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[Traditional Enneagram] holy shiz i really am a 9 :/

Avocado

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I'm going to add: I'm not proud of that post above, but I'm going to leave it there anyway. It felt like [MENTION=10082]Starry[/MENTION] kicked me in the guts and I am tired of people knowing I am not likely going to shove their own shit back in their faces when they deliver it to me and afterward try to convince me it's not shit. Or that I am being sensitive. Your reply was hurtful and unkind. If my post kicked you in the guts back, I apologize.

My post above, saying that this concept of merging being the end-point just doesn't jive, and saying that out loud IS WHAT DOM Fi DOES. Fi is self-referential in that how we discern the accuracy of things is from the inside out, felt interiorly, by feeling. If something written or spoken does not resonate for whatever reason inside me, it's because either I am wrong or the information is wrong or the way we are interpreting the information is wrong, a hundred ways it could be wrong but something is wrong. It is how dom Fi figures the world out, IMHO. When I refer to ME in MY posts it is because the interior of me is the compass of my understanding. YET AGAIN it is misinterpreted as me, high and mighty, imagining myself the center of the universe, or something patently ridiculous like that.

SO, no, GOD himself did not tell me that the references to enneagram 9 should meet with my approval. But, He did give me a gut to tell me when something is wrong. I really don't care what aspect is wrong, I could be wrong, and although I do like to be right, I really don't care who or what is, because that's not the part I am invested in. I just need to know how it resonates for other people to suss that 'right or wrong' out. I will pursue the "truth" in the best way I know how to come to a better understanding of what at least is potentially more true. True truth cannot be known. I do not want to make any apology anymore for that opinionated place inside of me that has to express itself in disagreement to find agreement.

So, I am sorry if that's a burden on you to hear my words, but I would ask that you keep your exasperation politely in check and don't use me as a vessel to dump it into, and until you demonstrate more clarity in how you express your words, I simply don't think you know as much of what you are talking about when it comes to the interior of e9. I do agree however, that the likelihood of Lady X being e9 is low. It does feel right however to say it is in her tritype.

Ouch.

I could learn to build better boundaries like you have sometime.
 

Starry

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I'm going to add: I'm not proud of that post above, but I'm going to leave it there anyway. It felt like [MENTION=10082]Starry[/MENTION] kicked me in the guts and I am tired of people knowing I am not likely going to shove their own shit back in their faces when they deliver it to me and afterward try to convince me it's not shit. Or that I am being sensitive. Your reply was hurtful and unkind. If my post kicked you in the guts back, I apologize.


Umm… I was actually lmao at your comment... happy that you had understood why I had responded in the way that I did and were being light-hearted and flipping me some shit... until I read the above weirdness and realized that true to type I was being insanely, overly optimistic.

If you actually think I was attacking you...and doing so because I believed you wouldn't "attack back" or whatever the hell... you're at some point beyond knowing nothing of me and so maybe put me on ignore or something? I'm never going to engage you again on this site and would appreciate the same in return. Take care.
 

PeaceBaby

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Umm… I was actually lmao at your comment... happy that you had understood why I had responded in the way that I did and were being light-hearted and flipping me some shit... until I read the above weirdness and realized that true to type I was being insanely, overly optimistic.

If you actually think I was attacking you...and doing so because I believed you wouldn't "attack back" or whatever the hell... you're at some point beyond knowing nothing of me and so maybe put me on ignore or something? I'm never going to engage you again on this site and would appreciate the same in return. Take care.

You were delivering a two-sided message but now you disown the side that was more personal because I say how it REALLY makes me feel? And no, you wouldn't have dared to say it to some other people, but you chose to say it to me but I'm not in the mood for your self-righteous parental Fi.

And let's even look at it from another angle - you can say whatever you want to me, in whatever shitty way suits you, but if it hurts me I don't get to say so, and if I DO say so, it's not YOU that is the problem, it's me. Nice. Noticing in your reply a distinct lack of "give a shit" about hurting my feelings.

Where's the slow clap emoticon btw? Gotta love people like you who can shovel that shit around but try to come out of it smelling like a rose.

Sure, I won't "engage" you, whatever, your loss.
 

uumlau

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Well, shit, Peacebaby... I guess I missed the part where the good Lord Himself came down from the heavens above and commanded that all references to enneagram 9 must be something that you not only relate to...but approve of.

If someone who is clearly e9 doesn't relate to a particular description of e9, even as other e9s do relate, that would still indicate that the description is inaccurate or perhaps incomplete. No need for divine intervention; logical intervention suffices.

