Have you ever felt like you're doing everything right —eating well, exercising, staying positive —but still can't achieve lasting health? The secret might not lie in what you eat or how you move, but in understanding why you do the things you do. In today’s episode, we dive into the power of self-awareness through the Enneagram and how it can help you unlock true, lasting health.  

You see, discovering your Enneagram number can be a game-changer for your health and well-being. After a conversation with Dr. Anna Toker, a leading expert in gut health, I realized that not everyone knows that understanding our personality and behavior patterns is crucial for long-term health success.

I’ll show you how the Enneagram helps you understand your core motivations and triggers. And with this knowledge, you can shift away from relying on willpower and start living in alignment with your true self.

Conclusion:

Self-awareness is the key to unlocking your healthiest self. When you understand your Enneagram number, you're on the path to gaining the tools you need to navigate challenges with greater ease and grace. Embrace the journey of self-discovery, and remember: there’s no finish line, only growth.

In This Episode:

00:00 Introduction

02:55 Why self-awareness is critical for unlocking lasting health

06:48 The meaning behind the “Corset to Crown” journey

08:48 What is the Enneagram?

19:58 How the Enneagram reveals motivations that drive behaviors

23:58 Understanding your Enneagram number means better self-awareness

29:46 Do childhood experiences influence your Enneagram number?

33:09 Practical steps for discovering your Enneagram number

Mentioned in the Episode:

Road Back to You: https://amzn.to/47f00DV  

Enneagram Made Simple: https://amzn.to/3L2p2i8  

Wisdom of the Enneagram: https://amzn.to/4omvPSi  

The Essential Enneagram: https://amzn.to/3WbXsl1  

Podcast Episode with Enneagram Ashton: https://youtu.be/oNjnYb2_Mzc?si=qZe5dvLCltQRGFvX

Join the waiting list for Carrie’s upcoming book, From Corset to Crown!

Sign up here: https://www.carrielupoli.com/  

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Connect with Tara Cavosie:

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Podcast Blog

Other Related Episodes: 

Looking for more tips to optimize health without dietary restrictions? Listen to these episodes:

• Enneagram Ashton Part 1
• Enneagram Ashton Part 2

Transcript: 

[00:00:00] Carrie Lupoli: So we all say we wanna be the healthiest version of ourselves, right? But what if the reason we're not getting there has nothing to do with food, exercise, or willpower? You've probably tried new workouts, better nutrition plans, and mindset hacks, but the truth is, the real key to lasting health isn't about what you eat or how you move.

[00:00:18] Carrie Lupoli: It's about understanding why you do what you do, your personality, your triggers. And once you see this, it will change how you approach your health, your habits, and your entire life.

[00:00:31] Carrie Lupoli: Well, hey there. On today's episode, I am actually continuing a conversation that I had just the other day with a doctor, Dr. Anna Toker, who is one of the world's best colorectal surgeons in the world is like the leading expert on gut health. She actually spent the weekend with me this past weekend, and I said to her.

[00:00:54] Carrie Lupoli: Do. Have you ever heard of the Enneagram? And she's like, no. And I was blown [00:01:00] away because one of the smartest women I know for sure literally can talk about just about any topic. You should follow her on Instagram if you don't already. Dr. Anna Toker. And uh. I was shocked that she didn't know this. And so as I was explaining it to her and why this is such a big part of my approach when I work with women, she was like, you gotta do a podcast on this.

[00:01:25] Carrie Lupoli: And I said, I've brought in an Enneagram expert before. And she's like, no, no, no. The way that you talk about this and why it's so related to health has to be a podcast. And I was like. You know, sometimes I don't think I give myself enough credit for knowing all the things that I know or teaching in a way that I teach because there's someone like her that I literally cannot ever get enough of, that I have so much respect for, uh, to tell me that I had something to teach her.

[00:01:50] Carrie Lupoli: I was like, oh my gosh. Now I will say, uh, she does listen to me when it comes to nutrition and, uh, loves how I approach it. [00:02:00] Uh, but she was just like, this was totally new to her. So I thought I would dig in today's episode because this is in my book that's coming out soon from Corset to Crown, disrupting everything you've been told about weight loss, confidence, and self-worth is not in there.

