We all love a good redemption story. The sympathetic hero or heroine’s normal, unexamined life is suddenly hijacked by unforseen events triggering a series of personal ordeals that challenge body, mind, and spirit, until the besieged protagonist, spiraling ever downward, is overwhelmed and nearly defeated by a combination of inner flaws and outer circumstance. With everything to lose, and teetering toward a tragic end, our hero suddenly, through grit or grace, wakes up and smells the bitter coffee of his or her own making. Rising from the burning ashes of their particular Passion, they ascend to a hard-won reformation of character, a renaissance of spirit – and possibly a hot new love interest.

Viewing extensive, entertaining film clips from three illustrative Hollywood movies — featuring one protagonist from each of the three Centers — we’ll see how an Enneagram type’s egoic compulsions and drives can lead to a character’s moral and psychological unraveling, and also how waking from the typespecific trance of personality can liberate our essential nature.

We’ll track our heroes’ descent into the depths of folly and despair, then see how they use the inner resources of their dominant type (and Direction of Integration), to climb back up and spiritually rematerialize, shaken but victorious in unexpected ways and newly able to express the melody of their Enneagram type in a higher octave.

Gayle Scott is a native of Los Angeles with a twenty-five year career in film and television production. Director of the Enneagram Institute of Colorado, she is a certified senior teacher and faculty member of the Riso/Hudson Enneagram Institute, and teaches Enneagram Institute trainings and workshops in the US and around the world. Gayle relocated to Boulder, Colorado, in 2002 to pursue her ongoing psycho spiritual studies in the Ridhwan/Diamond Approach school. She has served on the IEA Global Board of Directors since 2005, and is also on the Board of Directors of the IEA – USA Affiliate. She is Co-director of the 2010 IEA San Francisco conference.