Where is Gul in all this mess? Let's discuss 3w4

[Creepy-male]

"Am I a worthy human being"

I don't know, I'm a Nine

Out of those, 3 is probably the best, but it's of course my point of integration, and thus fairly intimately interwoven into my base type (maybe just because I'm a Nine? I can relate a lot to Sixey issues, especially around loyalty and finding my own opinions, for instance).

My subjective feelings on my self worth are typically that I have none, so I just try to ignore them. Usually I try to bolster my self-worth through things I do. World of Warcraft currently sees the most extreme version of this: I actively pursue being more skilled than everyone else, more knowledgeable about everything than everyone else, more prepared, more dedicated, and working harder than everyone else. Then and only then can I sit comfortably in a group of people (like my raiding group) and know, without a doubt, that I'm an equal.

Similarly in pick-up groups, as a tank, I try very hard to be the warrior-fu master who has all his keys bounds, knows the inner machinery of his class like an artisan clockmaker, and is an all-round swell guy, purely so that people will love me. I even feel a bit of pressure that this is an image I have to live up to or I won't be loved at all.

Random strangers on the internet.

IRL, I've often gotten wrapped up automagically following other people's ideas for me. The person you're talking to now is largely a caricature of myself because my dad wanted me as a kid to be more friendly and bubble and blah blah. The person I play on my warrior is a caricature as well in that he's very self-aggrandising in a really silly, ironic way. I pretend to be someone pretending to be someone with a huge ego (in a really silly way, so that people pick up on the fact that it's not entirely serious). Going the hard yard to learn my class really well and play it as damn hard as I can is sincere though, but patting myself on the back in party chat for being badass is not.

I've also always been drawn to performing. As a kid I wanted to be a stand-up comedian (I also wanted pokémon to be real so I had guardians and companions I could rely on, and I always loved Oak telling me how fantastic the relationship between me and my pokémon was and how we were BEST BUDS and the POWAH OF FRIENDSHIP HELPED US PREVAIL, but that's probably neither here nor there). Nowadays I'm fascinated by genuine acting, even if I'm completely frustrated by my lack of talent in expression.

[Creepy-male]

"Am I a worthy human being"

I don't know, I'm a Nine

Out of those, 3 is probably the best, but it's of course my point of integration, and thus fairly intimately interwoven into my base type (maybe just because I'm a Nine? I can relate a lot to Sixey issues, especially around loyalty and finding my own opinions, for instance).

My subjective feelings on my self worth are typically that I have none, so I just try to ignore them. Usually I try to bolster my self-worth through things I do. World of Warcraft currently sees the most extreme version of this: I actively pursue being more skilled than everyone else, more knowledgeable about everything than everyone else, more prepared, more dedicated, and working harder than everyone else. Then and only then can I sit comfortably in a group of people (like my raiding group) and know, without a doubt, that I'm an equal.

Similarly in pick-up groups, as a tank, I try very hard to be the warrior-fu master who has all his keys bounds, knows the inner machinery of his class like an artisan clockmaker, and is an all-round swell guy, purely so that people will love me. I even feel a bit of pressure that this is an image I have to live up to or I won't be loved at all.

Random strangers on the internet.

IRL, I've often gotten wrapped up automagically following other people's ideas for me. The person you're talking to now is largely a caricature of myself because my dad wanted me as a kid to be more friendly and bubble and blah blah. The person I play on my warrior is a caricature as well in that he's very self-aggrandising in a really silly, ironic way. I pretend to be someone pretending to be someone with a huge ego (in a really silly way, so that people pick up on the fact that it's not entirely serious). Going the hard yard to learn my class really well and play it as damn hard as I can is sincere though, but patting myself on the back in party chat for being badass is not.

I've also always been drawn to performing. As a kid I wanted to be a stand-up comedian (I also wanted pokémon to be real so I had guardians and companions I could rely on, and I always loved Oak telling me how fantastic the relationship between me and my pokémon was and how we were BEST BUDS and the POWAH OF FRIENDSHIP HELPED US PREVAIL, but that's probably neither here nor there). Nowadays I'm fascinated by genuine acting, even if I'm completely frustrated by my lack of talent in expression.