[00:02:17] Carrie Lupoli: And the reason why this is not in my book is because it would be a whole book in and of itself, and even just teasing it is not enough. So that's why I have to devote a whole episode to this, and you need to understand the backstory as to how I figured this out and how I teach this to my clients. And I'm gonna give you all the same tools to truly learn more about you.

[00:02:40] Carrie Lupoli: The journey of self-discovery is the key to truly understanding how you're going to stick with the lifestyle, how you're gonna be consistent, how you're gonna just stop relying on willpower and motivation. This is a big key to the whole puzzle. Now, in my book, I do talk about how I have a whole chapter called Why [00:03:00] Everything I Teach You Is Not gonna Work.

[00:03:02] Carrie Lupoli: And if, if we don't realize that self-awareness is truly how we unlock health, then we are never actually gonna get healthy. And so I do have a whole chapter about that in my book, but I don't talk about. This part of finding yourself, this part of truly understanding in a way that if you do not understand the Enneagram, like you're gonna be blown away by this.

[00:03:27] Carrie Lupoli: And if you do know the Enneagram, hopefully I'm going to kind of tap into a way to look at it that maybe you haven't seen before. So, uh, I think that being the healthiest version of ourselves is. So, so, so much more than care. Give me a meal plan. Tell me what to eat. I say this all the time. I can never just give a woman a meal plan anymore.

[00:03:48] Carrie Lupoli: I have to help her see all the layers, all the puzzle pieces, or it is like literally saying to somebody, this is what drives me crazy about health and wellness. Coaches, doctors, [00:04:00] dieticians. They think that they are going, you think they make you think that by following their plan. All the other pieces of the puzzle are gonna magically appear in the entire puzzle of a lifestyle that you say you want, and it just does it.

[00:04:14] Carrie Lupoli: We were not taught so many of the things that we need to understand, like the discipline of declining how, uh, motivation is not a strategy. That willpower is not how you're going to actually. Uh, implement something consistently that, uh, calories in, calories out is completely antiquated, and it's obviously not sustainable.

[00:04:35] Carrie Lupoli: 'cause how many of y'all have done that? How we are culturally conditioned to believe certain things about health, weight, and our self-worth, and like, it's just, it doesn't get layered in when somebody is just teaching you about food or exercise. So it's why we have to dig in deeply. But before we do, if you are watching this on YouTube, for example, and if you don't subscribe to my YouTube channel, go ahead and do [00:05:00] that because it's not just the podcast that's on.

[00:05:02] Carrie Lupoli: It's all sorts of different things. And you can see my shirt that I'm wearing, and if you cannot see the shirt that I will tell you about it. But I'm purposely wearing this shirt that says, bold, balanced, and beautiful. And on the sleeve it says, unapologetically me. And I love being able to come up with swag and apparel that inspires women to remember how they were born.

[00:05:28] Carrie Lupoli: Perfect, bold, beautiful. And. Themselves, uniquely them. And when we dig into the Enneagram, we can actually understand what the healthiest version of you what, what you do, what you say, what you think, what you believe, and recognize that there's nothing wrong with you. It's that we're always going to be on this quest of self-discovery, never having a finish line, always working to up the ante on how you can show up for yourself so that you can [00:06:00] show up for others, because that's really the end goal is serving others.

[00:06:03] Carrie Lupoli: We were all put on this earth for a purpose, and a purpose that is uniquely curated just for you. One that is really, truly about impacting other people. You weren't put on the earth to find the right diet or to weigh a certain amount, but if you aren't the healthiest version of yourself, and of course, weight is a symptom of our health and hormones, but it is not the root of the problem.

[00:06:26] Carrie Lupoli: It's blood sugar stabilization. And that's one of the reasons why this shirt says balance. Because when our blood sugars balanced, so many other things in our life are balanced. But when our belief systems, our behavioral science, our blood sugar, all the BS we actually need to know are balanced, then.

[00:06:43] Carrie Lupoli: Then we can actually show up as our true, authentic, and unapologetic self. And I don't think a lot of us know really what that is. I think especially for women, we have been conditioned to believe certain things. I think we have been conditioned. This is where the part of the title of my book, from Corset to Crown [00:07:00] comes in.

