Still not convinced the wings are worth anyone's time, tbh. You can't explain everything about a person using the enneagram, so stick to what it does well - clearly and concisely.
What the enneagram types are trying to point at are
fundamental world views - they're spectacularly simple & utterly encompassing, on a level that can be tough to appreciate at first - which is where I think the wings and the tritypes etc. come from. They just don't add anything beyond another layer of needless complexity that gets away from the actual workings of things.
My opinion.
I don't think they're "fundamental world views", though they can appear to be such. I would describe them more as "habitual responses" or "coping mechanisms" or "defense mechanisms." When one's only tool is a hammer, all of one's problems look like a nail: thus one's Enneagram type can appear to be a worldview.
But it isn't quite a worldview. All of the standard readings indicate that everyone has aspects of all the types, but only one (or two or three, depending on sources) really resonate with an individual.
That said, I sort of agree with Eck, here:
I'm 'against' overcomplicating systems which are already describe with high imprecision as well. The error rates rise faster than the precision augments. Usually there's a sweet spot inherent to each system. I think the enneagram wings work correctly enough for some people but are not necessary for the system itself to be descriptive.
It's easy to "overdescribe": by using tritype and then putting wings on each tritype, one can end up with more than half of the types in the system, to the point where one might as well describe one's type by pointing out which types one is not. This excessive description makes it nigh impossible to read about one's type as a type, because it has become more like one's "fingerprint": no one else (or, statistically speaking, remarkably few people) has exactly your type.
Once we start looking at the core aspect of each type, it's easy to see why people can identify with each one:
- Everyone cares about being correct to some degree. Few people make it an overarching priority.
- Everyone benefits from giving and receiving help, but only a few treat it as essential.
- Everyone cares to a degree about how successful/admirable/accomplished one appears to be, but only a few pursue such ends as a matter of course.
- Everyone cares about their identity to some degree, but only a few regard it as essential to their relationship to the world.
- Everyone would like to be truly skilled in some manner or another, but only a few are compulsive about it.
- Everyone worries about who is trustworthy or not, but only a few regard it of essential importance.
- Everyone likes new and interesting things, but only a few pursue them indefinitely.
- Everyone likes some degree of control over their environment, but only a few pursue such control in an ongoing basis.
- Everyone likes to have bad problems just pass them by, to avoid troubling issues, but only a few regard that as the best way of dealing with them.
It's easy to identify with any of these 9 types
to a degree, but there are probably a couple/three that pretty much explain most every reaction you have to the world. They're sort-of-worldviews, but while one might have primacy in an individual, the alternatives appear to be often present, and not always as wings, which makes them not-so-fundamental, and not-quite-worldviews.
When people say they identify with many types, I suspect they're identifying with the positive aspects of each. Type 5s care about being correct (like type 1), but that doesn't make them type 1. Type 5s can seem to be very like type 8 on the home turf of their mastery, but they aren't really type 8. Type 9s can seem like type 2s, adopting a helpful posture, but they aren't being "helpful" for the same reasons as type 2s.
One's real types are those which reveal their negative traits, their reverting to the single hammer that regards all problems as nails. Even if one has two or three "hammers", one runs into the problems typical of the type with which each "hammer" is associated should one abuse the "hammer." I know I'm a 9 because my "hammer" is to avoid those problems that I can, and do so without thinking. I know I'm not a 5 (though I have many 5 traits) because I don't obsessively try to master my skills. (I say this is in spite of my having a PhD in physics! I haven't closely followed physics since I graduated.) I know I'm not a 1 because I care about being correct
in context, not all the damn time. I know I'm not an 8 because while I can be forceful in my presentations at times (INTJ-ish-ness showing), I don't show it in most aspects of my life. I know I'm not a 3 because while I might care about appearing to be competent, I do so because simply
being competent isn't enough to assure others that I can get the job done.
All of the types I list above are ones in which I scored "high" on the RHETI test. Only type 9 is my "hammer." It's not a worldview for me, personally, which I think is better described by my MBTI type; it's a habitual reaction. I avoid problems without thinking, without often having formed an opinion. It can be done wisely ("don't sweat the small stuff" is not a lesson that one needs to teach a 9), but being done without thinking results in the "average" 9 traits.
Regarding the OP (so as not to totally derail the thread), I think it's perfectly viable to have no wing, 1 wing or 2 wings, or even resort to tritype. The real question is how do the wings fit you, if you believe they're there? I think Blackcat's post is apt, in this regard: as a 9, are you ignoring external reality (because it isn't perfect) or your internal reality (because it's too upsetting) or both or neither? It's not an easy question, because 9s are so very good at ignoring things, we are good at forgetting that there was anything to be ignored. Either way, it isn't your type that's important, but how thoroughly you answer that question for yourself.