Freeing the Lion

Astrologically speaking, I am a Leo.  A Leo I, to be exact, I was born in the Week of Authority.  I have always loved lions and legitimately try to fashion my hair like a lion’s illustrious mane.  And the idea of authority has always been a puzzle to me.  I am deeply respectful of teachers, healers and mentors who are in positions of authority, often blindly bowing to the answers they seem to provide.  However, I have struggled with finding and respecting the authority within, failing to trust my own internal compass, and sense of knowing.  It is difficult to have faith in oneself when you are in the grips of the roar of the inner critic.  For symbolic purpose, I will hereby refer to my inner critic as a lion.  Its characteristics are similar to that of a lion, being strong, powerful and fierce.  And boy, has its roar been loud lately!  So loud, that it has made my essential self ever smaller, to the size of a little mouse.

As a Four, one of my greatest strengths and alternately my greatest weakness is my romantic idealism.  I have incredibly high hopes, high expectations, high ideals, and high romantic visions.  They are so high that they all live above me, in a Kingdom of my own creation, nestled sweetly and safely on a cloud.  I love that Kingdom on a cloud.  I love to look at it and wistfully dream about the one day that I will live there.

A challenge that I have been experiencing, as of late, is questioning on whether I will ever get to those dreams in the sky.  I try to set goals that would be like stepping stones, or Jack’s beanstalk, carrying me little by little up to that pristine palace of romantic vision.  To set goals is not difficult for me.  In fact, they become their very own little castles. 

Let me be specific, a goal I am currently trying achieve is to create a self-care routine that I can commit to on a consistent basis.  It’s a beautiful goal I have for myself, one that includes treating myself with love and respect.  In this dream of a goal, I would be implicitly healthy.  I would wake up early in the morning, excited to meet my day.  I would have a practice of meditation, and gratitude and prayer, being thankful for all that God and the Universe has given to me.  I would treat my body like a goddess, feeding it only those foods that are most life affirming and nutritious.  I would go for long jogs in the park, able to clear my head of negative thoughts.  I would practice yoga, feeling the strength and length of my beautiful body.  I would go for dance classes, feeling free and having fun while letting my heart beat fast.  Oh, this goal of self-care is so beautiful.  But oh, to get there seems so impossible.

So, I have carefully constructed this goal, this dream.  It is pure and untouched and full of endless hope and possibility.  I stand outside of the castled creation, a little mouse underneath the drawbridge door, waiting for it to lower so I can enter.  The lion stands beside me, berating me with its critiques.  Every step I take, the door recedes, eluding my small efforts.  The lion roars loader, taunting me, tearing me down with its claws.  “You are worthless.  You are nothing.  You have no willpower.  You have no strength or courage.  You’ll never achieve what you want.  You’ll never be who you want to be.  You might as well give up.”  And on and on he growls.  The fire of his roar is singeing my little mouse body and I feel completely and utterly useless and powerless. 

I am reminded of the Aesop’s Fable, The Lion and the Mouse.  It was the mouse that rescued the lion from the hunter’s snare, by slowly nibbling away at the ropes, ultimately freeing the lion.  Inspired by the strength that this tiny creature exhibited, I looked up the symbolism of the mouse, and what I found was quite amazing.  The mouse is a symbol of trust in the Divine, of humility and simplicity and gentleness.  It is the mouse that is able to break a large problem (or goal) into smaller pieces and deal with one part at a time, slowly but surely, achieving its goal.

I know my lion has a purpose.  I know its roar comes from a frustration, of wanting to be free, so that I can be my best self.  It is instructing me on what it is that I really want and long for, on what is important to me and why.  In some way, it is encouraging me not to give up.  And I can use the gentleness of the mouse to assuage the lion’s fear and to free it from its ropes of imprisonment.  Not to be crippled by the lion’s grip, or reduced to a puddle of shame by the lion’s shadow, but to treat my inner critic with compassion, as I go about my merry way, taking my sweet time, of slowly and deliciously nibbling towards my dream.  Maybe it won’t be as fast as I want it to be, maybe it won’t be as grandiose as I imagine it to be, but I know for sure, if I can free that lion from off my back, I’ll get there one way or another.

