Listen now for fresh insight into practical faith for everyday life—and get ready to be inspired to ask new questions, try new practices, and rediscover joy in your faith journey.
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Navigating spiritual growth through the Enneagram with Hunter Mobley on Compass: Finding spirituality in the everyday. Hunter shares his personal journey from evangelical "five-step spirituality" to a deeper, more contemplative faith that sees spiritual practices as pathways to soul transformation. Discover how the Enneagram can help unearth your truest self, why letting go is key to spiritual growth, and how simplicity makes space for the surprise of the Spirit to show up in unexpected ways.
Hunter Mobley is an Enneagram teacher, author, attorney, and former pastor who brings deep insight and compassion to his work. He apprenticed under renowned Enneagram teacher Suzanne Stabile. His book, Letting Go, Finding You (2025), explores the Enneagram’s transformative power in helping individuals release limiting patterns and embrace their true essence.Episode Notes:
In this episode:
[00:00] "Journey to Soul-Centered Spirituality"
[03:44] Evolving from Task-Oriented Spirituality
[07:55] Evolving Faith and Personal Journey
[12:01] Enneagram: Path to Inner Transformation
[18:35] "Embracing Mutual Vulnerability"
[19:32] Enneagram's Deeper Truths Revealed
[22:54] Enneagram's Intelligence Centers Explained
[27:00] Enneagram and Spirituality Fusion
[34:43] Renewed Energy and Gratitude
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This episode posted on April 30, 2025
Episode Transcript:
Ryan Dunn [00:00:01]:
Hi, and welcome to Compass Finding Spirituality in the Everyday. My name is Ryan Dunn. I got to sit down with Hunter Mobley, author, spiritual teacher, and Enneagram expert to explore the journey from performance driven faith to a soul centered spirituality. Hunter opens up with us about his roots in evangelical and Pentecostal Christianity, the burnout that inspired his shift toward a more contemplative spiritual life, and how discovering the Enneagram became a pathway to deeper self awareness and transformation. Together, we discussed the ways our personalities shape our spiritual practices and why letting go is central to true interchange and how simplifying life creates space for the surprising movement of the spirit. Whether you're new to something like the Enneagram or you've been on your own journey of spiritual deconstruction, this conversation is an invitation to explore the beauty of living from the soul and embracing the holy in everyday moments. If conversations like this are valuable to you, do us a kindness and leave a rating and review on your podcast listening platform. That really helps us connect with other potential podcast guests and helps us to understand what's important to you, our listener.
Ryan Dunn [00:01:26]:
Hunter Mobley's book is Letting Go Finding You. You can find out all about Hunter Mobley and check out more resources on the Enneagram at huntermobley.com. So let's meet Hunter here on the Compass podcast. Well, Hunter, thanks for joining us in what's been a little bit of a crazy season around Nashville. We've been awfully wet. How is your internal state? How goes it with your soul?
Hunter Mobley [00:01:54]:
Thank you, Ryan. I'm so glad to be joining you. I appreciate the invitation to be on this podcast. I am I'm excited. My internal state is is pretty pretty enthusiastic in this moment. There's just a lot of good work to do, good work that I'm having the opportunity to do and excited to to get this book out into the world that we're talking about some today. So in the midst of a strange cultural zeitgeist moment where where so much is happening around us in our families, in our community, in our culture, in our church, in our world, there is a a sense of inner joy and excitement as well. So, I guess I'm I'm kinda sitting in the in the balance of all those things, but excited to be here with you today.
Ryan Dunn [00:02:36]:
Cool. Well, thank you. Speaking of the book and some of the names that you check-in there, it's clear to me that we share some some modern day influences. Like, I was reading about Barbara Brown Taylor and Brian McLaren. However, I think our our Christian spiritual backgrounds may differ slightly because you open up the book and talking about five point spirituality. Yes.
