a receptive body type, right? So you're like taking in, and so what's going on for somebody else is so much, you know, you're taken by it and it and so And yet, at the same time, you're a gut type, which is all about autonomy and kind of not being affected by others. So there's this, this battle in nines, and it's and it's sometimes why nines are seemingly completely shutting off and needing a lot of alone time. And it almost to some people, or in some context with a given nine it feels like an aggressive withdrawal to some people, because, and, and that's an interesting, it's interesting that it gets framed up that way, because, you know, the underlying, sort of substrate emotion for the gut is rage, right? So it's aggressive withdrawal, right? It's those kind of go together, in some sense, naturally. Yeah, and I wonder
Josh Lavine 54:03
if I answered your question. No, that was great. And I'm curious too about the relationship between what you just said and having deadlines. For, for example, for getting your book out, or for if there's a work thing, like there's a way I'm curious about the but my experience of nines is that there's this exquisite sensitivity to any form of pressure. And yeah, and so, well, yeah, as a What's that like for you as a prompt?
David Gray 54:41
So there's probably unconsciously, some degree of reframing the pressure coming from outside of me to do X, Y or Z work y. Realize by the fact that I'm creating my own schedule. I'm doing it in my own time when I want to do it, yeah, you know, in increments. And so that's a way to sort of bargain with my own typology, if you will, to get it done and to still be autonomous. Yep, is that I'm generating, yeah, my own pace and so forth. Yeah, what
Josh Lavine 55:32
about when you set your own deadlines? For, for example,
David Gray 55:38
the book I
um, well, I don't set my own deadlines very much about anything. Um, uh, I'm not. I'm trying to think if that's actually true. Um, but yeah, I think that's generally correct to say I did set a deadline for the book more than a year ago to have it finished by this past September. And it's not so that there's one answer, yeah. Okay, yeah. And it probably, it probably, I get hung up in self pres stuff, right where, if I'm worried about self pres things, which kind of never, in some sense, when it's your dominant instinct, it kind of never gets satisfied. And so you can keep, keep getting pulled into it. I'm sort of wanting a baseline and working on other business deals and things like that, to get a baseline of income so that I can take a year off and do the book, because having that distraction of concern around self pres stuff makes it to where I can't I just need to feel a big, wide, open expanse of freedom in order to concentrate on that book and finish it out.
Josh Lavine 57:11
I hear you. Yeah, yeah. Okay. One final general topic I want to explore with you is what inner work is like for you, and what, what have you tried, and what works and what is in that space for you now?
David Gray 57:32
So I would say that's pretty big topic. I haven't particularly been focused on inner work. I would say, however, over the last, especially last couple of years, it's I have tried a couple of specific modalities that I'll try to encapsulate, but the but despite describing myself as not really doing inner, inner work, the the bigger part of what I've done with the Enneagram is, and it, it is a kind of inner work, is watching myself be my type, and the more you're watching yourself be your type, the more you're you know can identify into, let's say, the part of you that's watching that isn't fixated into it, right? Yeah, yeah. And so you're getting some separation from being in the prison of it and and, you know, one of the big things for me that I realized early on, in my early 20s, getting into the Enneagram was the issue has a nine of having huge I would almost call it, unlimited amounts of repressed rage. And getting in contact with anger has gone through multiple phases in my life, and anger, really, or rage, you know, kind of like Primal Rage. There's a whole thing to go into around rage that's actually really fascinating, but it kind of it is the thing that does localize you for one thing, and it, and, and, and, you know, to the degree that I do have a distinct voice in the Enneagram world to to, you know, some minimal prominence, or whatever, and that I. You speak. You know I can do conflict and disagreement and you know all that stuff that comes of having new ideas and them not being accepted or whatever, and stand firm in where I am on those things and and again, have certain things associated with me that my connection and befriending of rage, you know, has allowed for a lot of that, you know, for for that, that that piece of in individuation, yeah, you know, a couple of the things that I've gotten into more recently that are actually more directly therapeutic. Is something called internal family systems, which I have heard of. Yeah, that's great. It's amazing. Actually, I actually did some really accelerated change work with that that has been that's, well, that's a whole conversation, but that has been significant for me. That's kind of completely, completely an exaggeration, but pretty much knocked out, like a whole big thing around, you know, kind of negative self critic stuff and stuff like that. And there's another one, family, constellations, yeah, and kind of energy work that's been done around that with another, with a different practitioner, that is a bit of a more abstract. I mean, internal family systems is abstract too, but this one's even more sort of energetic and somatic, I would say. And that has yielded a lot of results, again, that would, that would require a bit of a lengthy, you know, a half hour just to explain what that is and what it's like. But, yeah,
Josh Lavine 1:02:18
amazing. Yeah, I've actually wondered about your kind of combativeness online, and that is probably too strong a word for what it is, or maybe it's not for you. I don't mind in the context of being a nine and also putting these ideas out and then withstanding the heat, yeah.