[00:07:00] Carrie Lupoli: I believe we are all given this like metaphorical. Corset. It's not a physical one, but a mental one. One made of food rules, cultural conditioning, and a belief that in order to be better, we have to be smaller, that we have to actually shrink in order to be more. And in all reality, like we can't be too loud, we can't be too direct, and we can't be too large.

[00:07:21] Carrie Lupoli: We have to look a certain way, be a certain way, and we have to constantly try to fit into this corset. And when my daughter was 16, and I tell this story in my book. She actually ended up buying herself a crown. The same girl who 10 years earlier had been quoting me about calories. I didn't know I was teaching her about calories, but I was, and I think so many of us as women are so worried that the beliefs that we know about ourselves that are disempowered, that don't feel like we're enough, are getting translated over to our daughters.

[00:07:50] Carrie Lupoli: I've had so many women say to me, Oh, my daughter's really small, it's fine. And I'm like, doesn't mean she doesn't got self-worth issues, doesn't mean she doesn't have body issues. We actually have to [00:08:00] teach our girls how to know who they are and be confident in who they are, regardless of the size that they are.

[00:08:10] Carrie Lupoli: And if we don't believe that, we're never gonna be able to teach them that. But my daughter, when she was 16, I felt like I was on the right path when she bought herself a crown, a tiara. Uh, she bought it from Amazon. It was $ 6.99, and she told me that she knew her value, she knew she was worthy, and she could just buy a crown to remind herself of that.

[00:08:30] Carrie Lupoli: And so from corset to Crown is really that journey of self-discovery and reminding each one of you that you are worthy. And so I also wanna make sure, though, in that book and in my podcast, that I am giving you the tools to be able to truly understand how to become the healthiest version of yourself.

[00:08:46] Carrie Lupoli: And so that's where the Enneagram comes in. So let me tell you a little bit about what the Enneagram is. If you know what the Enneagram is, put in the comments. What if you're, if you're on YouTube with me, uh, if you're watching any of this on social media, go ahead and put it in there too. But I'd love [00:09:00] to know what number you are.

[00:09:02] Carrie Lupoli: And if you don't know the Enneagram, you'd be like, what? What are you talking about? Okay, so here's a little, kind of the 4 1 1 on the Enneagram. The Enneagram is kind of like a typing system, like a personality typing system that you might have heard of, like the Myers-Briggs before. Any of those kinds of like psychological tests that tell you more about your personality and things like that.

[00:09:26] Carrie Lupoli: Well. The Enneagram is so different than that because one nobody really knows where originated from. All of those other tests that you do are all, like a team of psychologists work together to be able to put questions, answers, and uh, just interpretations on paper. So it's easy to take a test to be able to determine what your like INTJ kind of, uh, scores are for any of those types of.

[00:09:54] Carrie Lupoli: Personality test because humans made it so humans can make the test to score yourself. No, none of them are [00:10:00] perfect, obviously, but the Enneagram, nobody really knows where it originated from. It's been around for thousands of years. It's stood this test of time, and there is a theory that the Enneagram came from God and that there are nine numbers and God is one of all of these nine numbers, and that we as humans on this earth as created by God, are one of these.

[00:10:22] Carrie Lupoli: Nine numbers, no number is better or worse than another. And if we could all work to be the healthiest version of our numbers, well then we could all live in pretty amazing, uh, collaboration, tranquility, peace, joy, happiness. It's, it would be really kind of amazing. And it is kind of like a North star because once you know your number, you can learn so much about this.

[00:10:44] Carrie Lupoli: Now, many of. My followers know that I was an educator before I was a nutritionist. I was a behavior specialist. I worked, uh, had an expertise, uh, in helping to change behaviors in students that struggled [00:11:00] to be able to really participate and engage in the classroom according to the way that, you know, a traditional classroom is set up.

[00:11:07] Carrie Lupoli: So I did a lot of analyzing behaviors. I worked in. A lot of middle schools, but I worked in elementary and high schools, and helping teachers to understand how where the behaviors were coming from and how we could work with the student and the parents, and the teachers to be able to help change their behaviors so that they could learn and they could actually be successful.