Hunter Mobley [00:02:58]:
And I
Ryan Dunn [00:02:58]:
don't know what that is. So was that a big part of your spiritual development?
Hunter Mobley [00:03:02]:
Yeah. You know, what I what I describe as five step spirituality in the book is really a a way of kinda making meaning to the evangelical Pentecostal background that I I grew up in. So I was raised in Southern Baptist Church, I migrated at some point toward more of a Pentecostal experience where I had the opportunity to pastor a Pentecostal church for six years in the Nashville area. But, really, when I when I talk in the book about five step spirituality, I think so much of my spiritual background in life was really about sort of this take the hill. We're gonna do big things for God. We're gonna figure out what the steps are. It's gonna be really hard. You know? Buckle up, buckle in, but it's gonna be amazing.
Hunter Mobley [00:03:44]:
And and that was really so much of the the spiritual ethos that came from my evangelical experience. And so I I you know, I think a lot of my spiritual past was I thought, gosh. I gotta work really hard and try to do some big things for God, and I gotta try to figure out all the the ways and the steps. And we're gonna go up the hill, and it's gonna be tough, but it's gonna be exciting. And, and so, right, I found myself late in the game to more of a contemplative approach to spirituality, integrating some other ideas of thinking about matters of the soul and matters of of spiritual practice. And so I've had to unlearn a lot of the what for me was more of an ego driven sense of, hey, you know, thank goodness that that, you know, God's got me here to do some really big things for him. And that's kinda what I, you know and and hopefully a a way that's relatable and also a way that we can find our own pathway into describe as that five step spirituality that that characterized so much of my life really before a contemplative journey began.
Ryan Dunn [00:04:55]:
You know? Okay. So, actually, I feel like I do share that kind of spiritual life, at least in having that expectation of, needing to do the work. Yeah. And and if big things aren't happening, this is where the trap comes in. You talk about it being ego driven, then I must be missing something. Like, my faith isn't enough. It it says some of what you started to run up against.
Hunter Mobley [00:05:17]:
Yes. Absolutely. And I think I think, Ryan, I imagine from any of our kind of Christian spiritual backgrounds, all of us that are in the American South and in just The United States are are steeped in some version of this sort of take the hill, the the the chart is always going up, kind of method and mentality to spirituality. And ultimately, you know, there's everything contains its opposite. I mean, that's certainly what the Enneagram teaches us. I think that's what a lot of spirituality teaches us. There there's two things can be true. Everything contains its opposite.
Hunter Mobley [00:05:54]:
There's a lot of wonderful things that that I experienced in my faith life growing up and and in my early adulthood. But I think that what was under tended to and underdeveloped were matters of the soul and really matters of fundamental personal self transformation. So, you know, there was so much that I I think I was felt like I needed to do for God.
Ryan Dunn [00:06:21]:
Mhmm.
Hunter Mobley [00:06:21]:
And, there a lot of that was misguided as well in in hindsight. But even the good impulse of that may have been producing or trying to produce good fruit in some way, but the soul still remains kinda untended to. And so that's where I really found myself in in a stage where I needed to explore spirituality that was was committed to looking at the inner life and the inner witness and seeing what was really going on with my soul and the development of my soul. And that's where I found my my path and my my journey toward contemplation.
Ryan Dunn [00:07:04]:
What inspired that shift in mindset? Were you burning out?
Hunter Mobley [00:07:08]:
All sorts of things. Burning up, burning out, burning through. You know? Goodness, Ryan. So many things. I'll say some personal things and some kind of larger corporate things. For one, I was pastoring a large evangelical megachurch in its second life, meaning that in a season where sort of the big parade had passed by. And so what what we were what we were always tasked with doing from our congregants and sort of even just from ourselves as leaders of this church was feeling like, where can we find the new rabbit to pull out of the hat to turn the clock back to be 1993 again?
Ryan Dunn [00:07:54]:
Yeah.
