The Enneagram, More than Just 9 Types

Have you heard about “The Enneagram?” 

I heard about the Enneagram a few years ago while I was looking for tools for personal and professional development. Initially I did not have much interest. Then I became friends with my colleague physician, Dr. Francis Yoo, a certified Enneagram teacher. We had conversations how the Enneagram could help personal and professional development over a few months. Recently I finally took the test and had a session with Francis who helped me to understand the result better for my deeper personal and professional growth. 

The Enneagram of Personality started by Oscar Ichazo, a Bolivian psycho-spiritual teacher in 1950’s and Claudio Naranjo, a Chilean psychiatrist in 1970’s. Since then, a few other teachers further developed the theory. Don Riso and Russ Hudson are the main teachers who formalized and run an organization, The Enneagram Institute* in Stone Ridge, NY.[1]

The Enneagram means Ennea, nine, and gram, a picture.[2] It is made from a circle, a triangle, and a hexagram that creates nine points representing each personality type. The idea is “we are the whole circle, we are the triangle, and we are the hexagram.” Each of us has one particular aspect that shines the most, which also can be our blind site.        

The one-word description of the 9 types can be expanded into four-word sets of traits.[1] 

Type 1 is the Performer: principled, purposeful, self-controlled, and perfectionistic

Type 2 is the Helper: generous, demonstrative, people-pleasing and possessive

Type 3 is the Achiever: adaptive, excelling, driven and image-conscious

Type 4 is the Individualist: expressive, dramatic, self-absorbed and temperamental

Type 5 is the Investigator: perceptive, innovative, secretive and isolated

Type 6 is the Loyalist: engaging, responsible, anxious and suspicious

Type 7 is the Enthusiast: spontaneous, versatile, distractible and scattered

Type 8 is the Challenger: self-confident, decisive, willful and confrontational

Type 9 is the Peacemaker: receptive, reassuring, agreeable and complacent

Also, each type has its own trap to feel the need of doing certain things in certain situation, which can make him/her to get stuck.

Type 1. Need to fix/react to mistakes

Type 2. Need to help/react to others’ needs

Type 3. Need to succeed/react to being accomplished

Type 4. Need to be different/react to longing

Type 5. Need to know/react to feeling stupid

Type 6. Need to be safe/react to decisions

Type 7. Need to be satisfied/react to pain

Type 8. Need to be strong/react to challenges

Type 9. Need to be at peace/react to conflict

Above description is very general overview of The Nine Enneagram Types.

Taking the test and reading the detailed full explanation of the result is the beginning of deeper understanding of ourselves for further self-development.

The biggest lesson I learned by taking the test and learning more about my Enneagram Type is that our type is our strength and weakness at the same time. Our type explains how we react to our circumstances, project inner ward or ignore.

In summary, as Francis said,  “we use our understanding of our Enneagram type to do Inner work to re-cultivate our perfection, will, freedom, hope, origin, Omniscience/transparency, faith, wisdom, plan, truth and love we were born with, but we lost throughout culture, education, training, outer societal expectation.”

If you are interested in learning more about The Enneagram, please check out references below. Hope you find Enneagram helpful for your personal growth.

References 

1.  The Enneagram Institute https://www.enneagraminstitute.com/

2. The Enneagram Webinar https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txvjAa76naM&t=44s

3.  The Enneagram test https://tests.enneagraminstitute.com/

4. The Enneagram for Physicians by Francis Yoo, DO https://mailchi.mp/5d38bb53cd88/the-enneagram-for-physicians