[00:11:26] Carrie Lupoli: So, uh, in that process of understanding behaviors, I think it's really important to recognize that some of the pushback I will hear about the Enneagram is I don't wanna be labeled. And as a person who dealt with the labeling of kids with special needs for many, many years, I get that. And I want people to understand that this isn't about a label.

[00:11:47] Carrie Lupoli: This is about understanding yourself and not putting yourself into a box that it shouldn't be in a label and an identity that is actually not yours. So let me give you an example. When I first learned about the [00:12:00] Enneagram, it was a little over 10 years ago, and it was our pastor from our church that introduced it to us. And he had been visiting us and was at our house, and he said, Hey, have you read the road back to you?

[00:12:11] Carrie Lupoli: That is a book by Ian Morgan Cron and Suzanne Stabile, and they're kind of like two of the most well-known people around the Enneagram. And I said, uh, no, the road back to you. I don't know that at all. And he said, and this is what it says here, it says An Enneagram journey to self-discovery. Ignorance.

[00:12:31] Carrie Lupoli: Ignorance is bliss except in self-awareness. And uh, I was like, okay, tell me more. So. It was interesting 'cause as I started reading the book. And understanding what each of these numbers were. I was in kind of a rough point in my marriage. My husband and I had just moved, uh, to the East Coast from the Midwest.

[00:12:50] Carrie Lupoli: And before that, we had been living overseas, and I had moved so many times with my kids and my family, and my life kept shifting and changing, and my husband's life kind of didn't [00:13:00] change very much. You know, would go to his job, and I had to deal with all of the shifts and the changes, and I was getting more and more frustrated with that arrangement, I will say.

[00:13:12] Carrie Lupoli: But my husband, bless his soul, is always so wonderful. He's so what we call perfect. Uh, no, there is no perfect person, but there's a joke amongst his siblings and myself that his name is perfect Peter, 'cause it just feels like he does nothing wrong, and it's so annoying. And so, uh, there's a phrase that says, comparison is a thief of all joy.

[00:13:35] Carrie Lupoli: And I found myself comparing myself to Peter. Peter would literally give his shirt off the like, off his back to anybody. And I was kind of like, well, let me, like, I need my shirt, but let me show you how to get your own shirt, you know, or, uh, let me help you get a shirt, but I don't wanna give you my shirt.

[00:13:52] Carrie Lupoli: And I always felt like I was wrong for that. And, that's how kind of Peter siblings sometimes grew up too, that. He was [00:14:00] always helping others, always thinking about others. And for any of us that were not innately doing that, it made us kind of feel worse about ourselves. And so, uh, not only was I dealing with all of this kind of resentment, I would say that his life, I felt like, never changed at all with all of our moves and mind did.

[00:14:16] Carrie Lupoli: And then he was just always, um, looked like the hero. And I always kind of looked like the, you know, you, you know what? The difficult one. And, uh, it was just frustrating that I always felt like I was trying to be more like Peter, trying to be more like Peter. And so when I read this book and I started reading, uh, and in this particular book, it doesn't, the numbers aren't described in order.

[00:14:40] Carrie Lupoli: They're described 8, 9, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. It starts with an eight, and there's a reason for that. But I read the first eight, and the eighth is direct. It's called the Challenger. They could be inspirational leaders or they could be real jerk,s depending on how healthy they are in their own knowledge of who they are.[00:15:00] 

[00:15:00] Carrie Lupoli: And as I was reading that, I was like, oh my gosh, this is me. This is me. And I felt proud of it. Like I, it was like I was seen for the first time. I was understood that the, uh, I used to say it, my kids, I'm not yelling, this is just how I talk. And like this book finally saw my heart. Uh, my husband always jokes that I'm like an Eminem, like, you know, crunchy on the outside or hard on the outside and soft in the middle.

[00:15:32] Carrie Lupoli: Uh, that my heart is so big, but a lot of times people don't. See it, and in this book, in this chapter, I, I just, I saw it, I saw me, and I saw that I wasn't bad. I saw that I was good, that I was actually really good, and that there was so much potential for me if I could control some of the pieces that are hard for me, like anger.

