Ann Gadd - The Enneagram of Eating: How the 9 Personality Types Influence Your Food, Diet, and Exercise Choices

Dedication

Thank-you seems such a small offering for all that I have received, but here goes:

To those who have walked the precarious path between weight gain and loss and whose comments weave their way through this book. Heartfelt thanks.

To all the teachers who have inspired my learning, in particular those early teachers who had the courage to first share this wisdom with the world so more of us could benefit from its insights, I am hugely grateful.

And to the Enneagram itself.

I never realized when I first idly picked up The Wisdom of the Enneagrams (Riso/Hudson) all those years ago, what a great and exciting journey awaited me and as a result, how my understanding of self and others would deepen so profoundly. As a regular workshop junkie, I felt in the Enneagrams, I had at last found a path that worked for me. I hope youll find the same.

Acknowledgments

No man or woman is an island.

A long the way I have had the honor to be taught by many teachers, some living and some long since passed on. Many have been authors themselves. Russ Hudson, in particular, whose workshops and writing, together with the late Don Riso, I found inspiring; Sandra Maitri; Pam Roux; Claudio Naranjo; Beatrice Chestnut; Helen Plamer; among othersthank you for sharing your insightful information and teachings with the world. Im grateful, too, to the people I have interacted with, either as friends, pupils, or in the past, as clients. Each relationship has added both depth and richness to my experience of the Enneagram. Thank you, all.

To my editor, Nicky Leach, for saving me from myself and in so doing, making the book so much better and easier to read (and working through my comma fixation with a smile).

To Sabine Weeke and the team from Findhorn Pressyour warmth and humor have been endearing, and its been a pleasure working with you. Thanks also to my publishers for believing in me sufficiently to publish six of my books. Thats a lot of positive reinforcement! Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

To my much-loved family, who have endured my absences with understanding and who have been insightful sounding boards for my ideas, as well as providing valuable inputthank you deeply, Anthony, Tess, and Taun, (supper will now be served...).

To Monika Afdeling (Mons), from the Nine Domains, who went through the book at its early stages and was wonderfully encouraging and supportive.

To the dietitians whose input Ive sought over the past yearsyour patience is commendable, particularly Judith Johnson, who enjoyed the idea when I first shared it with her (and yes, Im still on the green shakes).

To my friends and family: Ruth Bradburn, Glynis and Jamie Hart, Gareth and Coralie Bradburn, Lydia Carstens, Marianne de Jager, Clive Lucas, Terese le Merle Walther, Hazel Trehearn, Jenny Norman, Jenni Normand, Jeanine Nautathank you for being who you are.

And lastly, to the unseen support and inner guidance I have received along the path to completion of this book, which never fails to astound and humble memy grateful acknowledgment.

Prologue

I was born thinso much so that my ribs protruded more than my breasts. In fact, if the measurement around my ribs was a 34C, then my breasts were a 34A. Sadly, I never appreciated my slim body and, as is the case with so many women, focused my feelings and low self-worth on my lack of meaningful breasts.

I maintained my 54-kilo weight until having my first child. From there it was a sticky bun slide downhill, from 55 to 100 kilos in 30 years. No cookies barred.

To reverse the steady accumulation of kilos, over the years I acquired a library of diet books, CDs, and seldom used gym equipment.

• The eat only protein diet.
• The eat according to your blood type diet.
• The eat the way the French do diet.
• The gluten-free diet.
• The listen to tapes and that will kill your desire to eat diet.
• The dietitians sensible eating plan (you are not to use the word diet).
• The cut out all fats diet.
• The eat as much fat as you like diet (but avoid carbohydrates and sugar).
• The count the calories/kilojoules intake diets.
• The cabbage soup diet.
• The coffee diet (my personal favorite).
• Protein shakes.
• Slimming drops.
• Pills to remove your appetite.
• Green tea.
• Herbal drinks (I was an agent).
• Yerba mate tea (and yes, it does taste foul).
• Weight loss clubs.
• Curves.
• Sure Slim.
• Personal trainers.
• Exercise routines.
• Swimming 50100 lengths daily in a 50-meter pool.
• Walking 50 kilometers a week.
• Windsurfing (that really worked, but when motherhood and work demands curtailed activity the weight came pouring back).

I endlessly tried new trends and ideas in the fight against flab. The only reward for all that effort? An extra kilo or two annually.

My bookshelves creaked with advice from various authorities. I waded through volumes as each author expounded about their newfound dieting or eating plan. Granted, many of them did show impressive images of their before and after figures, or those of their followers, while despite various attempts at losing weight, my body remained the same weight in my before photo as the after one. In fact, even though a slight weight loss may occasionally have occurred, within months it had crept back on.

The weight I had disliked 10 years ago now became my goal weight as I attempted yet another diet fad. I watched as friends, using one product or another, slimmed down dramatically, only to expand with even faster speed when they stopped taking the shake, slurping down endless bowls of cabbage soup, popping pills, or subscribing to an eating plan.

I had read that most diets fail hopelessly in the long term and that in 83 percent of cases, weight gain over and above the starting weight is the norm after a year. I had given up on myself, as I suspect many overweight people have.

As a result, I attempted the New Age thinking that I must learn to love myself as I am. Not easy when you look in the mirror and see there is so much more of you to love than you feel good about loving. Success in all other aspects of my life was abundant, yet having spent half my life as a thin person, the weight gain in the second half of my life haunted me daily and ate voraciously at my self-esteem.

About the Enneagram

I was listening to the radio today and heard a woman complaining. She was on a strict diet of no sugar, high protein, and little or no carbohydrates while her office colleague ate stacks of french fries, daily footlong bratwurst hotdogs swimming in sugar-loaded tomato sauce and mustard, and sodas and a variety of sugary snacks in between. Despite this, her colleague remained skinny, while the callers weight seemed to ignore her efforts entirely and stayed in its wobbly place.

I want to give you an insight into why that might be, so that you can view yourself and your desire to lose weight not just being about eating less but understanding that subconscious programming has told your body to desperately hold onto each kilogram, despite your conscious efforts. Key to that understanding is knowing your Enneagram personality type.