Radical Healing, Wholeness and Islam (Part 4)
An Introductory Narrative on Transforming Emotional Pain Through Journeywork
Part 4
By (Dr) Muzammal Hussain
Accredited Journey Therapist, Coach, and Medical Doctor (with background in NHS Psychiatry)
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The Nine ‘Types’: Enter the Enneagram
The map and the work
What would it be like if we had a comprehensive map of our core ego-driven fears, that point to what we fundamentally need to face, to truly grow as a human being?
More importantly, what if there was therapeutic work that offered tools to facilitate the meeting and the release of those fears - helping to loosen the grip of the ego (the nafs), and opening us that little bit more to the nurturing embrace of Spirit, of Ruh?
Firstly, I believe that such a map does exist. It’s called the Enneagram.
Secondly, some would say that this map appears to have its roots in Islamic spirituality.
Thirdly, this map is deeply valued and actively used in Journeywork.
Fourth and finally, the beauty of its use in Journeywork is that the patterns of our nafs discovered through the Enneagram model, can be gradually dissolved through applying the powerful processing inherent in the Journeywork approach.
My own introduction to the Enneagram, in 2001, was not at an Islamic conference or talk, but at a week long, immersive retreat within the wider Journey therapist training.
The reason we immerse ourselves into Enneagram work is that Brandon Bays believes (I feel rightly) that therapists can be much more effective in enabling their clients to grow, when they understand the core ego drives and avoidances that play into a client’s life and processes.
Additionally, as we therapists experientially immerse ourselves into this work, we also uncover more of our own core emotional avoidances - and crucially, we get to face them! This enhances both our own self-awareness and our ability to empathise with our clients.
That particular training week was thus dedicated to exploring and understanding the core human emotional 'fears’ as mapped out by the Enneagram and how they manifested in our own lives.; and perhaps more importantly, fully facing and processing those fears within the depths of our being.
The three in the nine
So, what does the Enneagram model map out? According to the Enneagram model, there are nine basic human types, (‘Ennea’ in Greek means ‘nine’). The model describes the core fears and drives of each one.
It can be helpful to view each of the nine types, or core fixations, as being in one of three categories, such that there are three types in each category i.e. the category of either:
a body type
an emotional type, or
a mind type.
In simple terms, a body type will fall into the trap of identifying with their body, a mind type with their thinking mind, and an emotional type with their emotions. (Whereas ultimately ‘we’, as in our true ‘self’, are in essence neither our thoughts, nor our emotions, nor our body. We are something that is deeper than these aspects of ‘self’, and that existed before we were born and will continue to exist even after we physically die).
Identification with one of these three aspects - body, emotions, or the mind - comes with it’s specific challenges. As a result, each type will have core emotional avoidances specific to its type. This core emotional avoidance goes much deeper than surface level behaviour, which is why we cannot identify our Enneagram type based solely on how we behave.
My Skepticism of ‘Types’
Being blown away
Personally I have always been skeptical of any model that ‘boxes’ us into ‘types’. My reaction might be something like, “That’s too simplistic, too superficial, it’s not how I work”, or, “It misses so much of who I am”!
However, I was blown away that week, when we experientially explored this particular model.
Firstly the Enneagram model isn’t rigid. It acknowledges that we each have all nine types in us, and describes how they can inter-relate.
Secondly, when we reached the one that was my core fixation, I felt that an innermost part of me had become known! It was as though I was now sitting there in the room with more than a hundred others totally naked! My inner world and below-the-surface level strategies had been laid bare, and had been described more accurately than I would have been able to describe them - it felt surreal!
Another aspect of the Enneagram that really resonated, was that it recognises all nine types as being able to move into either healthier - or more ‘spiritualised’ - states of ‘themselves’, as well as into more unhealthy states of their type. In other words, there is a vertical dimension, or axis, of growth for each type.
The Enneagram also recognises the key underlying strengths, or gifts, that each type offers. I could see the ones described for my type to be very present in my life, and also saw space for them to emerge more fully.
Additionally, in combination with Journeywork, were tools for each of us to unlock more of that potential, and shift to being more healthy, open-hearted human beings.
The nine in one, and the beauty of diversity
A further beautiful thread during that week was through the paired work we participated in. We experientially identified, felt and spoke from the place of pain felt by the presence of each type within us in our lives. (As I mentioned, while we land primarily on one type, we have all nine in us). This enabled me to feel more empathy for those whose core fears and avoidance strategies were different from my own.
Just because I wasn’t trapped in the same core conditioning as someone else, didn’t make me a better person. It just meant that my own core traps and challenges were different. It also illustrated how diverse and beautiful the world is! We are not, nor can we be, all the same!
In the wider natural world, there is diversity, and difference is to be celebrated. Through being aligned to it’s fitrah (natural disposition), each element in creation has something beautiful to offer. Each element plays it’s role, such that together in this inter-connected, inter-dependent world we reflect the principle of Oneness, Unity, or tawhid. The journey, therefore, involves doing both our own work and participating in the relational dimension - while knowing that the two, the individual and the relational, also intersect.