[00:15:53] Carrie Lupoli: Like being overly direct, like sometimes telling people what they need to hear, even if it's not what they want to hear, but not [00:16:00] really that person not being open to actually hearing it. Like, I needed to be more self-aware of all of that. And so when I read that book, I was like, there's nothing wrong with me.

[00:16:09] Carrie Lupoli: And then as I continued to read and my husband read it, we realized he was a two. A two is a helper. And it was just such an incredible moment for him, for me to realize, oh my gosh, this is why he gives his shirt off his back to everybody. And there are healthy versions of being a two, and some unhealthy ways you can be a two, just like in any number.

[00:16:30] Carrie Lupoli: And we found some of the unhealthy ways that he was being a two as well. And I finally I remember where I was sitting in my kitchen table. My kitchen is the source of so many different things. It was a source of where my kids first started talking about calories, and it was a source of where I really found out who I was.

[00:16:48] Carrie Lupoli: I have cooked so many meals in my kitchen and at my table, and I feel like it's such an amazing symbol for the evolution of life and family. And so sitting at that table, reading that book, and [00:17:00] talking to my husband, and I was like, I know who I am, and I had a North star. What is the healthiest version of this?

[00:17:08] Carrie Lupoli: Eight? Do say, think, and believe, and I don't need to be more like Peter. I need to be me and without. People like me, we wouldn't have movements, we wouldn't have people standing up for the little guy. We wouldn't have people that aren't afraid to say the things that other people are afraid to say. And without my husband, who's a two, we wouldn't have cherries.

[00:17:27] Carrie Lupoli: We wouldn't have people that give of themselves just fully and, and, and completely. And we need all of them. Every single one of these numbers are so powerful and so in like important to our ecosystem. And again, no number is worse or better than another. And I've had people say to me, like my daughter is a one and a one is a.

[00:17:52] Carrie Lupoli: It used to be called a perfectionist, and you'll see if you start studying the Enneagram, the perfectionist comes out as a one, but [00:18:00] it innately kind of communicates something negative. Like if somebody's a perfectionist, that doesn't sound like a positive. So, uh, that, that term, that number has been, uh, adapted to being a reformer.

[00:18:16] Carrie Lupoli: And my daughter is a one. And, uh, really truly, I remember from when she was a little girl, she just liked things a certain way, very organized, very structured. And uh, my other daughter, Grace, is four. And she's a creative romantic, and I am very similar to my daughter, who's a one. She likes things a certain way.

[00:18:38] Carrie Lupoli: Uh, my daughter, who is four, is that romantic, creative, that is very, um, not type A. And so for someone like me who's very type A or for my other daughter who's very type A, it was a, it's, it had been a struggle to be able to be aligned and on the same page about things. But what was so incredible is when we learned each other's numbers, [00:19:00] it really opened up our eyes to understanding the other person.

[00:19:03] Carrie Lupoli: So not just understanding ourselves, but understanding them and where they were coming from. Because perspective is what's so important. You know, we have our own truths. They're based on our experiences. They're based on the things that we have seen in our lives, the things that we have been told. You know, our feed on Facebook and the Instagram, and TikTok are all curated based on the algorithm of the things that you have shown interest in, and that is how we look at likes.

[00:19:35] Carrie Lupoli: We look at life, not actually in truth, but in what I call truthiness. And it's based on our own lens, our own perspectives. And by understanding the Enneagram, we can actually understand other people's perspectives, which opens up a whole new world for how we can look at ourselves and how we can respond, but how we can get along with others.

[00:19:58] Carrie Lupoli: Now the thing that's really different [00:20:00] about the Enneagram that I think is so incredible is that it doesn't just talk about our behaviors. I'm a behavior specialist. I'm obsessed about behaviors, especially when it comes to health and wellness, and helping people to truly understand the way their brain works when it comes to consistently shifting our behaviors.

[00:20:17] Carrie Lupoli: But when it comes to the Enneagram. Many people of different numbers can exhibit very similar behaviors. And so when I was talking to my friend, Dr. Anna Toker, I really thought, like in my brain, while I don't wanna like put a number on any particular person, I thought she was a three. A three is a performer.