Hunter Mobley [00:07:55]:
And, of course, you know we all know that there is no rabbit to pull out of the hat to turn the clock. And and also, at the same time, thank goodness, there's no rabbit to pull out of the hat to turn the clock back to 1993 again. But so I've been I've been spending so many years just trying to figure out how could we restart, and reignite this kind of evangelical mega experience in a way that we had it ten or fifteen years ago? And, man, it just beat me up, and and I was tired because, you know, there are it's really a futile experiment, because world evolves, churches evolve, neighborhoods have evolved, Nashville's evolved, faith has evolved, all it's good. You know, we we all there's so much good in all that. And then personally, Ryan, I was on a a personal journey of self exploration of my own personal life, my own sexuality. I've been, you know, a person who'd been raised in a very traditional context and had had to suppress my own just inner sense of my sexuality as a gay man. And at some point in life, it just I kinda looked up and thought, why am I doing this? What what is all this about? What is all this for? So I'd say things in in the cultural zeitgeist, in the church that I was serving and had served in my personal life in the world as I watched our country move more toward a Christian nationalism, iteration that just didn't resonate with my worldview or spirit or so. All those things just made what I had felt so committed to in conservative, evangelical, Pentecostal spirituality in my first thirty years of life just feel like they no longer rang true for me.
Hunter Mobley [00:09:55]:
And so I found myself, like so many of us, in kind of that deconstructing reconstructing world, and, I still felt fundamentally compelled by the Christian story and the Christian experience and the life and the witness of Jesus and the way of Jesus. And so I wasn't ready to just throw it all out, but I felt compelled to to discover and discern if there was another way that I could hook into that story and that experience that was different from the way that I had hooked into it in the past.
Ryan Dunn [00:10:30]:
Well, tell me about coming to the Enneagram movement, the Enneagram mindset. It's it's, your work now is so ensconced in that area. So It is. When did that come about?
Hunter Mobley [00:10:43]:
Well, you know, it's kinda perfect. So I Ryan, I'm an Enneagram two. And so, any your listeners who follow the Enneagram will know that Enneagram twos are relationship people. We're we're connectors. We like to make relationships. We like to meet people. And, you know, that's our blessing and our curse in many ways. But so the way that I was first introduced to the Enneagram was through a relationship.
Hunter Mobley [00:11:06]:
I was seated at a dinner table next to Suzanne and Joe Stabile in Boca Grande, Florida, and I'd never heard the word Enneagram. We'd never met each other. We were just simply seated by friends next to each other at a dinner party. And as an Enneagram two myself, sitting next to an Enneagram two, Suzanne Stabile, who I later come to know what twoness means. We just naturally connected, and, we became friends. And that friendship continued beyond that evening, and it was through that friendship that, you know, what do you do for a living? What do you what do you teach? And I heard the word Enneagram for the first time. So, it's kinda funny and, I think, perfect for me that as an Enneagram too, I came to a knowledge and an awareness of this tool, really, first through a friendship. And and, Ryan, it resonated with me.
Hunter Mobley [00:12:01]:
Once I learned the Enneagram, it resonated with me as something that was true and something that I needed. And it's connected to all that we've talked about so far because so much of my life was disconnected from sort of an inner journey for many reasons. One, I was afraid to take too deep of an inner journey of what would I find and what conclusions would I come to, and then what would what would that mean that I was invited to bear out, and how would that, connect me or disconnect me with communities that I've been a part of. And and so, you know, I was hungry for that, but but frightened of that in some ways. And the Enneagram just invites us inside. It's a tool that invites us to go look inside and mine a little bit deeper what's there. And, ultimately, I think the Enneagram has the potential, if we will let it, to lead us deeper inside to actually rediscover and become reacquainted with the things of the soul. And and so that's why I'm passionate about it, and that's why I teach it now and travel the country and and speak to people about it because I think that it's a tool that has the potential for personal and soul transformation.