Knowing Your Type

There is great freedom that comes from knowing your type.  In the spring of 2011, I took my first Enneagram Workshop in New Orleans with my mom.  She and I love to talk about personal growth.  (Side note: One of our favorite movies is “When Harry Met Sally,” and we love the scene in the bookstore when Marie [played by Carrie Fisher] says to Sally [Meg Ryan] referencing Harry [Billy Crystal]: ‘There’s a man staring at you in Personal Growth.’)  Anyway, we often trade new books we’ve read, articles we’ve perused, and practices we’ve heard about with each other.  The Enneagram Workshop seemed right up our alley!  

Before the workshop began, I had had difficulty determining my type.  I had taken some of the very lengthy quizzes in various books and online, and kept coming up with different possibilities.  At the start of the workshop, I decided I was a Type Two: The Helper or The Giver.  

I was going through a somewhat stressful time in my life in New York City.  I was working as a waitress in a restaurant, I was frustrated with the lack of acting job opportunities, and my days were structure-free.  I was going home whenever I could get a ticket.  I had no stable romantic relationship in my life.  All in all, I was having trouble committing to myself, and my life in New York. 

I was boundary-less.  If a friend wanted to meet me for coffee or lunch, I would go to their destination of choice.  If I had plans to work on an audition, and got invited to see a movie with someone, I would drop my plans.  I would be overly available to my loved ones, putting my needs aside in favor of others.  It even went so far that when I would sit down for a meal with a friend, I would measure my eating with hers, eating the same quantity and at the same pace as her, in an effort to be on the same page and stay connected.  Relationships were (and still are) pivotal to me…they are my life-blood.  But it was at this time of stress when I went towards my Type Two point.

So, at the workshop, I spent the entire time thinking I was a Two.  The workshop I attended is taught in the Narrative Tradition, meaning we learn about Type by hearing panels of people telling stories of what it means to be their type.  As I sat on the Two panel, I felt the urge to take over, wanting to make it about me, “my stories are so interesting!  Listen to how and why I think I am a Two!”  I noticed that the others on the panel didn’t seem to have that same amount of self-absorption or need to stand out.

Then, it was time for the Type Four Panel: The Individualists.  I looked at them and noticed that they were all wearing similar colors: black and cream, chartreuse, and cherry red.  I looked down at what I was wearing, black jeans, and a cream shirt with geometric designs in black and red.  As they started sharing their stories, I could see in their faces and hear in their voices that little bit of self-satisfaction I recognized in my own sharing.  I also felt drawn into them and the way they described suffering and melancholy, and the ease at which they could hold a space for other’s pain.  A little light bulb went off in my head: That’s where I belong!  With the Fours!

This is not to suggest in any way that all Fours are self-satisfied, self-absorbed sadists.  It has more to do with the Fours desire to stand out, to be different and unique, in order to feel that they are worthy and alive.  After the workshop, I did a little more reading about Type Fours, and my synapses were firing.  Everything seemed to fall into place.  I felt seen and understood.  Parts of me that I’ve known at my subconscious level came flying to a conscious surface. 

A few years ago, I was talking to my friend Lisa, who happens to be a Five.  I was saying to her, “You know how right before you go to bed, you daydream about your ideal life,” assuming she’d jump right in with a resounding, “Oh, totally!”  Instead she said, “No, what are you talking about?”  I was shocked and tried to explain it to her more fully, certain that it would resonate with her.  “You know that moment before you fall asleep, and you close your eyes and think about your perfect future.”  I went on to describe the romantic moments I would daydream about, the beautiful romantic handsome man with dark hair and blue eyes, myself looking like a lithe ballerina in a lovely ethereal dress, the way we would come together in an filmic embrace on a faraway exotic land, complete with fresh, succulent food and warm breezes next to picturesque vistas. Again, she didn’t connect.  It was one of the first wake-up calls I had as to how different other peoples inner worlds could be. 

Once I was finally able to determine my type, I felt known.  It allowed me to truly understand the perspective I was operating from, awareness being the first step towards self-acceptance, self-acceptance being the first step to freedom.