The ENNEAGRAM SELF-DISCOVERY WORK BOOK

I always loved doing two things in life: traveling and self-improvement. One time, while I was staying in Paraguay (right in the middle of South America), I met a person who really caught my attention. Now, let me tell you that he was a very... let's say... "disciplined" guy. The people in my town talked about him a lot, and they could NEVER quite wrap their minds around him nor could they understand what went on inside his head. He surely wasn't an ordinary man! He seemed to lack every human aspect that we deem negative. I don't think he even knew what laziness was! Not only that, he achieved everything that ordinary people thought would take YEARS in a very short amount of time. He became a millionaire before 23. He was a two-time gold medalist at the Italian championships of weight-lifting, and he had the best, most supportive friends I could ever imagine. In the town where I was staying, people talked about him a lot. Some said he never slept at night. Some said he was actually a robot or a very well disguised cyborg. Others said that he was the result of a crazy science experiment gone right. Long story short, everyone believed he was superhuman. And, I kind of did too. After learning more about this guy, it became clear that he was completely out of the ordinary! He seemed to have NO bad habits and his will actually seemed unbreakable. I was very intrigued. I wanted to find out more about him. So, I thought of a way I could talk to him, even for one second. Fortunately for me, he was quite predictable. He had a very strict routine and he went out to run every morning at 5:30. It was tough to get myself out of bed, but I finally managed to find him running. I absolutely wanted to get some knowledge from him but I knew I didn't have enough time to start chatting. I ran beside him, and without even thinking, I just asked: "What is the most important thing to know in life?" For a second, he had a surprised look on his face, but then his expression changed. A smile appeared on his face. Without even thinking about it, he replied: "Yourself." He then proceeded to ignore my puzzled look and took off, running faster than ever before. I didn't have the best stamina at the time, so I didn't even try to chase the guy. That day I came home quite confused. "Why did he say that?" I thought to myself. I then thought that if HE said that, it means it must have been something quite vital. That day I did not think about it anymore but his words were stuck in my head and there was no way of getting them out of there. In the next few days, I started to think about my life and about all the goals I had set to myself that I had never achieved. It was gnawing me at the back of my mind to see how much that guy had managed to achieve in just one year while I remained more or less the same over the years. I then realized that this also happened to most people. Very rarely have I seen someone turn their life around 360 degrees and drastically improve themselves. Almost everyone, including me, more or less stayed the same throughout time: same weight, same bank account balance, same kind of friends and romantic partners. The more I thought about it, the more questions I seemed to have. Why is there like an invisible dark force keeping people stuck at the same place? Almost everyone I knew wanted more, but it always seemed impossible to effect change. I knew it wasn't because people wanted to STAY at that level forever (I sure didn't!). Almost everyone I knew wanted a life that was better in at least SOME way. Almost everyone knows (consciously or subconsciously) what they need to do in order to better their lives, but almost no one actually manages to make significant changes. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that every time I made some progress, I always did something that thwarted any further progress! Every time I dieted and worked out for 5 days, there was always an uncontrollable urge to eat unhealthy foods and undo all