Today, I want to talk to you about the health patterns for the Ennea Type 1 personality, the “Perfectionist”.
What we see with the Type 1, when they come in, is this is a serious hard-working kind of person, and they come in to the acupuncture clinic for some pretty classic examples of what in Chinese medicine we call “Liver Qi Stagnation”.
Qi is our energy, so the Qi of the liver, the energy of the liver is stagnated. This is a classic condition for people with a lot of drive but who feel a lot of frustration.
Types 1 are people who are holding themselves to high standards all the time, and we talked in the past about the feelings of resentment that come up for the Type 1 because they are holding themselves to much higher standards than other people.
So, feelings of frustration, resentment, anger… these impact the liver more than any other organ in the body. The liver, its job is to detoxify, and you know what, our emotions can be toxic as much as food in the environment can be toxic and the liver has to work overtime to process all that.
According to Chinese medicine, what are some typical examples of Liver Qi Stagnation, Type 1 can tell you all about them. It really has a lot to do with closing down the diaphragm. We are not breathing deeply into the belly or kind of hold ourselves real tight.
We see a lot of problems in the upper half of the body; we see jaw tension, nagging shoulder, grinding the teeth, TMJ. So, lots of tightness.
In Chinese Medicine, we call this temperament “Metal” temperament of the five elements. The Metal, which is rigid, it’s stiff, but at the same this is our structure and our foundation right. These are the people who hold the principles to our society so we want to help them feel more relaxed in their body.
Additionally, a lot of 1s are athletes and we see a lot of sports injuries for the Type 1. On the one hand, being athletic really helps the 1 discharge their tension; on the other hand, again that liver aspect that I was mentioning before can also lead to dryness in the body.
The liver and the gall bladder works as a team to keeping the tendons moist and so when the liver is getting hot and inflamed, because you’re feeling hot inflammatory feelings, we actually see the tendons start to dry out of the body, and we can see a lot of hip, knee and ankle problems for the Type 1.
So, these are some of the examples of what I might be treating a patient for. Acupuncture is absolutely going to help them feel better but at the same time, it might be worthwhile to spend a couple of minutes talking with the Type 1 about how they can be more relax in their body… Make sure they are breathing all the way down into the belly… Keeping an eye on his resentful, angry thoughts and try to keep themselves and talk about “Am I judging too much?” “Am I feeling resentful too often”… and working on these feelings amazingly can reduce the headaches the TMJ, the tension in the body.
If you are interested in trying acupuncture and coming in for your ailment, please give us a call at Lightworks Acupuncture.
Candice Thomas, Licensed Acupuncturist, Enneagram Teacher
Owner of LightWorks Acupuncture, a Holistic Medical Center
To learn more about the Enneagram and how it can help you in understanding your temperament and living a more fulfilled life, subscribe to our YouTube channel and call us for an appointment at (520) 318-5560!
