In the magical land of Internet checkboxes, where everyone is entitled to a quick shot of emotional caffeine by being told just how quaint and whimsical they are, there isn’t much space for the darker side of life, unless it’s described in endearing terms. (If you are wondering where the sarcasm is coming from, I’m a core Millennial, the generation that was supposed to do away with labels, and instead presided over their multiplication. I’m allowed to be butt-hurt)
Few aspects of the Enneagram receive less emphasis in Internet discourse than the nine Sins or Passions. Wings, subtypes, tri-types are all overemphasized ad nauseam so as to allow the endless diarrhea of words that we keep ourselves occupied with to flow uninterrupted; yet the core aspect of the Enneagram is often forgotten or downplayed.
The reason is quite simple: the word ‘sin’ evokes images of imperfection and of moral authoritarianism; yet in the performative world of socials, where all that matters is that we find someone to whom we can submit our navel for them to contemplate in our stead, there is only space for heart-warming quirks and witty repartees. True, even in the sense used in Enneagram theory, the word ‘sin’ is to be taken metaphorically. Yet it does point to something that shouldn’t be overlooked.
Imagine a king in a wonderful castle. This king has nine sons whom he sends out to explore the world in nine different directions. Each direction has its own peculiar terrain, climate, beasts, cultures, etc., forcing each son to adapt in a different way and adopt different strategies. When the sons come back, they are vastly different people, who will act in ways that each of the other sons doesn’t fully grasp.
So is with the Enneagram. I’ve already discussed how personality develops as a point of view on reality, and this happens by a limitation of perspective. By developing a separate sense of self, we learn to employ strategies that overemphasize certain aspects of our experience to the detriment of others. This creates an imbalance in us. It is a necessary imbalance, without which we would never grow to be separate individuals. But it is, nonetheless, an imbalance. This is what Enneagram theory means by ‘sin’.
The nine Sins or Passions are the core of the personality exactly for this reason. They are like the motor of our psychological mechanism. These sins don’t require penance. They only require observation. By learning to observe ourselves we see when our mechanism is a good response to our current situation and when it is the vestige of an outworn survival strategy.
The Nine Sins or Passions of the Enneagram
Type One – Anger
Ones are in the Body triad, and anger is the overall passion of that center, since it is the natural complement of Body types’ drive for autonomy. However, Ones are often incapable of expressing this choler in a direct and, as it were, ‘clearcut’ way like Eights. Instead, they subject themselves to some kind of supposedly objective standard that they seek to embody and in whose service they put their drive. This leads to them cultivating a type of frustration with themselves which, in some serious cases, can even turn into self-hatred as they notice the impossibility of living up to their own standards. Needless to say, their harshness toward themselves is reflected in their strictness in dealing with others. The more they become angry at themselves and others, the more they see the ideal as unreachable, the more they become strict and therefore angry.
Type Two – Pride
Twos give active expression to the energy of the Heart triad, which has to do with connectivity and validation. The general passion of the Heart center is Deceit, i.e., the mistaking of personality for reality, of what is accidental for what is essential. To avoid the pain of discovering their helplessness as separate entities, Twos inflate their egos, which is what we usually call Pride. They seek to have their self-image validated by other people, and they do so by manipulating others (‘helping’) into being mirrors for them, trying to incorporate them into a symbiotic or co-dependent unity with them, so that nothing outside of themselves can emerge to take their self-image away from them, which would leave them vulnerable. Pride is this inflation of the ego to dissolve the outside potential for disillusion, and the discovery of being unneeded and helpless. The more proud they become, the more Twos perceive other people’s autonomy from them as a threat, the more they inflate themselves to become indispensable, infiltrating every nook and cranny of others’ lives, etc.
Type Three – Deceit
As the core type of the Heart triad, the passion of the Threes is Deceit itself. Deceit, sometimes called Falsehood, is essentially the mistaking of who you are for who you think you are, exactly as mentioned for Twos. Threes, however, suppress the Heart energy instead of expressing it. They therefore take the route of action, seeking validation for what they do and how they perform, and identifying strongly with their performance. Deceit may secondarily be a strategy toward other people, in as much as Threes seek to “sell” to other people the image of themselves that they attach to their own performance. Unfortunately, other people have a way of picking up on the inauthenticity of these cardboard cutouts that Threes try to pass off as the real self. Threes themselves tend to have an ill-defined but persistent sense that they are being phony in their self-presentation, either to themselves or to others, which prompts them to look for the next rabbit to pull out of the hat to dazzle themselves and others, etc.
Type Four – Envy
Fours are the last Heart type. They correctly identify the unstable nature of personality, in so far as it is a semi-arbitrary abstraction of a part from the whole. However, they are deceived into believing that this applies only to them. They come to feel that everyone else has it figured it out and so they feel singularly unlucky, like fallen creatures despised by the gods. They begin to look around with Envy in their eyes: they are missing something that other people have. Sometimes this is material, but much more often it is a sort of unspeakable quality of ‘just-right-ness’ that they feel they lack and everyone else has. All they long for they idealize in the form of fantastic images connected with a lost past, an alternate present or an unreachable future. This feeds the Four’s belief that they have been sentenced to a life of unhappiness, which in turn feeds their Envy of other people’s fortune, life and qualities.