[00:20:38] Carrie Lupoli: She has a, uh, really amazing Instagram feed. She is able to talk at any time, loves being on stage, loves sharing her knowledge. And so I thought she would be a three. A performer and entertain, yeah, a performer. That's what it's, sorry. And when we went through a series of questions, which I'm gonna share with you, and we kind of dug in, I, we realized, [00:21:00] oh my gosh, actually she is a six, which is a loyalist, and she, uh, operates very often on fear.

[00:21:13] Carrie Lupoli: Uh, worst case scenarios and she, her behavior may have looked like others, but the motivation behind it is what we're looking for. And the thing is, only you can really understand your motivation. Only you can understand why you might be doing certain things. So there's nine numbers in the Enneagram, and you can divide nine by three.

[00:21:37] Carrie Lupoli: So if we think about them in triads. Eight, nine, and one are a triad. Two, three, and four are a triad, and five, six, and seven are a triad. And in each of these triads is what's sitting right beneath the surface. So in your first attempt to figure out like, maybe what number are you, one of the really good things to do, and I did this to Dr.

[00:21:59] Carrie Lupoli: Ker and [00:22:00] she couldn't figure it out at first, but then she really dug in and saw it's your like. I joke about my dog. He is a golden doodle, and he's always by my feet. He's right here, and he will literally jump like a coiled spring at any given moment. If I say his name, which I will say very quietly, Cooper.

[00:22:19] Carrie Lupoli: Then he's fine. But if I go like this, Cooper, hey, oh bam. He is like a coiled spring, ready to go. He's always right at the surface, ready to jump. So in the Enneagram, if we think about these triads, we're sitting right at the surface, ready to jump in one of these three areas. Either anger, shame, or fear. For me, it was so easy.

[00:22:44] Carrie Lupoli: Eight nines and ones anger is just sitting right there at the surface, ready to pounce, ready to jump. If you are a two, three, or four, shame is right there. And as my husband is a two and my daughter is a four, I can see it. And I have to be really careful of that because as [00:23:00] an eight, I don't have a ton of empathy.

[00:23:01] Carrie Lupoli: Naturally, I have to work at that, and so I could, without meaning to, make someone feel shameful. In my attempt to tell them the truth, or what I perceive is true, to give them feedback. And because shame is sitting right at the surface, bam, it can be easily activated, and that's the last thing I wanna do.

[00:23:22] Carrie Lupoli: But for an eight, nine, and one, anger can be right there. So if you could see somebody that's easily angered, that's might be because they're sitting in one of those triads, one of those numbers, and then fear is in a, in a five, six, or seven. And it's like right beneath the surface, they're afraid. They're afraid of success, afraid of failure, afraid of what might happen if they're not fully prepared.

[00:23:44] Carrie Lupoli: And as Dr. Anna and I dug into this, we realized. There was fear there. She's always like, worst case scenario, she's got multiple businesses because in case one fails, she's got another one to back her up. And so these are the things that [00:24:00] allows us to like really dig into some of the most amazing, uh, just, just discoveries about ourself and especially if we know that no number is better or worse than another.

[00:24:12] Carrie Lupoli: My daughter was four, remember we sat at a sushi restaurant. And I gave her the road back to you, and I opened up to the, um, well, I, I kind of thought she was a four. I wasn't quite sure if she was, uh, what she was. The more you get to know numbers, you can kind of try to like see some similarities in certain people, but you really cannot decide for them.

[00:24:33] Carrie Lupoli: They have to decide for themselves. And there are tests that you can do for the Enneagram, but because a human did not necessarily make the Enneagram, a human does not always do a great job of developing a test for it, because again, behaviors and motivation are very different. So I always engage, um, the people that I work with on the Enneagram in a journey of learning who they are.[00:25:00] 

[00:25:00] Carrie Lupoli: Uh, you can actually refer to episodes 215 and 216 in my podcast. I have a part one and a part two of the Enneagram with Enneagram Ashton, who is one of the leading experts in the Enneagram. Uh, she's got like half a million followers. She's so knowledgeable. She actually has done guest coaching sessions with my clients and my coaches, and her knowledge is just incredible.