Lol I don't know but I'd cut out the WoW analysis, and focus on your real life, and your feelings of self-worth surrounding that. Think globally. Analyzing the warrior you play in WoW isn't going to be a telling sign.

Think of stuff like your role in society, your relationships with people, and feelings you have about yourself when you look at your picture, look in the mirror and so forth. Do you think you play a worthy role in society, do you feel like people in relationship find you worthy, do you look into the mirror and feel worthy or are you a bit repulsed or unsatisfied with yourself? Those may be good starting grounds.

Even if these question are somewhat complicated, in attempting to answer something like "do I play a worthy role in society"... this may lead you to begin thinking about issues surrounding this, and those issues are telling of your feelings, which can then be deconstructed and matched to enneagram descriptions.

[Creepy-male]

I guess I'm too internally focused to really have a role in society. I largely view it in terms of it being a separate system that doesn't have a whole lot to do with me. A lot of my desire is to have a mutual non-interference pact. This is my typical relationship with any impersonal system.

Socially, with people, my role is basically the clown. I wear a very charming, happy persona because that's what I was taught was expected of me. It's sadly a role I don't "own", even though I view myself at my core to be a performer, and most of my deceptive behaviour is well and truly a conscious performance.

Most of my self-worth is really internal. I have this constant drive to polish away at my perceived shortcomings. I wouldn't say I have an "ideal image" of myself. I feel a sense of pride in myself knowing that I'm free from things others suffer with due to my work. I feel like an artisan in the craft of myself. That "artisan" feeling is important to me in a lot of things.

Part of me wants to be loved and admired for that. I feel on the one hand from within that I want to be the best person I can be, just to prove to the world that really wonderful people exist, to gain a sense of self-satisfaction, and something else.

[Creepy-male]

Points in favour of E5:

• I need space. And more than space, I need my space. My home is my castle. I feel claustrophobic and overwhelmed when my space is lost.
• I feel like people's expectations of me are unbearable burdens.
• I often feel the need to hoard my energy, I feel this really acutely when other people tax it, like they're going to suck me dry.
• I approach a large majority of things head-first.
• I like to take time to think about things. The analogy of a baseball game on enneagramcentral.com rings really true for me:
  "Fives love to replay and rehearse. If the baseball game is on Sunday, they mentally rehearse it on Friday and Saturday, play on Sunday and replay it in their minds on Monday and Tuesday."
• I like analysing and understanding things. I'm pretty willing to engage people by sharing my observations. One of my ESE friends commented that if he ever wants to learn a game or a person inside and out he'll just put me on the case for a day or two then have me report back. This is a pretty good observation, I learn people and things and the way they work inside and out really fast and try and predict things ahead of time, long before I start taking action. Except Socionics. I've taken my sweet time with this beautiful complicated mess.
• Related to the above: engage people through my observations, yes. Through anything else? That paddles like intimacy, has a bill like intimacy, and is shaped like intimacy. Chances are good it's not an elephant attending a fancy dress party as intimacy. No; not doing it, goodbye.
• Action happens when thinking is no longer possible. Not before.
• I identify a lot with needing to understand things, and being an observer moreso than a participant.
• I have a difficult relationship with my own emotions. I get anxious over the potential they hold to overwhelm me.
• I depersonalise when other people make me uncomfortable; I'll replay events in my head and analyse them from a third-party perspective.
• I get lost inside my mind frequently, when I'm puzzling something through. Could be E9 though, see below.