Ryan Dunn [00:13:19]:
We talk about the Enneagram fairly consistently on this podcast, but never with in-depth. Like, most of the time, it's just coming out as our guests come on. They'll say, oh, well, I'm an Enneagram number blank. I'm an Enneagram nine, by the way. But for for the uninitiated or the under, under underexposed, could you give us kind of a brief overview of of Enneagram?
Hunter Mobley [00:13:44]:
Absolutely. The Enneagram is is really a personality system, not unlike some of the others. Lots of people have encountered or bumped up against some of the Myers Briggs or strength finder or DISC or Berkman, or are you an Otter, Tiger, Lion, Golden Retriever? You know? Go I'm raising my hand with the Golden Retriever. And, all of those systems are really interesting and good and have something to give us. They all really give us a language for describing things about the way that we see and the way that we respond and the way that we interact with other people. What is interesting and I think compelling about the Enneagram is the Enneagram really comes to us as one of those systems with a basis in, spirituality. Really, in many ways, the Enneagram is based upon the nine passions by one of the desert mothers or fathers of Agarus Ponticus, who is doing work in the third and fourth century around nine different ruling forces that sort of trip us up more often than than others. So, we've come to kinda know these nine passions really as the seven deadly sins plus two.
Hunter Mobley [00:14:51]:
Mhmm. You know, they're sort of in our in our language, in our cultural speak. Here's what's interesting and and worth exploring about the Enneagram to me. The Enneagram says, okay. We're gonna talk to you about personality, nine different ones. Nine different ways of seeing, nine different ways of interacting, nine different ways of being motivated that are based upon those nine passions along with other kind of foundation stones that we could talk about, wounding, childhood messages, all sorts of things. But it says, we're gonna talk to you about personality because we actually believe there's something deeper to you than just personality. We believe you have a soul, an essence, a true self.
Hunter Mobley [00:15:32]:
Self. Whatever language feels right to you. As Christians, we might use language from the Bible and say the Christ in you are the Christ in me. The image of God that we bear. There's a truer iteration of each of us. And so the Enneagram comes to say, let's look at personality as a way of discovering whether that personality is sort of right sized or maybe whether it's oversized. Mhmm. And if we can explore it and get it to a place where it's a little bit right or sized, maybe not so oversized, then we actually have the potential to move through personality at moments and get to matters of the soul so that you and I, Ryan, in maybe fleeting moments of our day could have a soul to soul interaction, not just a personality to personality interaction.
Hunter Mobley [00:16:23]:
So I say all that to say what I think is compelling and interesting and fundamentally powerful about the Enneagram is it stands alone as a personality system that says, hey, we're talking about personality, not because we care all that much about personality, but because we care about the soul. And we want to we want to explore personality as a way of of moving through it to some deeper truer things, to some true self, to some essence, to some soul.
Ryan Dunn [00:16:52]:
So would you say it's a way of maybe identifying, kind of like a spiritual vision or a divine vision for your life?
Hunter Mobley [00:17:05]:
It is. It's a way of well, to actually take that one step deeper, you know, I talked about the passions. Mhmm. There's a passion for each number, and that's really the language of personality. Yeah. The passions are anger and pride and the deceit and envy and greed and fear and gluttony and lust and sloth. And so one of those is is typed to each of the nine Enneagram numbers, and it really describes sort of what kind of trips us up in our personality most often. On the flip side, there's there's these nine virtues.
Hunter Mobley [00:17:43]:
And if you look at the virtue for each number, it's the opposite of the passion. Okay? So look at me for a second. I'm a two. My passion is pride, which is all about me as a two sort of wanting to under identify and represent my own need and overplay my role as, you know, the the savior, fixer, helper of the world. You know? Isn't it so good that I don't need anything today so that I can help you with all the things that you need? That's what that's pride for an Enneagram two. Well, the virtue for Enneagram two is humility. Pride and humility are opposites. They're really the 180 degree paradox of one another.