[00:25:26] Carrie Lupoli: So I have a two-part. A podcast series with her that goes through every single number. So I absolutely encourage you to go and listen to that if you haven't. But what I did with Grace, and this is what I do with a lot of my clients, is in the road Back to You, that book, there's the beginning of each chapter, and there's bulleted points for each number.

[00:25:48] Carrie Lupoli: And so I gave it The Grace, the Four, and she was going through, and I gave her a highlighter, and she was highlighting all of the bullets that she felt like were most like her. And I. Tell my clients very often to do, do [00:26:00] this right at the beginning of each of those chapters, to be able to take a highlighter and just highlight the attributes and the behaviors or the motivations, whatever the descriptions are that sound most, most like you.

[00:26:10] Carrie Lupoli: And if you do that for all nine numbers, you go back and you see which one had the most number of highlights. And so Grace did that. And four, when we got to four, it was just unbelievable how many there were. And she looked at me with tears in her eyes and said, you mean there's nothing wrong with me? My daughter, Grace, is an actress.

[00:26:29] Carrie Lupoli: She's a creative, uh, she is often, she wants to be seen as different, but she also is so afraid of being different. Not being able to fit in. And it's this juxtaposition of these two different feelings of wanting to be accepted, but also wanting to be unique and different. That can be a really hard thing for a kid, especially at that point.

[00:26:51] Carrie Lupoli: She was in middle school when she was figuring that out. And it was just a beautiful moment of awareness and love [00:27:00] for herself, and so she has embraced that as a four, as a 20-year-old. Now she knows who she is in part because of the Enneagram. My daughter Ellie, who's 19, knows who she is because of the Enneagram.

[00:27:14] Carrie Lupoli: And as a one, she understands why when things are out of order, when things are not just. Structured in a certain way why she can get really stressed and she can recognize it, and she doesn't recognize it as truth. She recognizes it as her truth. And it doesn't mean everybody else has to adjust to her. It means she has to adjust so she can get herself to a better place.

[00:27:35] Carrie Lupoli: And so do you see how by understanding these things, the level of self-awareness increases, which means our health. Increases our balance, increases our love for ourself, our ability to be bold and unapologetic as to who we are, what we're doing, why we're doing it, the triggers that get us. If we don't understand this part of ourselves, we're missing a huge piece of the puzzle, [00:28:00] and it is something that you can study and study and study for decades and decades.

[00:28:04] Carrie Lupoli: If we go into Ashton's book, Ashton Whit, Moyer, Ober. Called the Enneagram made simple. My clients all use this book as a resource as well. It is a beautiful book filled with color. I love a book with color, but is so well it's, it describes so incredibly well the attributes of each of the numbers. There's two other books that I use to help my client dig into the Enneagram, and one of them is by Dr.

[00:28:32] Carrie Lupoli: David Daniels and Dr. Virginia Price called The Essential. Enneagram, this book was shown to me by my Enneagram coach. Uh, one of my therapists that I've had over the years was an expert in the Enneagram, and from now on, I will only see a counselor or a therapist who has the Enneagram, um, knowledge, because it is such a key point to me of health.

[00:28:57] Carrie Lupoli: And, uh, this kind of GI is a [00:29:00] discovery guide in helping you walk through your number. It's a really small book, but it's, it's a great tool. Instead of a test. It doesn't matter what I say, though. Everyone's still gonna go get the test. And then there is a book that I call like the Bible of the Enneagram.

[00:29:13] Carrie Lupoli: And if you're just starting out, I think that it is, um, maybe way too overwhelming. But if you are somebody that knows the Enneagram or wants to dig in more, or is like just so enthralled, like I am, it's called the Wisdom of the Enneagram, by Don Richard Rizzo and Russ Hudson. It's much more technical, but there are a lot of really great ways that you can.

[00:29:35] Carrie Lupoli: It's a lot more technical, but there are a lot of really great ways that you can learn deeper and deeper and deeper about the Enneagram. So that is really exciting. So, uh, a lot of questions that I get around the Enneagram, um, are around whether or not kids. Could have their Enneagram number, uh, or if experiences when you were a child actually dictate your number [00:30:00], and the overall belief and the overwhelming, uh, understanding of the Enneagram is that really, no, it's not your experiences.