Points in favour of E9:

• I'm very unfocused.
• My thinking is slow and gradual, I as much ruminate until I get a lightbulb as I do actively research and attack a problem in my head.
• The description of Nines as having a two-way switch between auto-pilot action and deep daydreaming rings fairly true for me, even though I have a big tendency toward the daydreaming side.
• I just do. not. focus. If I start an activity I'll kind of just drift into a walking trance and get lost in whatever I'm going. I've gone on walks that have lasted hours on end without realising it, or I can get lost in housework or chores for an hour or more and it'll feel like mere moments. Thinking something through when I get inspired is one of the worst offenders here, I've lost a couple nights of sleep this past week thinking and reading up on 5 vs 9. To no avail
• "Deliberate and drifty" would describe my cognitive rhythm and pace of life really well.
• I tend to get caught up in mediating conflicts a lot. I instinctively try and calm people down and get them to empathise. It's a knee-jerk reaction. I've been doing this all week in WoW (P.S. this forum is filled with angry and fucked up people, so half the time it isn't worth reacquainting people with the bigger picture. Don't take my picking fights and being a dick to people as indicative of anything meaningful.)
• Action happens when thinking is no longer possible. Not after.
• I certainly ramble like a Nine!

Points in favour of either:

• I live in my head.
• I feel really uncomfortable when people "invade" my emotions. I feel like I'm sitting on a wellspring that's waiting to drown me, so I need to jealously guard my inner world from anything that could unsettle it. (This could be E9 as well.) NEED. NEED. NEED.
• Emotional and pushy people are suffocating and terrifying for me. Sometimes even just bubbly and "over-friendly" make me feel a little smothered.

At this point I don't really doubt I'm a self-pres type. sp Nine and sp Five are annoyingly ambiguous though.

That's all for now. May post later as I think of things, if I think of anything else.

EDIT

Possibly not that it means anything, but I'm really fond of my doggie in my avatar. Look at him, he's wearing glasses and is poring over books. That's my self-image at the moment.

[Galen]

You are sooooooo not a 5. Shame on you for even considering it.

If you get to be a 5 then so do I.

[Creepy-male]

Shame on me for considering it? Was that IEE irony?

[Galen]

Shame on me for considering it? Was that IEE irony?

I don't think that constitutes as any form of irony; I was half-joking if that's what you meant to ask.

[crazedrat]

random guess.. 9.

[Korpsy Knievel]

I'm going to be a five, too.

[07490]

The SEI/E5 combination is highly improbable.

this is the most interesting I have ever heard in this forum.

[Creepy-male]

The SEI/E5 combination is highly improbable.

Out of curiosity, because I've been trying to get concrete etype/sociotype impossibilities, why do you think that?

[Creepy-male]

Actually, I'm having an interesting conversation on PersonalityNation about Fivey mediation versus Niney mediation. It's starting to look like I'm a very strange Nine indeed, but I still think there's room for me being a Nine, being a self-pres subtype and basically having my feet on the ground and being practical.

There's a lot of really useless and even downright insulting stereotypes about E9s around. The worst offender is R&H's embarrassing 9 vs 5 mistype profile that basically boils down to "If you're a Nine you're a simple-minded idiot, WAFFLELOL."

That said I'm kind of at a personal critical mass of gripes with the E9 portfolio that I'm seriously questioning if it is even my type.

[Airman]

Are you assertive when you have to state your points of view?
Do you find it easy to prefer one thing instead of another, or are you very doubtful of which one, or simply indifferent because they're the same anyway?
How do you drive? Do you like driving? Do you find it hard to drive?
In my experience 5s usually have a small problem driving cars because they see everything in so narrow field of view.
One more thing, 5s do trust their minds A LOT, they trust themselves based on their minds, on their knowledge. 9s usually don't have this issue, they just stay calm and peaceful and that's what they like.

[Creepy-male]

Yes, E9s can be unjustly portrayed as simple minded, unfortunately. IMO, I think both can be highly intelligent and knowledgeable. E9s can be more impressionistic or 'laissez-faire'/diffuse, and E5s may tend to go analytical and in depth/intense. Based on this, I sense you are more E9 than E5. Of course, all I have to go on are your posts.

Well, posts are good. I don't know if it's worth considering, but Socionics is kind of peripheral to my life. On things that I actually think/have thought about, like psychology, fashion, physics, or relationships, I'm told I have a tendency to go into waaaaaaay too much detail analysing the "Why?" of something. In one of the conversations where this came up I was contrasted with an IEE, whose rantiness comes because he talks around the topic and devotes a lot of time to talking about the bigger picture in that lovely IEE way.