Hunter Mobley [00:18:21]:
Humility for Enneagram two is really my invitation to say, you know what? Ryan, I'm just as messed up as you. Not not saying, you know, I know your your paper, but, you know, I have to
Ryan Dunn [00:18:33]:
We've already established that.
Hunter Mobley [00:18:35]:
I'm just as messed up as you. And so let me share with you my problems and desires and fears and dreams, and you share with me your problems and fears and desires and dreams, and let's have a mutual reciprocal relationship that's not elevated by me putting myself in the seat of the helper or the fixer. That's humility for me as a two. Ryan, you as a nine, the the passion is sloth, but the the virtue is action. Well, sloth and action are are opposites as well. When you when you see the mystery Enneagram that the passions and the virtues are opposites of one another, what you learn from that is the virtue is connected to the soul, while the passion is connected to personality. The virtue is the truer thing. The personality and the passion is the false thing.
Hunter Mobley [00:19:32]:
Not bad and not not in a moral inventory sort of way false, just the opposite of true. And so the Enneagram comes to say, Ryan, even though you describe yourself as an Enneagram nine and you would use the language maybe of passion and personality to tell somebody how you see and how you're motivated and how you show up in the world. The deeper truth is that you're actually the opposite of that. Hunter, as an Enneagram too, even though I would come and talk about all this Tunis and all this pride stuff is how my personality shows up, the deeper truth is at the soul level, I'm the opposite of
Ryan Dunn [00:20:11]:
that. Okay.
Hunter Mobley [00:20:12]:
And that's the gift and the grace that the Enneagram can offer us to see that you are not your personality. In many ways, you are fundamentally the opposite of what your personality bears out. Now we've forgotten that because we've fallen in love with our personalities. We've come to rely on them. And so the Enneagram comes to us and invite us back to a process of rediscovery of who we really are.
Ryan Dunn [00:20:43]:
So it'd be fair to say then that I'll feel most alive or most, most spiritually connected when I am taking action
Hunter Mobley [00:20:53]:
Yes.
Ryan Dunn [00:20:54]:
Opposed to Exactly.
Hunter Mobley [00:20:55]:
It it exactly. Action is so fundamentally true about you. It's the most precious and vulnerable true thing about you. So in response to the world's trouble, which we encounter from day one, you learned to protect it and to hide it away. And what do we protect things with and hide them away with? Well, we protect them with their opposite. Opposite. So many times what we project is the opposite of what's true. And we've done that so long we kind of forgot.
Hunter Mobley [00:21:25]:
So I forgot that humility was there. You forgot that action really fundamentally was there. But as we find our way back toward those matters of the soul, you're exactly right, that's when we will feel most truly alive and most truly aligned with matters of the holy and vocation and fundamental calling.
Ryan Dunn [00:21:52]:
Well, in addition to talking about the enneagram fairly regularly, we we often share spiritual practices on this podcast. And, in letting go finding you, you you give a number of spiritual practices as examples in your work, in consultation with, people through this process. Do you find that certain Enneagram types lean towards certain spiritual practices?
Hunter Mobley [00:22:18]:
Absolutely. You know, we all kinda have we all have spiritual practices, I would say, in our Enneagram type that are easier for us or more accessible to us. And then we all have ones that are like, oh, gosh. You know, I hopefully, no one ever invites me to do that one. And and both of those pathways have something to offer us. Right? You know, there there's something for us in the practices that feel just like a warm cup of coffee, you know, on a rainy day in an armchair. Mhmm. And there's something for each of us in the practices that we just resist.
