part of the mad dash to the finish line

The Enneagram and the Filipino Psyche

My instinctive answer was that Filipinos are essentially Type Two, or the Giver/ Helper. I sense that Filipinos are Type Two in how they will go out of their way to please the other. The other’s happiness is their happiness. Hence, Filipinos are famous for their hospitality. But helping/ giving is not limited between Filipinos and non-Filipinos. Rather this way of relating takes place between individuals, within families, and within almost all social structures.

Like how food is central to Filipinos. Within families, food is love, and woe to the child or family member who escapes the Filipino mealtime. Also how over-protective parents can be of their children, or how martyred some spouses are. Third is the theorized tagasalo phenomenon, where someone in each family takes on the burden of ensuring the happiness of the others at the expense of themselves.

The Filipinos take pride in their good relations, and see the social network as their source of strength. Hence, the inescapable system that prioritizes the kilala over the di kilala, that enlists numerous pairs of godparents at weddings and baptisms, and the failsafe network that rescues those in need at crises situations. Taken to practical extreme, good relations have also metamorphosed into the palakasan system within institutions that discriminates against strangers even those more capable or as capable.

Perhaps Filipino resiliency and adaptability is also related to being the Helper. Filipinos can transcend the most difficult conditions, and can overcome the most challenging limitations for the sake of loved ones. Take for instance, the overseas workers who brave sand, snow, storm, distance, loneliness and alienation just to ensure that loved ones will have something to live on, or will have some of what their heart desires.

Also, it is probably related that much of the work abroad that Filipinos get into is caregiving work. Filipinos are the nurses, midwives, domestic helpers, entertainers of many countries and many races. Such that it has become common to ask among wealthy foreigners, do you have a Filipina too?

Two’s give love in order to receive love. So that they may be validated, they need to feel useful and giving. When mutuality is not achieved, resentment can erupt. Hence debts are called in: one must pay one’s utang na loob. Or at the very least, the recalcitrant is labeled walang pakisama. Two’s notice when there is insufficient return of investment on their love and care, and can act up or act out.

Of course there is a shorter way to love. It need not come from others, but be a self-replenishing well from within.

In the way that Two’s understand about giving, integrated Two’s come to know that there is abundant love available to all in the Universe, including themselves. This Filipinos can also learn.

Disclaimer: this was a short offhand answer to an exam question, that did not go into detail on the levels of enneagram type two. meaning there are too many hasty generalizations given that the enneagram is empirically established. and actually for each type, there are healthy to unhealthy ways of being, the better to find out how one may grow.

but thought i'd put this out here in the meantime, as food for thought, and come back to it when i have more time to give a more considered answer.