Type Five – Avarice
Fives express very clearly the energy of the Head center. All Head types deal with the passion of Fear. Fives fear that there is not enough of them to go around. They perceive the outside world (especially, but not solely, the social sphere) as a threat. Everything feels too much for their limited resources and abilities, so they retreat into their heads, where they learn to identify with some carefully selected truths. The rest they let go of, feeling that they don’t have enough energy to keep it all together. Thus, their Avarice compels them to begin hoarding themselves, their energy, their knowledge, their time, withholding them from others, in hopes that one day they’ll have enough to finally join the real world and show their competence. But the more they retreat, the more they feel drained by the slightest contact or challenge, the more they need to develop their Avarice, and so on.
Type Six – Fear
Six is the hub of the Head triad, whose energy it suppresses. Sixes are animated by a visceral sense of uncertainty about their life, and are unable to become the source of their own certainty. Sixes are famous for their catastrophizing attitude (“what’s the worst that can happen?”) and they take some comfort in it, because it alleys the sense of not knowing what is going to happen. They often look outside of themselves for a source of security that will allow their Fear to subside. Once they have found one that seems to resist their skepticism, they become unshakable, even blind adherents. Their tasking other people, institutions, ideologies, etc. with their own safety, however, sets them up for failure, as that external source is doomed by the nature of reality to take a wrong step once in a while. Then, Six’s fears are reawakened, the source of security is torn down as untrustworthy, and the cycle continues.
Type Seven – Gluttony
Sevens are the last Head type, which means they, too, deal with Fear. They use their triad’s energy to come up with an endless variety of plans, ideas, projects that will keep them entertained and distracted from the sense of fear of want that even they sense is festering somewhere in their more muted recesses. They try to become blind to the negative side by remaining hyped to all the goodness that awaits them out into the world. This is their Gluttony, i.e., their urge to ‘eat life’ figuratively speaking. Sevens are notorious for their fear of being limited in their options or being limited by their own previous choices. Their emphasis is usually on variety rather than ‘specialization’ or commitment (though the idea that they cannot commit is also a stereotype.) The more this happens, the more the shallowness of the ‘divertissement’ becomes apparent, the more the inner fear of sorrow or pain becomes audible inside, the more they are led to doubling down, fleeing away from themselves.
Type Eight – Lust
Eights are the assertive Body type. Through them, the choleric quality of the Body center finds the most immediate expression and the drive toward autonomy is realized most coherently. Eights charge at the world with incredible intensity, a “Lust” for things, people, situations, power through which they may achieve a satisfaction of their urges. Although sexuality is often important to Eights, Lust is to be understood more generally as a craving for the intense experience of meeting a resistance outside of oneself and overcoming it through a display of power or energy. Eights use this ability they have to defend themselves from outside threats or ‘enemies’ and they do so also on behalf of those whom they consider friends. They do it to cater to their perceived need to be strong and not show any weakness, because they are usually aware of a tender spot inside of them that they need to protect at all costs. But this leads often to them exaggerating, which is typical of their ‘bulldozer’ stance. Their Lust is this very exaggeration, which leads to people becoming resentful of Eight’s aggressive, or at least conquering behavior, which leads to Eight feeling the need to protect their tender spot by exaggerating even more.
Type Nine – Sloth
Nines are the hub of the Body triad, where the Body energy is suppressed. Nines seek to secure their own autonomy by not causing trouble or rocking the boat, especially when others are in it with them. They become either oblivious or disregarding of their own aims and preferences, often giving precedence to those of others in hopes of ‘being seen’ and appreciated as autonomous beings. Their Sloth is not necessarily a lack of activity, physical or otherwise, but rather an attempt at not being fazed by life, becoming impervious to it and, at the same time, not creating problems to others so as to not lose connection with them. It’s a general ‘it’s not a big deal’ attitude. This self-denying, self-effacing strategy leads to them being disappointed when people fail to honor them as autononous, well-defined individuals or when they feel trampled over by more decisive people. This in turn leads to them exerting a sort of silent, passive resistance to other people’s actions that renders them even more still and ‘slothful’, which makes it harder for people to understand Nine’s boundaries, aims, etc., which leads to more passive resistance, and so on.
Some Remarks
A couple of things are worth noting, in ending this post. Firstly, note the beauty and elegant simplicity of the Enneagram of Passions, as opposed to the ever more baroque systems contrived in the attempt to complicate it and map out every minor shade of behavior. The Enneagram describes the inner motor of our personality, not the secondary psychological knick-kacks that clutter our waking consciousness. It is essential and specific.
Secondly, this motor of our personality tends to be a self-perpetuating cycle of general behavior, a general structure that can accomodate as many variations as there are people (again, without the need for conceptual complications.) This general structure tends to be the result of a survival strategy adopted by the person during the childhood, although the specifics are debatable.
Thirdly, what I said is not meant to be weaponized against people, like to accuse Sevens of being too excited, or Fives of being too cerebral, or Threes of being too driven, or Fours too mopey, etc. Whether they are too much of something or not is up to them to decide, unless they force it on you or cause you direct problems. All else is an attempt at manipulating others. But the Enneagram is also not meant to shame yourself. It merely brings to light less-than-conscious patterns so that you can observe them and at least tweak them. Let us also keep in mind the following: we are used to hearing things like, “This personality’s mechanism is a strength, but it is also a weakness.” But the opposite is also true: “this personality’s mechanism is a weakness, but it’s also a strength.” The world is made wonderful by Ones’ uprightness, Twos’ caring, Threes’ drive, Fours’ creativity, Fives’ ideas, Sixes’ reliability, Sevens’ positivity, Eights’ decisiveness and Nines’ all-embracing peacefulness.
Finally, I have only described the vicious cycle so far. However, there is also a virtuous cycle when the person becomes aware of what they are doing and learns to at least partially let go of outgrown patterns. Contrary to what life-denying mystics say, your individual existence is not a prison sentence.
