The enneagram trifix theory is missing a center: the soul center

[Metamorph]

Boo. It's based on Gurdjieff's centers of intelligence and an old Sufi glyph. How do you propose modifying it without destroying it?

[mclane]

Boo. It's based on Gurdjieff's centers of intelligence and an old Sufi glyph. How do you propose modifying it without destroying it?

I'm not saying it's incorrect, I'm saying it's incomplete. The trifix was discovered much later by somebody; I've now discovered that it was missing the soul, that's it. If the trifix is an imaginary triangle linking three of the types of the enneagram, adding the soul it is actually a pyramid with the soul at the top.

[Ave]

I'm not saying it's incorrect, I'm saying it's incomplete. The trifix was discovered much later by somebody; I've now discovered that it was missing the soul, that's it. If the trifix is an imaginary triangle linking three of the types of the enneagram, adding the soul it is actually a pyramid with the soul at the top.

With regards to Gurdjieff, you have to understand that to him what you are calling the soul was not present in most people. It could only be present in someone who had attainted what he called liberation, everyone else was a machine.

Fourth Way, Gurdjieff's teaching is based on what he identified as three paths found across the world, the way of the Fakir, focused on the physical body and its mastery, the way of the Monk, based on faith and emotion, and the way of the Yogi, focused on the mind. This is where the idea of "three centers" comes from. In Gurdjieff's use of the Enneagram you didn't have a core type, you could be on a different point of the enneagram at different times of day depending on where your attention was focused. His model was to unite the way of the Fakir, Yogi, and Monk in an individual, so that all three centers were balanced and this was called "The Fourth Way to Consciousness". What you are calling the soul here could be what Gurdjieff called Consciousness, the attainment of which was the goal of his teaching. Basically, to unite all three centers would lead you to the top of the pyramid, to borrow your image, but this is not easy work and is not innate or natural in humans.

I don't know what this adds to your topic, but I was reading Gurdjieff earlier and since he was brought up I think its necessary to clarify what his teaching was (in a very superficial manner as I am doing here) since it is important to know the origins of ideas, since they reveal clues to the nature of those ideas. Afterwards you can modify these ideas as you wish, but I think its good to know why they are structued the way they are. For what it's worth.