Most Enneagram descriptions contain a lot of cruft (Cruft - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia), a lot of descriptions that describe people who happen to be whatever type, but do not apply to all people of that type. It's quite useful in Enneagram (and MBTI!) to identify those features that are sort-of-but-not-really true so that people can more readily identify their own type based on the features that are necessarily true for each type.
 

wolfy

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This shit got real.

For realz. lol. A misunderstanding? Communication breakdown? Imagine if you were in the same room. At the kitchen table. I think you'd be "Hey, hey, let's all chill out"
 

PeaceBaby

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For realz. lol. A misunderstanding? Communication breakdown? Imagine if you were in the same room. At the kitchen table. I think you'd be "Hey, hey, let's all chill out"

How very e9 of you.
 

prplchknz

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For realz. lol. A misunderstanding? Communication breakdown? Imagine if you were in the same room. At the kitchen table. I think you'd be "Hey, hey, let's all chill out"

I wouldn't. I'd probably just leave tbh, if they're gonna kill each other I'd prefer not to be a witness. If I couldn't leave I'd probably just sit their feeling uncomfortable. or feed the dog or cat table food and pet them.
 

Starry

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You were delivering a two-sided message but now you disown the side that was more personal because I say how it REALLY makes me feel? And no, you wouldn't have dared to say it to some other people, but you chose to say it to me but I'm not in the mood for your self-righteous parental Fi.

And let's even look at it from another angle - you can say whatever you want to me, in whatever shitty way suits you, but if it hurts me I don't get to say so, and if I DO say so, it's not YOU that is the problem, it's me. Nice. Noticing in your reply a distinct lack of "give a shit" about hurting my feelings.

Where's the slow clap emoticon btw? Gotta love people like you who can shovel that shit around but try to come out of it smelling like a rose.

Sure, I won't "engage" you, whatever, your loss.


I don't have a problem with you expressing to me how my comment made you feel. But that's not (all of) what you are doing in your responses to me...

No, you are assigning an intent to my comment as if you somehow *know* ...as if you somehow know me better then I know myself and have the authority to make statements with regards to my character.

You didn't say "wow, that comment really hurt me what did you mean by that?" No, you expressed hurt alright...but then without even allowing me the opportunity to explain my meaning... you assign negative and imo cowardly intent to my comment and start painting a terrible and false portrait of who I am as a human being. What is it that gives you that right? What is it that makes you feel you have the knowledge and authority to do this to another person?

Above...you say that "I wouldn't have dared say this to others." And how I don't give a shit...and on and on and on... as if you have been trying to "work with me" wth? I find it scary, highly arrogant, and offense and I want it to stop. Thanks in advance.

And no, none of your behaviour leads me to feel like I've suffered a loss...my god no.
 

Starry

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If someone who is clearly e9 doesn't relate to a particular description of e9, even as other e9s do relate, that would still indicate that the description is inaccurate or perhaps incomplete. No need for divine intervention; logical intervention suffices.

Most Enneagram descriptions contain a lot of cruft (Cruft - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia), a lot of descriptions that describe people who happen to be whatever type, but do not apply to all people of that type. It's quite useful in Enneagram (and MBTI!) to identify those features that are sort-of-but-not-really true so that people can more readily identify their own type based on the features that are necessarily true for each type.


This is what I enjoy so much with regards to this site...looking for patterns and exceptions...putting the pieces of the puzzle together... (So much of the 7 description fails to describe me and regardless of whether X is a 7, 9 or some other type altogether...I do know she wishes there weren't as many exceptions as there are.)
 

Lady_X

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This is what I enjoy so much with regards to this site...looking for patterns and exceptions...putting the pieces of the puzzle together... (So much of the 7 description fails to describe me and regardless of whether X is a 7, 9 or some other type altogether...I do know she wishes there weren't as many exceptions as there are.)

yeah exactly that's all i was saying. i just want it to be clearer. i have so.much to say about this but posting on my phone is making.me.bananas.

Illcomebacktoit
 

Avocado

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yeah exactly that's all i was saying. i just want it to be clearer. i have so.much to say about this but posting on my phone is making.me.bananas.

Illcomebacktoit

I'll be waiting.
 

PeaceBaby

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I don't have a problem with you expressing to me how my comment made you feel. But that's not (all of) what you are doing in your responses to me...

No, you are assigning an intent to my comment as if you somehow *know* ...as if you somehow know me better then I know myself and have the authority to make statements with regards to my character.

You didn't say "wow, that comment really hurt me what did you mean by that?" No, you expressed hurt alright...but then without even allowing me the opportunity to explain my meaning... you assign negative and imo cowardly intent to my comment and start painting a terrible and false portrait of who I am as a human being. What is it that gives you that right? What is it that makes you feel you have the knowledge and authority to do this to another person?