Hunter Mobley [00:22:54]:
So I think, Ryan, that where that comes up most often is it comes up really in the centers of intelligence that are associated and ordered within each of our Enneagram numbers. So we talk about with the Enneagram that each of us has thinking, feeling, or doing to rely on all day long. But based on our Enneagram number, one of those is sort of in first place, and one of those, it comes in last place. And so for each of us, there's one of thinking, feeling, or doing that we sort of rely on most, and then there's one of thinking, feeling, or doing that we sort of lives in the basement and we kind of pick up the least. And so I think for each of us in our Enneagram type, you know, I'm a two, so feeling sort of comes up first for me, and thinking lives in the basement. So that means, you know, any spiritual practices that kinda tap into art and beauty and feeling and transcendence and awe and reverence, you know, those things, man, I'm ready to hook into them. And I love them, and and I'm here for it. Spiritual practices that challenge my ways of thinking or that challenge me to think about things that are broader than just relationships and people and conversations and matters of the heart are a little bit less explored by me, but I need both.
Hunter Mobley [00:24:23]:
So I we all have that in our numbers. So if you, in your number, just look at and you can find it, you know, anywhere. What is the center of intelligence that's dominant for you and what's repressed for you? That's gonna give you some clues to what is both most accessible to you in spiritual work and also what maybe you're invited to go pick up in spiritual practice work.
Ryan Dunn [00:24:52]:
So, Hunter, what's a spiritual practice that you've been leaning into lately?
Hunter Mobley [00:24:57]:
Well, the number one one that I've been leaning into lately because I need it the most, and I kind of think we all need it the most, is centering prayer. It's hard for me because it challenges my thinking. Yeah. You know, in centering prayer, you sit for twenty minutes in a chair and you let go of thoughts and you settle your you settle on an intention to be totally open to the presence and activity of God that is unseen, and then you release thoughts for twenty minutes, and then you get up and you walk away. And you you don't seek or attach to the idea that, you know, this is gonna be my great moment of epiphany, or this is when I'm gonna finally figure out all the answers to all the questions I've been stewing over forever. Actually, if if epiphany comes, you let it go just like all the other thoughts. Well, that's hard for me because, my thought life is so occupied by people and what I need to do and what I said wrong and what I could do better and how I could who I need to connect with. And it's hard for me to to sit there and let the thoughts pass by like boats in a stream, and so I I need it.
Hunter Mobley [00:26:05]:
I want it. It's hard for me. It's one that I'm I teach a a cohort each year in Dallas on contemporary spirituality. So in that cohort right now between our last gathering and this gathering, we're focusing on centering prayer. So that's that's part of why I'm focused on that one especially. But that's one that I I offer that one to everybody as sort of the fundamental building block for contemplative spiritual practice. Start there. Start with five minutes, in a chair with an intention releasing thought, not looking for epiphany.
Hunter Mobley [00:26:39]:
And, I think that's kind of one of the ones that sort of is a building block for all the others.
Ryan Dunn [00:26:48]:
It's a great introduction to that, need to let go as well because as you mentioned, there's no result expected of No result. Prayer. Right? So and Well
Hunter Mobley [00:27:00]:
and and, Ryan, that's really why you know, it's funny. When I wrote this book, by the end of it, I was like, I don't know if I wrote an Enneagram book or if I wrote a contemplative spirituality book. And and and then I realized, oh, okay. Maybe that was the point. And it's because the first years that I was doing work with the Enneagram, I was still in kind of what we we talked about at the beginning is that sort of, you know, take the hill, you know, do big things for God, figure out, you know, the next conference, the next book, the new guru, kind of Christianity. And when we bring that approach to Enneagram work, when we're trying to, you know, okay, what can I do? What are the five steps I can make today as a two to be healthy? All we've done is is just layer on more personality because I'm still in charge. I'm still in control. I'm still trying to figure out what I can do in my ego to find change or transformation.
Hunter Mobley [00:27:51]:
So what I what I realized along the way is this isn't doing anything. You know, this is interesting, but it's not changing me from the inside out. And and so I realized that, woah, woah, woah. I I need a I don't need an active spiritual approach. I need a contemplative spiritual approach that's about going inside and letting go. That's about less, not more. That's about releasing, not taking on. That's the spiritual approach and the spiritual ethic that I believe fundamentally can lead toward the transformation that the Enneagram points to.