Also, take a look at Harmonic Groups. Positive Outlook (E9) vs Competence group (E5). I think this concept is useful in contrasting both types.

That's actually one of the confounding points for me :/ Both apply. Nine in the sense that I tend not to get worked up about a lot of things, I don't "sweat the small stuff" or get worked up over irrelevant or insignificant things (unless I'm nitpicking! or someone's said something head-splittingly illogical or irrational (xNFps are the worst for this)), Five in the sense that I try to be competent and knowledgeable and tend to depersonalise or dissociate and analyse things from a detached perspective.

[EDIT: I have lots of great Arrogant Intellectual discussions with Neotropic, who I find I relate a lot to on the matter of people being daft. I'll call him into the thread.]

Are you assertive when you have to state your points of view?
Do you find it easy to prefer one thing instead of another, or are you very doubtful of which one, or simply indifferent because they're the same anyway?
How do you drive? Do you like driving? Do you find it hard to drive?
In my experience 5s usually have a small problem driving cars because they see everything in so narrow field of view.
One more thing, 5s do trust their minds A LOT, they trust themselves based on their minds, on their knowledge. 9s usually don't have this issue, they just stay calm and peaceful and that's what they like.

I don't have points of view to assert. I do when I do, though.
Generally indifferent because they're the same anyway, or there's something more important to consider.

[Airman]

Ah, I forgot that it was you here, Gulanzon or Brian...
you're blatantly E9 I could see it in your lazy eyes and all your behavior on camera in tinychat some months ago. Forget E5.

[Creepy-male]

You seem very focused on the emotional atmosphere around you, and altering it to a pleasant uplifted level that at the same time low key and laid back. it's never tiering to interact with you.

You seem to have a strong intellectual capacities, but I sense that you do not always trust the strength of your logical faculties. perhaps your lack of focus, lends you to be distracted easily, thus you fear a "derailment" of your deductions. This may explain why you admire people who you perceive has having a "clarity" of thought. because interacting with these people helps gives you an outside reference point to centre your own logical deductions.

You don't come off to me as someone who has a long sighted sense of time. You seems to struggle with long therm implications of a decision, instead focusing on what can grant the best short term payoff, without any obvious long therm ramifications. Would I be correct in saying, that you tend to focus on tangible benefits of the present?

You also have a tendency of being very individualistic, preferring your own convictions over the acceptance of popular belief or authorities.

Does sound like I'm a Nine, and I guess I'd have to agree. I'm just really unhappy with how R&H characterised Nines as being simpletons or delusional idiots who only imagine they have the capacity for deep thought

I suppose there's nothing really contradictory to being a Nine, esp. a self-pres Nine, I just have a lot in common with E5, but equally I guess there's a lot of ways I diverge from E5; the same cannot be said comparing myself to other E9s, especially sp Nines.

Of course, there's always the possibility I'm some third type. E4 or E7 would be the only reasonable options, and E7 goes right out the window due to my lack of future planning. [EDIT: maybe not. I'm definitely a planner when it comes to acquiring stuff. I love my stuff, and things, objects, items, trinkets, doodads, om nom nom. And food. And alcohol. God yes. Self-image aside I don't realistically pursue any of that like a Seven would. I live with a Seven. He has a large collection of expensive alcohol, I have a large collection of cup noodles. Enough said.]

[Bluenoir]

Forgive my facebook spelling

[Creepy-male]

I only notice the typos now Shows how much attention I'm paying!

[Airman]

In my experience 9s and 5s are so similar in many things it becomes hard to distinguish them sometimes. I have a 9 friend who's a very stereotypical 9 except she has some very typical 5 traits, like for example, even though she's rich, she stores all types of useless things in her room, like bananas, and whatnot, in case someone would want to eat something while in her room, or in case she needs to eat but doesn't want to go to the kitchen.

My brother is a 5 who resembles an E9 if you meet him you'll probably come out of the first meeting with the impression of having met a 9, he's controlled, absorbed in his thoughts and lazy. But when you meet him better he's a very typical 5. He's ISFP which is even stranger for a 5.