Above...you say that "I wouldn't have dared say this to others." And how I don't give a shit...and on and on and on... as if you have been trying to "work with me" wth? I find it scary, highly arrogant, and offense and I want it to stop. Thanks in advance.

And no, none of your behaviour leads me to feel like I've suffered a loss...my god no.

This is what non-engagement looks like, eh? As far as I'm concerned, if you quote me I'll take that as a signal you still want to talk and work this out, and I like actually resolving conflict, rather than erecting false boundaries that essentially paint the person being shunned as the "problem" person. Because wow, that's pretty much how you're twisting this one. If you were so concerned that I get the correct meaning from your words, you took no pains to ensure that was the case. In fact, by your own admission you were totally aware they could be taken badly because you expressed pleasure that I initially went with a flippant response to your cutting post. So, please, let's not feign ignorance on that.

I do want to say too congratulations for so clearly demonstrating for the audience WHY e9's typically avoid conflict as much as possible. We have to deal with reactions like yours. You have utterly and completely invalidated my emotional expression and you've managed to make this all about YOU, your feelings, your reputation, you you you. Now I have to deal with the fallout of YOUR emotional reaction (which is all about you btw, just as mine is all about me) and deal with your complete lack of concern about my feelings on the matter. Please note that not once have you given any appearance of giving a shit about me here. There is no false portrait of you painted by me - your own reactions are the paint on the canvas. Just as mine are for me. THAT PLACE you struck with your initial smart-ass reply is a sensitive place for me and I freely have admitted so in the past.

So, do e9's want to have to deal with all this disruption to harmony? No. We don't say how we feel, we keep our mouths shut and we internalize all this because it leads to hurt feelings all around, because not many people, e9 or no, have enough emotional awareness or fortitude to really work THROUGH things, really be able to talk about hurting and being hurt as equals. In saying that, does it mean I think I am perfect in this way? No. But it's an observation that's true nonetheless, notwithstanding the delivery of it by me. Look how fast you disengage, saying, "Don't talk to me, don't engage me." e9 fear of loss and hey, congrats on illustrating that too!

You can go back to your non-engagement now.
 

Werebudgie

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Two thumbs* down on the drama.

Two thumbs* up on the substance of this thread overall, and also on the graceful and almost successful effort to divert from the drama and resume the substance.

*Now I'm having a moment of appreciation for having thumbs at all. Thumbs are really handy in the real world.

ANYWAY. Speaking of substance, I don't know if this would be of use to people here in this thread or in general re e9, but I personally found this e9 description, written by someone who identifies as that type, to be marvelously insightful (though I myself am speaking from the outside, as someone who knows an e9 rather well but am not a 9 myself):

Type 9: Down the Rabbit Hole​
Everyone is sensitive in their early development to one of the Holy Ideas, and this sensitivity is what leads people to develop their ego around that idea. In order to understand type 9 as a whole, then, one must recognize that the type is centered around this dynamic: sensitivity to and loss of contact with Holy Love, repression of the pain and anger caused by this loss, and the adoption of attitudes and behaviors resembling Holy Love, which the 9 hopes will fill the void, in a sense.

The type can also be understood as a set of layers within the psyche, including repressed anger and an inner resistance to being deeply affected, of which the 9 may not be aware. It is important to see that the 9 is not simply the surface attitude and behaviors, that there are deeper attitudes the 9 wishes to repress, and that these attitudes have a significant impact even if the 9 is not consciously aware of them. Self-awareness is essential to growth. The only question is this: how far down the rabbit hole do you wish to go?

I. The Rabbit Hole

Illusion of Harmony
^
|
Acedia & Inner Deadening of Feelings
^
|
Anger/Frustration: "Nothing is worthwhile"
^
|
Loss of Holy Love: "Love is not real"
^
|
Holy Love​

Illusion of Harmony

At the surface layer, 9's are looking for peace, harmony, wisdom, and happiness. They want to see value and goodness in all things and people, choosing to acknowledge their positive qualities over their negative ones. Consequentially, 9's tend to treat everyone with respect and are pleasant, agreeable, and accommodating. Because they are looking to recreate Holy Love, they may adopt philosophies around the concept of love, harmony, and noninterference ("live and let live").

But when they do this at the surface level, they are not necessarily experiencing true harmony. In reality, there is a deep inner resistance or blocking within them that prevents them from being fully present and affected. 9's have essentially created the illusion of harmony--it is not the same as Holy Love.