Hunter Mobley [00:28:24]:
So I I really believe these two tools, if you will, contemplative spirituality and Enneagram wisdom, are both not just tools that run on parallel tracks, but they're interwoven, interdependent. I don't fundamentally believe you can do any good work in the Enneagram on yourself through kind of a I'm gonna fix myself. I'm gonna figure it out. I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna do big things for God approach. I think the only way that we let the Enneagram lead us towards transformative soul growth and work is through saying, woah. I gotta I gotta shed some layers here. I gotta strip all of off all of this crap.
Hunter Mobley [00:29:07]:
I've gotta go deeper inside. I've got to let personality be released so that what is living behind it and beyond it, which is virtue, true self, soul, can actually begin to shine again.
Ryan Dunn [00:29:24]:
Well, less is more. We're in a season of of less is more. As we're recording this, it's the Lenten season, which people often observe by, practicing fasting, letting go of things. And you've tied simplicity with, part of letting go. Tell us a little bit about how you're practicing simplicity in these days.
Hunter Mobley [00:29:47]:
Yeah. You know, simplicity is one of the spiritual practices that I need the most. I need it in every area of life. And I you know, what I what I found for myself is I can practice simplicity in some really ways that seem very mundane but are still spiritually fruitful for me. So, like, here's a silly little way that I practice simplicity in this season. You know, we all have a closet of clothes that we wear, and this is a one thing that I've done in this season is I've just kinda you know, in this season, I'm I'm I'm not gonna I I I'm not gonna look at all these. I'm not gonna draw from all you know, I need to put half of these up. I I'm just I'm just gonna draw from these.
Hunter Mobley [00:30:27]:
Mhmm. Now that's a very little thing, Ryan. That's very specific to just a moment in my life. But it's any way that we can say, you know what? I'm gonna declutter life a little bit so that my attention and focus is freed to be on maybe some things that are different from what it traditionally is on. So sometimes in my office at home, I just I have to, like, take pictures off the wall. I have a sense of I've kind of a tendency to sort of, like, surround myself with totems and tobias
Ryan Dunn [00:31:00]:
and, you
Hunter Mobley [00:31:01]:
know, and and I'm just kinda oriented that way. And sometimes that's you know, I need a reset. I need to strip all this away. I need to look at the white walls for a little while and observe a simpler moment. I can do that in the way that I eat. I can do that in the way that I spend money. I can do that in my physical environment. It's a little thing, but it's a way that we can fast, And it's it's a way that I think our environment or our body can bear witness to really more of a soul principle of less is more.
Hunter Mobley [00:31:40]:
We don't need all the things that we have. When we have so much in our environment, in our eyesight, in our bodies, we are distracted. We are full in every way that we can be full, which allow which doesn't allow surprise, doesn't allow curiosity.
Ryan Dunn [00:32:02]:
Tell me a little bit about that surprise. How is simplicity, an invitation to surprise?
Hunter Mobley [00:32:09]:
You know, surprise is one of my favorite spiritual words, and it's kind of one of the parts of Pentecostalism that I keep. I think there are so many wonderful pieces of the Pentecostal charismatic tradition in in Christianity. And, like all iterations of Christianity, there's some harm too. But the the beauty is that in the Pentecostal charismatic tradition, there is an openness to the idea that today, I may walk out my door, and I may think that I know everything that's gonna happen today. I may think I know where I'm gonna go and who I'm gonna meet and what I'm gonna do and what I'm gonna accomplish, but maybe, just maybe, I'll be surprised. Mhmm. That's really the fundamental ethos behind the Pentecostal charismatic tradition, and it it it also is the fundamental ethos behind mysticism and contemplation. That transcendence all the holy will surprise us.