One thing I should add in case it may still seem simplistic is that, while the Enneagram does describe nine types, each type can be further divided into sub-types! So the model does have more complexity. However, by understanding just the nine basic types, and our own core fixation, we can help ourself immensely in our growth and in understanding and relating to our fellow human beings.
Managing the self, or transforming the self?
A word of caution about the Enneagram: many approaches and books that describe it, do so at a superficial level. They frame the Enneagram as a model of ‘personality’ types, and their approach is more about managing, rather than transforming the ego. They surf on the horizontal axis of personality rather than sliding upward along the vertical. They focus on behaviours rather than on facing and dissolving core fears and emotional avoidances.
My own personal and professional interest rests more on this latter, transformative approach to working with the Enneagram: utilising it to more fully face and process what we primarily avoid internally.
Used in this way, the defensive barriers around the heart/qalb are dismantled, enabling the heart to soften and more freely orient itself towards the Ruh (Spirit). We open more fully to Divine light and our soul realigns to the fitrah, our birthright, enabling us to live more harmoniously in community and with the wider creation.
The roots of the map: An Islamic origin?
In terms of the roots of the Enneagram, I did mention that some people believe the Enneagram to have arisen out of Islamic spirituality - more specifically that it came through ‘ancient Sufis’ (Sufis place a strong emphasis on the inner dimension of Islam).
I should add that this view isn’t shared by everyone, and different groups do try to lay claim to it! I haven’t researched this enough to have a clear position, but because I have experienced this to be such a precise and powerful model for overcoming the false identification with the nafs, it seems very likely to me, that it has an intimate relationship with an authentic spiritual tradition.
Although I have personally come across only a handful of Muslims who have some familiarity with the Enneagram model, it is nonetheless given importance in a few Sufi circles. However few of them seem to actually utilise it in an active applied way.
I was quite astounded, however, when in one Sufi circle, it was said that the nine types are actually each mentioned in the Qur ‘an! … and described in their spiritualised forms in the exact same sequence as the Enneagram model describes them!
Interestingly, the chapter, or surah, in which the nine types are supposedly mentioned is the… ninth (Surah At-Tawbah)! However it isn’t actually obvious when reading that section (9, 112) that it is referring to those nine types, and in my view is actually open to interpretation.
Rumi: More than a Poet
The religious scholar who speaks wisdom to healers
Interestingly, a figure that the founder of the Journey Method, Brandon Bays, sometimes quotes is Rumi, the great poet who lived in the 13th century. I too have quoted Rumi in several places in this piece. (Brandon however tends to focus primarily on spiritual teachers associated with the vedic tradition and also draws significantly on aspects of vedic culture).
While hundreds of thousands of westerners love and have been positively affected through reading Rumi’s poetry, few are aware that Rumi was a Muslim.
Rumi was not only a devout Muslim, he was also a scholar within the Islamic tradition. Some people also describe his Mathnawi as being the Qur’ an in the Persian tongue, and his poetry in general as being a gentler entry point to the Qur’ an itself.
The heart of the work
The appropriateness of quoting Rumi in an emotional healing context is because some of Rumi’s quotes get right to the heart of this work: the need to fully face the difficult stuff within, if we are to become more whole.
This is particularly relevant to Journeywork, because there are many approaches that tend to bypass this inner facing. They instead entertain a make-believe version of wholeness or spiritual experience - when instead the path is to truly face and transform the inner pain, which is what Journeywork specialises in enabling people to do.
Some of the quotes in this article capture Rumi expressing this aspect of the work. Another wonderful poem of Rumi’s that also does this is ‘The Guest House’, which I briefly talk about in relation to spirituality and religion on this short video here.
The quoting of Rumi amongst certain healing practitioners further confirms to me the common ground between religion and healing, which is the point I made at the start of this article and have expressed in a variety of ways throughout.
The Individual, and Beyond: Some Concluding Thoughts
The need for outer work
While individual work to connect with Spirit or Essence and transform the self is a crucial dimension in Islam, our lived relationship to our wider context is also central to the faith. There is, after all, a wider natural environment and community in which we exist.
It is true that as we engage in our personal healing, we loosen the grip of the false self, and realign more fully to the fitrah. We begin to function in greater harmony with other human beings and also with other aspects of creation. We also become more patient and compassionate, and our presence can affect people in a powerful and profound way.
At the same time, as members of a wider system and community, appropriate outward engagement is also necessary. We have responsibilities to utilise privileges we have, to help towards the restoration of balance and justice in the world we share.
This outer work can actually assist our inner journey, if we participate consciously. This is the beauty of this work: it all inter-relates.
Avoidance and bypassing the outer
While the outer is not the key focus in this article, I feel it necessary to communicate the importance of also working in the outer realm. This is partly because many circles that focus on healing avoid getting involved with issues ‘out there’. The culture of Journey practitioners is not entirely immune to this. Within religious circles, this avoidance can also be commonplace, though the possible forms this can take can be more varied.