Acedia and Inner Deadening of Feelings


On a deeper level, 9's are far more apathetic than they may seem. They have put up walls which prevent them from being deeply affected, and have adopted an attitude of acedia (also known as accidia): having little concern for one's own position in life.

Dorothy Sayers in her commentaries to Dante’s Purgatory writes that accidia “is insidious, and assumes such Protean shapes that it is rather difficult to define.” It is not merely idleness of mind, but “that whole poisoning of the will which, beginning with indifference and an attitude of ‘I couldn’t care less’, extends to the deliberate refusal of joy and culminates in morbid introspection and despair. One form of it which appeals very strongly to some modern minds is that acquiescence in evil and error which readily disguises itself as ‘Tolerance’; another is that refusal to be moved by the contemplation of the good and beautiful which is known as ‘Disillusionment’, and sometimes as ‘knowledge of the world’.” (Naranjo)

9's do not want to be affected--to experience unpleasantness, stress, and pain. They avoid these things by mentally checking out, by not being fully present to their own lives. The attitude of "I don't care" can be a powerful one, allowing them to give up when things get stressful and difficult without feeling the loss of what they have given up on. They may lack strong preferences and opinions, preferring to see all sides of things, but really this is a manifestation of acedia. It is easier to not choose a side because the middle path is sure to avoid offending or devaluing anyone who has differing views. Acedia causes 9's to take the path of least resistance, or to ignore and block out stress so they will not be disturbed. They may put off dealing with things if it will cause them stress, and they distract themselves with nonessential things.

Type 9 is considered the least intense of all the enneagram types because their primary defense mechanism involves disengaging themselves and removing their attention from sources of pain or stress, and this may give them a calm and easygoing demeanor. But to the extent that they block out pain, they may also unknowingly become numb to positive emotions. Because of this, 9's may be prone to bouts of anhedonia: reduced capacity for pleasure.

The emotional numbing here may also be viewed as a defense mechanism to protect the ideal self image of being peaceful by repressing their "dark side", as is explained in the next two paragraphs.

Anger/Frustration: "Nothing is worthwhile"

Hidden deep within the subconscious is a well of anger and frustration at being cut off from Holy Love. If love is not real, then nothing is worthwhile. Nothing feels truly meaningful or significant. 9's are incredibly frustrated that they have been going along with life merely "pretending" to care. They have not really invested themselves in life and seem unable to feel deeply moved. They may not have been able to find anything that makes life feel truly worthwhile, yet they keep on living with the hope that someday things will be better. Someday they will wake up and everything will be magical and filled with the peace, love, and harmony they have wished for.

If hope is what drives 9's, then it makes sense that their dark side which they try to repress is disillusionment. Deep down 9's may have a side that is quite cynical and dark, rejecting the value of all things and rejecting hope because nothing ever changes. But 9's do not want to see this side of themselves because its existence is in direct opposition to the self-image they've cultivated of being peaceful, caring, and seeing the good in all things. 9's fear this side of themselves, perhaps more than anything else. They fear being loveless--that they can neither give nor receive love.

Loss of Holy Love: "Love is not real"

The source of emptiness and disillusionment, hidden very deep within the psyche, is the loss of Holy Love. At some point in childhood, 9's developed the belief that love is conditional. If they do things others like, they will receive love and approval. Love, then, is simply the consequence of surface behaviors or characteristics deemed worthy or acceptable by others. Some 9's may even have felt that their parents' love didn't mean anything because it was simply the natural consequence of their parent/child relationship. If love is conditional, then what about it is truly meaningful? This isn't the kind of love 9's had longed for. If that's all that love is, a simple action-reaction formula, then 9's feel the kind of love they idealized must not be real.

Holy Love

Within the deepest part of the 9 lies the capacity for Holy Love. 9's are so sensitive to this concept that it has formed the basis of their ego. They may have felt that Holy Love was lost, but they were not able to accept this and so they built these layers around it. The surface layer is actually a reflection of this innermost part of them, and they have shaped and cultivated it in an attempt to reconnect with Holy Love.

Holy Love is perhaps best described by Almaas:
Holy Love is not the feeling of love, nor the essential aspect of love. Holy Love is a quality of existence that makes that existence lovable. Its loveliness and lovableness is what generates in our hearts sentiments of love, appreciation, value, enjoyment, pleasure, and so on. So we are talking about the quality of lovableness of reality when it is seen without distortion, rather than through the filter of the ego. In other words, Holy Love is the fact that objective reality has an intrinsic quality of being wonderful and pleasing—it is intrinsically lovable. This is Holy Love— whatever it is that makes it lovely, enjoyable, lovable, whatever it is about it that we can’t help but appreciate. When reality is fully perceived, one cannot help but enjoy and appreciate it. One cannot but respond with awe when the Holy Truth is fully apprehended, and one cannot but be full of wonder when Holy Perfection is realized. One cannot but melt in appreciative sweetness when beholding Holy Love. Holy Love brings you the experience of love, but it is not the love itself; it is something much more comprehensive. It is a quality of reality as a whole and is very difficult to fully define. We could say that Holy Love is the intrinsic quality of the reality of Being that is nonconceptual positivity. It is pure and unalloyed blissfulness. It is the value-saturated quality of truth. It is pure goodness, the Good of Plato.

