Customer Reviews

Human Types: Essence and the Enneagram

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

In her latest book, Susan Zannos categorizes all people into just seven simple categories. Each category reveals generic observations that are both profound and useful - as to what they contribute to the psychological, physical, social and spiritual understanding of human beings.

She also takes further steps, explaining how these human types are related to - and communicate with - the solar system in which we live.

This book is noteworthy for its explanations of how different scales - micro-worlds, human beings, and the universe - interact and thereby make man what he is.

The knowledge upon which "Human Types" is based is esoteric, and is understandable at different levels by human beings at different levels.

Perhaps one of the most important conclusions that one can reach, from reading Ms. Zannos' book, is that a human being is no different from a machine. But the book hints and hints and hints at the possibility that a human being can also evolve into something that is not a machine.

It is apparent to this reader that Ms. Zannos is aware of some secrets that are not told - and perhaps cannot be told - in "Human Types."

Although this work is not for all readers, it is for seekers and finders.

Excellent! A five-star plus literary experience.

Reading this has helped to broaden and deepen my understanding of humans in very significant ways. Zannos' book is not only probably the best book on the subject of essence types currently available, it's also one of the best books I've read in the whole area of psychology.

Susan is a long time (over 20 years) personal friend of mine and we have both followed the same spiritual path during this time. Her book is so lucid and easy to understand. She gives a great introductory perspective in the first 3 chapters: Origins, Ancient Wisdom, & Modern Research and then she spends about 250 pages on the subject of Centers and Body Type, two aspects of our human essence. It's filled with easy to understand examples, plus she has photos of real people (most of them I know and can attest to the accuracy of her perceptions from years of my own observations) to illustrate types. This is an amazing book at an amazing price!!! I reccommend it to fellow spiritual travelers all the time, as it is one of the keys to self knowledge. If you don't know who or what you are, how can you become anything more? Go for it!!! Thankyou Susan :-)

I found out about this book three days ago, and I just couldn't believe it. Previously the only book worth reading about the subject (seven types of human essence according to Gurdjieff's system) was Friedlander's, and even so, it was seriously incomplete, although his description of the types was quite detailed and the book made for entertaining reading. This books includes a great wealth of information never before (I think) constructed as an integral whole. If you are a serious student of the Fourth Way system it is undoubtedly a very useful book. Congratulations to Susan Zannos for an extraordinary book. (If this book is translated to Spanish and sold in Mexico there is a lot of people that will find it very interesting.) Written by: a Lunar Intellectual (you'll have to read the book to find out what this means ) :-) ABC.

My boyfriend taught me about this stuff and I didn't believe him that I was a Venus Mercury type. And then I read the book. Jeeze. This is the missing link. Another missing link, the Indigo Crystal children phenomenon. Google that.

This book is definitely worth reading if you are interested in personal development, but it needs to "taken with a grain of salt" for it is incomplete/inaccurate in some ways and has a lot of fourth way baggage. Overall there is a lot to be gained, at least as far as generalizations of certain stereotypical personality types go and once you have read it you will probably start typing people and not be surprised when you hear about the issues they are dealing with.

The inaccuracies I found were subjective and consisted of a few differences in opinion about the body type of a couple of individuals used as references in the book.

There is at least one other type not mentioned in the book, e.g a Uranus type (similar some regards to lunar and Saturn), and this is one reason why certain individuals are almost impossible to pinpoint exactly as one type or another and casts the enneagram into suspicion, though it does work as a vehicle to explain the types mentioned.

Another thing about book is that it is "implanted" in one interpretation of Fourth way system, but really this is totally unnecessarily. Same is true of the intellectually stimulating, but flawed idea of the Four Functions (represented by the deck of cards) that can be explained at so many levels, e.g. a part of a part, etc. that no objectivity is possible and anything observed can be explained in so many different ways that the explanations are totally subjective.

Someone wrote a note in my copy of the book on the front page that says..."Nothing in this book should be taken seriously" I agree, but do feel it is a fun idea and useful shorthand for predicting human behavior and seeing your own tendencies.

Zannos approaches human typology from a variety of perspectives, and ties the Gurdjieff-Ouspensky Fourth Way system to a wide range of cultural, religious, and scientific traditions. She traces roots in Homeric legend and the Olympian pantheon through medieval astrology and the Qabalah, as well as discussing endocrinology and psychology. She points out resonances to C. G. Jung's psychology, the work of Piaget, and to Native American iconography. After exploring the functions, she launches an extensive discussion of the classic types of the Enneagram, leavened by personal anecdote and lively description. While this book will be of special interest to Fourth Way students, the information can help people from all walks of life who want to learn about themselves and the people they care for.

The Enneagram is just not about human types. This is an error introduced from jolly California. The diagram is about the cosmos, about the two great laws that created and sustain the Universe. It was never a tool for typology. Get this straight, dear seekers.