Hunter Mobley [00:33:09]:
It's around every corner. It's around every turn. God is under every rock. And so one of the ways that we posture our souls and our bodies for surprise is by freeing up space and room and time. You know, if every moment in my mind and in my day is full, full, full, full, full, well, I'm probably gonna miss a lot of the opportunity for surprise. And so that's how all this to me connects. That's how simplicity, subtraction, fasting also connects to the beauty of surprise and and charisma and mysticism and contemplation. It's all really it's a one thing.
Ryan Dunn [00:34:03]:
Have you felt a sense of surprise lately?
Hunter Mobley [00:34:06]:
You know, I have. I, so I have MS. That's just a a little part of my journey. And I as part of having MS, I have treatments every six months where I go in for kind of a full day of infusions. And, because I go in only every six months for that infusion, you know, by month four or five, you know, it's worn off, and I'm kinda in the tank. So for me, the month of February and most of March this year was I felt horrible. I was exhausted. I was just I was full up in every way.
Hunter Mobley [00:34:43]:
I I didn't really have any physical capacity for much. A couple weeks ago, you know, it was that kind of twice a year, six months sort of thing that I I do. And, man, I feel like a new person. Well, that's a little bodily example. You know, that's connected obviously to my body and my health experience, but it's been also a spiritual reminder of, oh my goodness. The world is in color again, and, and I I have energy again. And it's made me grateful for all of that. And so I've I've I've I've kind of the last couple weeks, I'm full of you know, I'm kinda ready to I've I it's I had gotten so used to not feeling good that I am ready to be surprised at every turn.
Hunter Mobley [00:35:32]:
Right. So, yeah, I I really Ryan, I am committed to still that Pentecostal charismatic tradition in many ways that, I carry with me from my past. And so my just way of seeing in the world is I really I walk out the door and I'm thinking, what the world am I gonna experience today? Who in the world am I gonna meet today? It's probably gonna be crazy and unexpected. I sort of live with that idea in mind, and I try to as well. You know, it's it's also a discipline to live with that idea in mind.
Ryan Dunn [00:36:12]:
Well, for folks who want to get to know you a little bit better, Hunter, or, check out some more of your work, is is your website a good starting place for that?
Hunter Mobley [00:36:20]:
It's a good start. Every you can kinda find me anywhere, a website, social media, enneagramhunter, enneagram hunter Com and enneagram hunter kind of social handles. And, you can also find me at Life in the Trinity Ministry. That that website, that's Joe and Suzanne Stabille's ministry. I teach a year long cohort with them in Dallas each year. And you the work that really we've talked about today, the work that I'm talking about in the book is the work that we do with 40 people each year in a in a year long experience there in Dallas. So I invite people to check that out and and think about if if you might feel led to come join us one year.
Ryan Dunn [00:37:00]:
Perfect. Well, Hunter, thank you so much for sharing your story with us and, for enlightening us in terms of the Enneagram, but also in the ways in which the spirit might introduce some surprise into our lives.
Hunter Mobley [00:37:12]:
Thank you, Ryan.
Ryan Dunn [00:37:15]:
Well, that wraps up this episode of Compass Finding Spirituality in the Everyday. A huge thanks again to Hunter Mobley for joining us and sharing such thoughtful insights about the Enneagram spirituality, the joy of surprise in our daily lives. If you'd like to dive deeper in anything we talked about or explore more episodes, be sure to visit our websitemc dot org slash compass. You'll find episode notes, resources, and a growing library of the conversations that we've had on the podcast. You know, just like this one, we're grateful to the team at United Methodist Communications for making this podcast possible and helping us bring these important stories to you. If you haven't already, please take a moment to subscribe to Compass wherever you get your podcasts. And if you found something really meaningful here today, we'd really appreciate it if you rated and reviewed the show. It helps, again, others find us and be a part of the conversation.
Ryan Dunn [00:38:12]:
So thank you so much for listening, for sharing this time. My name is Ryan Dunn. I'll chat at you again in a couple weeks. Peace.