While 9's may be able to understand the concept of Holy Love and try to incorporate it into their views, they lack the energy to truly stay in touch with it. This is because their energy is going toward blocking out unpleasantness. Growth for the 9, therefore, involves getting past this habit of tuning out the unpleasant and becoming grounded and open to experiencing the fullness of life.

Source of the quote is here
 

uumlau

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^^^ Yes. That is a very apt description.
 

Starry

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yeah exactly that's all i was saying. i just want it to be clearer. i have so.much to say about this but posting on my phone is making.me.bananas.

Illcomebacktoit

Yah, I'd really like to hear your thoughts on it when you get a chance...as what you've been saying all this time (with the help of this thread and [MENTION=9310]uumlau[/MENTION]'s comments) has come together in my mind in a more meaningful way. How many exceptions to the descriptions...to the "expected behavior" should an individual accept before they are no longer 'reasonably' considered that enneagram type. It's up to the individual...but it should feel like a better fit I definitely agree with that. I like that you keep questioning this.
 

Avocado

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Yah, I'd really like to hear your thoughts on it when you get a chance...as what you've been saying all this time (with the help of this thread and [MENTION=9310]uumlau[/MENTION]'s comments) has come together in my mind in a more meaningful way. How many exceptions to the descriptions...to the "expected behavior" should an individual accept before they are no longer 'reasonably' considered that enneagram type. It's up to the individual...but it should feel like a better fit I definitely agree with that. I like that you keep questioning this.

Agreed. I still question wether I should say So/Sx or So/Sp. So-dom for sure.
 

prplchknz

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Two thumbs* down on the drama.

Two thumbs* up on the substance of this thread overall, and also on the graceful and almost successful effort to divert from the drama and resume the substance.

*Now I'm having a moment of appreciation for having thumbs at all. Thumbs are really handy in the real world.

ANYWAY. Speaking of substance, I don't know if this would be of use to people here in this thread or in general re e9, but I personally found this e9 description, written by someone who identifies as that type, to be marvelously insightful (though I myself am speaking from the outside, as someone who knows an e9 rather well but am not a 9 myself):



Source of the quote is here
do you think a lot of villains and people who turned "evil" started out as 9? sometimes I feel like a villain because i'm a lot more cynical and feel more evil than I did as a kid. I thought I was gonna solve world hunger and that people were inherently good (still something I delude myself into believing from time to time), was gonna time travel help nazi prisoners (the ones in the camps) escape than travel further back and help slaves escape. of course none of that happened and unfortunately don't have such a power. now I just get angry when people yell at the clerk in the store over something the clerk has no control over, and i hope the customer gets kicked in the head or something.
 

uumlau

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Yah, I'd really like to hear your thoughts on it when you get a chance...as what you've been saying all this time (with the help of this thread and [MENTION=9310]uumlau[/MENTION]'s comments) has come together in my mind in a more meaningful way. How many exceptions to the descriptions...to the "expected behavior" should an individual accept before they are no longer 'reasonably' considered that enneagram type. It's up to the individual...but it should feel like a better fit I definitely agree with that. I like that you keep questioning this.

I look at it more as finding the few key items that are essential to the type, as opposed to the "personality traits" which are kind of extraneous. For instance, an essential feature of e9 is wanting a peaceful state of mind. An inessential feature is wanting to "make peace" between other parties. Making peace is just one of a multitude of ways that an e9 might react to conflict, along with simply avoiding the conflict.

So if Lady X's primary issue is avoiding anger to maintain a peaceful state of mind, then she is e9. If it is not her primary issue, it still might be her main way of dealing with anger, while she otherwise usually reacts to her fears about the world as an e7. The nifty thing about tritype is that you don't really have to care which is your main type, because you've defined how you react in any of the grief/fear/anger cases. I list e3 as the last of my tritype, but I still find insight from being aware of it: I react to the grief of not getting along with people not by trying to be helpful (e2) or looking for that one person who will love me as I really am (e4), but by trying to be the kind of person that anyone might love/admire (e3).
 
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