The Person You Love Already Makes Sense

We assume behaviour is random, irrational or difficult.

What if it isn't?

I've spent the past few days back in the training room, once again diving deep into the Enneagram. If you haven't come across it before, I often describe it as a personality framework - but for me, it's been so much more than that.

A gateway.

To what, you ask?

To understanding myself and the people around me more deeply. To greater compassion. To recognising the unconscious patterns that shape the way we think, feel and relate to one another. And perhaps most importantly, to discovering that we have far more choice than we realise.

I've studied many different models over the years, but the Enneagram is one that ignited something in me. Understanding the nine types didn't put me in a box, it helped me step out of one. It opened up my world. It gave me language for experiences I couldn't previously explain. It helped me heal, grow and flourish where I had once felt stuck, hurting and uncertain.

As Enneagram teacher Russ Hudson writes, "Too often, the Enneagram is viewed as a set of simple personality types that lock us into fixed ideas about ourselves. In reality, it's a dynamic tool for transformation."

And can I be honest with you?

It really has transformed my world.

Someone asked me on the weekend, "What impact has the Enneagram had on your relationship with your husband?"

Without hesitation, I answered...

Understanding.

The biggest shift has been that I stopped taking so much personally.

I used to wonder why my husband did the things he did. Now, more often than not, they make sense to me. And I know they make sense to him.

That one shift has brought more compassion, fewer arguments, better conversations, more aligned parenting, and a much deeper appreciation for who we both are. More than anything, it's given me permission to stop trying to make either of us someone we're not.

When I show up more authentically, I become a better partner, mother, daughter, friend and colleague.

Speaking of becoming a better mother...

Each of my three boys sees the world differently. They've grown up in the same home, with the same parents, yet their perspectives couldn't be more unique.

One happily eats the same lunch every day. Another would be horrified packing the same thing twice.

One processes life out loud. Another disappears into solitude to make sense of it quietly.

Before the Enneagram, I often found myself asking, "Why are they like this?"

Now I find myself asking a different question:

"What makes perfect sense to them?"

That question has changed the way I parent.

Rather than labelling behaviour as difficult or assuming one child is simply "the challenging one," I have a framework that helps me understand what's driving their behaviour. It reminds me to look beyond what I can see and become curious about what's happening underneath.

I still get frustrated. I still get parenting wrong. But now I understand far more than I used to.

And understanding has changed everything.

What would having a deeper understanding of the people you love make possible?

How might you parent differently if you understood your young person more deeply?

What kind of relationship could you have with yourself if you understood your own patterns with a little more compassion?