[00:30:09] Carrie Lupoli: It's like the nature-nurture thing. It really is more nature. And that you handle things in your childhood according to your number versus your number dictating kind of, or your childhood dictating your number. And, you'll really start to see the attributes of a child's number probably around 12 years old.

[00:30:29] Carrie Lupoli: Uh, but I think it is one of the most amazing tools to be able to give to your child, uh, an understanding of themselves and who they are, why they do the things that they do. Before, Grace used to say that, uh, before knowing the Enneagram, it was like she walked around with blurry glasses on, and now she can see herself clearly.

[00:30:47] Carrie Lupoli: And how could you possibly get truly healthy if you can't see yourself clearly? Love yourself for who you are and understand that you are made exactly the way you were intended to [00:31:00] be made. But understanding that beautiful machine of your body and your mind, how they work together to serve others, is such a gift to understand.

[00:31:11] Carrie Lupoli: Now, there's some parts around the Enneagram that I haven't even been able to get into because if you think about the Enneagram, like a circle, you can sit next to certain numbers. So a one sits next to a nine, and a two an eight sits next to a seven and a nine. And a seven, for example, is an enthusiast.

[00:31:26] Carrie Lupoli: And they're often very much like the life of a party. They have a fear of missing out. Sevens can also be really, uh, kind of attuned to addiction. And fall victim to that. Again, without this level of self-awareness that can happen. And I am a wing seven. And so that means if you're, if you know what your number is, your wing is right next to your number.

[00:31:49] Carrie Lupoli: I've had people say, I'm an eight wing three, and I'm like, you can't be an eight wing three. You're an eight-wing seven or an eight-wing nine, and your wings can change throughout your life, depending on some of your experiences, but [00:32:00] your number will not. And while Dr. Anna and I were working this weekend on her number.

[00:32:05] Carrie Lupoli: She had a hard time figuring it out right away because, as a 58-year-old woman, she feels like she knows herself pretty well, and she's a pretty healthy version of herself. So we had to go back to some of the questions that we were looking at as when she was in her twenties, sort of before she really understood who she was.

[00:32:20] Carrie Lupoli: It had more wisdom, and the wings can change depending on where you are in your life or what's more prominent than another, but your number won't. And so I find, I found myself I am an eight wing seven, and, uh, that seven, that enthusiast to me is what prompted me to decide I'm going to Mexico for a year.

[00:32:42] Carrie Lupoli: I packed up my girls and we moved to Mexico for a year, or my husband stayed home and visited us every six weeks. I wanted them to learn Spanish, and I felt like there was no other way to do it. I, uh, I, I've done a lot of like, kind of impulsive things like that, and I didn't know why. And once I learned the Enneagram, I [00:33:00] realized this is why.

[00:33:01] Carrie Lupoli: And how can I make sure that I'm doing things in a way that's actually serving my life, my purpose, and my body versus things that could be hurting it. So I hope that this gave you just a little bit of an overview of the power of the Enneagram, and it intrigued you enough to be like, okay, I wanna take the next step.

[00:33:18] Carrie Lupoli: So I'm gonna put, uh, a link to. In, our show notes, the previous, uh, two sessions I did with Enneagram, Ashton on the Enneagram links to the books that I've mentioned here. And, uh, just continue to like, dig in. You will innately find a variety of tools. You start looking at the Enneagram. You can search on Instagram and TikTok.

[00:33:40] Carrie Lupoli: It's absolutely fascinating, and you'll never be done learning about it. So, as I always say, wherever you are in your journey, there is a place for you to be able to begin. Just know that there is no ending, and so whether you are on a journey to understand more about you or to become the healthiest [00:34:00] version of you.

[00:34:01] Carrie Lupoli: These are all pieces of the puzzle and the Diet Disruptors podcast that I am focused on truly helping you to understand. So I hope that you find this episode, uh, engaging, and make sure you subscribe because every single week I am here with ways that you can truly take off the corset, put on the ground, and become the healthiest version of yourself.