In December, I boarded a plane and flew across the world to visit my mom for the holidays so I thought it would be a good time to focus on family dynamics. Family can push even the most evolved of us to the brink of insanity. Case in point? My mom thinks I’m a spy.
It all began earlier this year when I was having a call with my Social Type 3 mother. We had covered all our regular news and were about to hang up when she dropped the bombshell.
“My friend Mishi asked me if you might be a spy for the United States government.”
Stunned, I said nothing.
She continued “And I asked my friend George, and he agreed it is possible..”
In a flash I understood not only does my mom suspect I’m a spy for the US government, but she’s discussed the possibility with her entire friend group.
And here is where I misstepped.
Rather than deny it (for the record, I’m not a spy), I laughed and asked her what she thought I could possibly be spying on here in Greece. I forgot to say I’m not a spy, and now it’s too late to undo it. She thinks I am.
But let’s unpackage what’s really going on. My mom is a Social Type 3 and that means her social ranking within her community is front and center in her mind. I’m her only daughter, and I’m difficult to explain. I’ve never been married, I don’t have kids, and I left California and moved to Greece for reasons no one can really pinpoint. I live a colorful, untraditional life that doesn’t fit into any of the clear boxes of what a “successful” daughter would look like. But…if I were a spy, everything would fall into place. I would be the cool espionage daughter spying for the US government and by extension, she would be cool since she’s my mom.
And then I thought about it more… She knows I went to Egypt earlier this year, and I’ve spoken before about a trip I took to Beirut. I’m extremely fit– she’s even seen pictures of me crawling commando style under barbed wire (it was for a Sparta race, not a spy mission..).. My dad was in the defense industry and had classified security clearance so we sort of have a family history of spying.. It isn’t so much of a stretch to imagine.
I can only imagine the conversations we will have during my four day visit to her home. She’ll ask me about my flight, and I’ll have to share that I had a one day layover in Istanbul. I was taking a walking tour to see the city, but she’ll think I was meeting with Erdogan…
I share all this just to say that learning the Enneagram type of your family members makes these situations significantly better. You will take all that crazy behavior way less personally…
And this is a nice time to remind you that I offer Enneagram typing interviews. ❤️