Interestingly, just as inner work that avoids truly facing the internal pain is a form of spiritual bypassing, I would argue that any approach to ‘healing’ that exclusively focuses on the inner, and permanently avoids the difficult and messy stuff ‘out there’, can also be a form of bypassing, though of a different kind.
In the first instance we greatly restrict the potential to transform the self; and in the second we inhibit our capacity to develop authentic, just and wholesome communities. As the two inter-relate, in reality we restrict the potential for both, whichever form of avoidance we fall into, if that avoidance is overly sustained.
In many healing groups, there can also be a middle class element that is part of the picture. Within this middle class healing culture, there can be a belief that one’s own comforts are a result of one’s own spiritual evolution. I believe this can lead to unhealthy dissociation from those who have less privilege and may lead to a blindness of one’s wider responsibility in the world.
The outer and inner as one
This wider engagement, or responsibility, in the outer realm can take varied forms, At a simple, but fundamental level, the practise of giving zakat, one of the five pillars in Islam, is a method of more fairly distributing wealth while simultaneously enabling our own purification. Also, helping to mediate conflict, where warranted, is a noble act that supports the nurturing of wholesome communities, something that is also fundamental to our work in this life.
Organising together to regenerate the earth, taking actions in solidarity of oppressed groups (centred on creating space for them to lead), and speaking truth to oppressive systems while transforming such power structures are other ways.
Of course, as we take responsibility in the outer world, developing our awareness and engaging in inner work can help ensure that we are responding from a place of wholeness, rather than reacting from a place of hurt, or desire for revenge. Even against ‘enemies’, the central principle must be to value all life, while working for justice and to restore wholeness.
The desires of the ego need to be worked with and transformed so they do not get in the way of the healing that ultimately we all want. This is Islam.
As we engage outwardly, approaches such as Journeywork can be part of a mix that enables action to emerge more from a place of healing and love, than from hurt and ego. The messiness of the outer world, exacerbated by the uncertain times we are in, may trigger our past, lead us to feel tense and give rise to strong, upsetting emotions.
Journeywork-type approaches can provide powerful, practical tools that support us to feel and process these internal tensions and emotions, and to more deeply learn from any outer engagement. I have found it to be a godsend when working within groups and on change-making activities.
Thus, whether someone is experiencing anxiety, depression, an addiction, lack of meaning, relationship breakup, bereavement, or experiencing physical ill-health, Journeywork could make a deeply valuable, even pivotal contribution in restoring inner wholeness. Simultaneously, when taking action in the outer world it can help ensure that action comes from a heart-felt place rather than being motivated by the desire for revenge, or from hatred.
For me, this is a journey of transforming the self, while also taking responsibility in the world. The inner and outer are connected. The restoration of wholeness is the invitation - an invitation that aligns to both the heart of authentic healing approaches and to authentic religion.
This invitation extends to you, and it is for you to choose how you would like to respond to it.
Download this series as a single compact E-book right away (no email required)
About the Author
Dr Muzammal Hussain (likes to be called Muzammal) has worked as a medical doctor in the area of NHS Psychiatry over more than 12 years. He is also an experienced Accredited Journey Therapist and a Coach at Restorative Wholeness.
Additionally, Muzammal is active in ecological activism where he weaves together the strands of Islamic ecology, Permaculture and Inclusive leadership. He is especially passionate about the relationship between inner transformation, conscious community building and ecological healing. He lives with his wife in Brighton, East Sussex, in the UK.
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Helpful References
Bays, Brandon: ‘The Journey: A Practical Guide to Healing Your Life and Setting Yourself Free’ (2012)
Billet, Kevin: The Enneagram - Ancient Wisdom, Modern Insights: (VIdeo, 2020)
Rahman, Jamal: ‘The Fragrance of Faith: The Enlightened Heart of Islam’ (2004): See p. 109-110 for a description of 'Sacred Holding'.
Rothman, Abdallah and Coyle, Adrian: Towards a Framework for Islamic Psychology and Psychotherapy: An Islamic Model of the Soul (2018)
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Acknowledgements
I would like to express my deep gratitude to Elizabeth Lymer for her dedicated time and attention in carefully reading the first two drafts of this publication, and providing valuable feedback that helped immensely with adding clarity and refinement to almost all aspects of the final version of this book.
I thank my caring friend, Ben Rogaly who, having listened to a writing update on one of our physically distanced woodland walks, offered an insightful idea for the main title that I just had to take up.
I would also like to thank my dear wife, Shumaisa, for her love and encouragement every step of the way, with this piece of work and so many others.
Privacy
The names of any clients mentioned in this book have been intentionally changed to honour their privacy.
Disclaimer
If you have a medical illness, you are advised to consult your own medical practitioner. Any approach described in this post is not a replacement to seeking medical advice. While people have reported significant improvements in physical and mental well-being following Journeywork, each of us is unique, and no one can say in advance how any one individual will respond.