David Gray 1:02:39
Well, so one thing too, just to you know, I don't want to be too self deprecating or something, but I mean, it's actually not all that uncommon for nines, for some nines to be combative online. And if you think about it in the context of a type that has the most repressed rage of any type, and you get in a situation where you're online and you can do whatever you want, essentially on One level, it's going to come out and, and often it's really, you know, my experience with nines, some of the biggest conflicts are with nines by a long Shot and and ongoing, and, you know, continuous. Yeah, just, you know, it's almost the never ending saga thing that I was talking about at the beginning, into rage, right? Because it's kind of like you're tapped into, it's like you're tapping into that elemental rage of the universe, if you will. You know the sun, the life giving sun, is billions, hundreds of billions of nuclear explosions, explosivity, right? Anger, and that's life, right? So in some sense, as as being this nine that's connected into, connected into the universe, or whatever, um, you can actually kind of channel that and and sometimes it's inadvertent and unconscious, and it's shadow stuff speaking in Jungian terms, you know. And so anyway, yeah, that's another conversation we could do. Be glad to do that at some point, just talking about my combativeness. Because, yeah, I kind of started a more recent, I mean, recent, as in the last few years, just a push for this thing we call not a four. Right, because that's right, people that are Miss mistyping as fours, and I was kind of the one within our group. I mean, those that's happened in the past for sure, from other people, but within our group, I was kind of the one that was, like, angry about it. That's interesting.
Josh Lavine 1:05:15
It's funny, because I talked to Emma about it, who's an eight and was and, and he actually kind of pinned the origin of it on you. It was like, Yeah, you're the this interesting to me.
David Gray 1:05:26
Yeah, the peaceful nine actually starting wars.
Josh Lavine 1:05:31
Yeah, yeah. So we'll, we'll probably come to a close here in a minute. Um, yeah. But my final question is, what has this been like for you to be on the receiving end of a bunch of questions about yourself.
David Gray 1:05:44
Oh, it's interesting. It's, you know, there was a time a few years back we've been doing more video stuff and more, you know, you know, just being a few people on camera and the podcast and so forth. The last few years, it's like, I'm a little bit more able to sit in the space of and now here's David, you know what I mean, that kind of thing, whereas, whereas that used to be like, super, I don't know, agitating, or I'd withdraw from it, or, you know, energetically speaking, right? So, yeah, now it's coming into a place more of ownership, of kind of this kind of thing, of spotlight on me kind of thing, or whatever,
Josh Lavine 1:06:40
interesting in a way, it's a practice. Yeah, you know, for you,
David Gray 1:06:43
it's definitely a practice in a world, yeah, yeah. And, and that's one of the things that's valuable about having other people that I'm working with, which as a social blind, by the way, I totally wouldn't do. I mean, it just kind of ended up happening with people that I bonded with, and I just wouldn't have even, like, it's literally that blind that I wouldn't even, I don't even know the value of working with other people on one level, right? And so and that it would lead to things that I wouldn't expect. And right? It's just kind of like, yeah, it's so in such an insular kind of framing of the world, myself and and so on. But yeah, so it's, it's been, it's been really valuable for me to to really, kind of, in a way, be forced into it, and I welcome it
Josh Lavine 1:07:44
cool. Well, so people want to find you. You are on eniagrammer.com you are co host on the big hormone Enneagram podcast. Eniacs.com is your own personal site, the Dark Arts Academy also another plug for that, which is where you're sort of demonstrating your and with also Emeka and Joseph. Joseph, yeah, your way of typing celebrities and all that stuff. It's amazing. I think it's like 19 bucks a month as a subscription. It's fantastic. And also looking forward to eventually the release of your book. And there's also the trifix pamphlet that's in it too, that's
David Gray 1:08:26
available now. Yep, yeah. Cool. Great. Well, thank you, yeah, this has been great. Yeah,
Josh Lavine 1:08:31
thanks for doing this. You.
