Tilt
Active member
- Joined
- Sep 18, 2015
- Messages
- 2,584
- MBTI Type
- ENFJ
- Enneagram
- 3w4
- Instinctual Variant
- sx/sp
The main problem with determining MBTI vs Enneagram correlations is that it's one thing to have the personalities correlate, and quite another to have the actual types correlate. For example, I believe that a lot of E4s are mistyped as INFPs - and vice versa - because the personalities are so similar. Similarly, I think a lot of INTx types are wrongly typed as E5s - and vice versa - because the personalities match.
That's the main issue I had determining my E9 type. The E5 descriptions said all the "right things", but didn't really match: it describes a generic nerd. Similarly, the E9 type matched me in terms of motivations, but the personality descriptions have a ton of emo-fluff in them that didn't match me. I had to do the difficult work of figuring out what the Enneagram types "really meant" to get my type right. Once I arrived at INTJ E9, everything clicked: I think like an INTJ, I react like a E9.
While I'm only one data point, I currently believe that a lot of these correlations that we see in typical MBTI vs. Enneagram data aren't as significant as they might appear to be on the surface.
Agreed. I think that there is relevance and value to the correlations between the two systems but it sometimes seems like once people find their "right" type in one system, there is a temptation to want to fit neatly into the other one and have the two clearly match up (due to the very nature of categorizing). One could easily follow and understand the underlying thought process of the fellow members of a certain type but with the subjectivity and the variability found in the human experience, there is going to range of motivations that are going to affect actions and reactions. This is why I would be hard-pressed to say certain combinations are impossible, albeit maybe quite rare.