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Thread: Enneagram 4/5 inconsistencies. I need your help.

  1. #1
    in dire need of needing life Fransiskus's Avatar
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    Default Enneagram 4/5 inconsistencies. I need your help.

    I might be just E4 or E5, but here's the thing lads.

    -> inconsistencies.txt {

    I notice that there are a lot of inconsistencies between my understanding of the concept and myself. I could be connecting what it means to myself using the theory, yet after a lot of thoughts I just accidentally discovered that the descriptions / theory itself is inconsistent, or just vague.
    There are 2 possibilities, either I'm just stupid or there is an inconsistencies and flaws in the system the deeper I go.

    Enneagram 4 is associated with envy, self-image, or basically the need to be special. Yes, I do all of them, and yes, I do both feel superior and inferior at the same time, just like the description. But those could be associated with my fear of being incompetent.


    I poke people's weakness on their train of thought for my coping mechanism, and once I feel like they're within my grasp / potential, I finally regained my composure to know that I am not the one with weakness / incompetence.

    }

    -> questions.txt {

    My question is:
    Is it because of my fear of incompetence that it leads to the feelings of inferiority, or through my feelings of inferiority that I realized being competent is my idealized self-image, coping through it?
    Think of it like this. Is my fear/desires is associated with Enneagram 5 and then it leads to 4, or Enneagram 4 that it leads to 5?

    The more I dig deeper and deeper, I realized I was just directing my thoughts and emotions to align to the depicted image and descriptions of 4/5. It's like using the system to create an identity, which is just naïve.

    But yeah, after much thought, I realized that I relied too much on system to know myself better, rather than just pure abstractions, logic and essence.

    }

    -> struggle.txt {

    You can't believe how many times I've tried to ignore and throw away my "typology mindset" such as Enneagram, MBTI etc, on my already hardwired brain.
    Think of like Windows. I placed "typology" both to startup and the taskbar that it is the default state of my mind and I needed administrator access to remove it.



    And even if I removed it, it just goes to the recycle bin. The wire is still there, waiting to be rewired.

    Yes, I find emotions to be overwhelming at times. One minute, I indulge in my emotions, feeling superior with my self image, directing everything from my thought, emotions and body to that "image", but the second minute, I find that to be stupid and cringe.

    First it's like I'm acting on first person, after a second thought I go to the third perspective, looking at my cringe self a minute ago.
    Alternatively, it's like running a failed program even if it doesn't have an error, but after debugging it there's a logical mistake and algorithm failure within the code.

    }

    -> closing.txt {

    Sorry for the rambling.
    What do you think of this? Do you have any insights?

    }

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    The Prismatic Mirror FaeSoleil's Avatar
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    I don't really have deeper comments on the details here; it's... yeah. The power of suggestion is strong, and analyzing yourself in a framework could change what that "self" is. It's hard to tell how much of typology systems seeming to work is the power of suggestion, no?

    ... and typology in general has issues when the self is inconsistent or contradictory. To categorize people means assuming they can be categorized, that people are only one thing.

    But even that's not always true.
    C’est ainsi, je ne danse pas pour vous,
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    Quote Originally Posted by FaeSoleil View Post
    I don't really have deeper comments on the details here; it's... yeah. The power of suggestion is strong, and analyzing yourself in a framework could change what that "self" is. It's hard to tell how much of typology systems seeming to work is the power of suggestion, no?

    ... and typology in general has issues when the self is inconsistent or contradictory. To categorize people means assuming they can be categorized, that people are only one thing.

    But even that's not always true.
    It's all suggestion. People go to typology systems when they want to be suggested, and it's almost never for the better.

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    The Prismatic Mirror FaeSoleil's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Coeruleum Blue View Post
    It's all suggestion. People go to typology systems when they want to be suggested, and it's almost never for the better.
    "All" is still a stretch. There are real divisions between people and you can classify them. Personality still exists; just perhaps not in the orderly way people'd like it to.
    C’est ainsi, je ne danse pas pour vous,
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    Quote Originally Posted by FaeSoleil View Post
    "All" is still a stretch. There are real divisions between people and you can classify them. Personality still exists; just perhaps not in the orderly way people'd like it to.
    There are real differences between people, but what does any typology system have to say about them that's true and insightful?

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    The Prismatic Mirror FaeSoleil's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Coeruleum Blue View Post
    There are real differences between people, but what does any typology system have to say about them that's true and insightful?
    Quite a lot of things, just not in the way that people hope.

    A lot of the archetypes are real. Every enneagram type describes a kind of person that exists and describes competently the psychology that leads them to being those ways. SEIs and IEIs really exist, the gestalt archetypes and descriptions are really patterns of behavior that you see in your daily life. A lot of the dichotomies are real. There are results focused people versus process focused people. There are people driven strongly by emotion and people who reject all emotion - repressing it entirely. A lot of the processes they describe are real. Most people do focus on their strengths and have complexes around their weaknesses. Most people do get depleted trying to adapt to roles that aren't "theirs".

    These systems all started with people observing people and finding ways to categorize them, and then pulling those categorizations and observations together. They are built on real insights into the patterns that exist in people.

    The problem is, it's just one view of a far more complex reality. The problem is, people take these systems as more total and more absolute then is remotely reasonable. There is no truth to the 16 types, no reason every single person needs to fit into one of 16, no reason every person does need to fit into one of the 9 enneagram types, etc.

    But that doesn't erase that there are real insight into patterns that exist. More just that you have to read between the lines rather than taking things entirely on face value.
    C’est ainsi, je ne danse pas pour vous,
    Mais seulement pour le vent.

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    Quote Originally Posted by FaeSoleil View Post
    Quite a lot of things, just not in the way that people hope.

    A lot of the archetypes are real. Every enneagram type describes a kind of person that exists and describes competently the psychology that leads them to being those ways. SEIs and IEIs really exist, the gestalt archetypes and descriptions are really patterns of behavior that you see in your daily life. A lot of the dichotomies are real. There are results focused people versus process focused people. There are people driven strongly by emotion and people who reject all emotion - repressing it entirely. A lot of the processes they describe are real. Most people do focus on their strengths and have complexes around their weaknesses. Most people do get depleted trying to adapt to roles that aren't "theirs".

    These systems all started with people observing people and finding ways to categorize them, and then pulling those categorizations and observations together. They are built on real insights into the patterns that exist in people.

    The problem is, it's just one view of a far more complex reality. The problem is, people take these systems as more total and more absolute then is remotely reasonable. There is no truth to the 16 types, no reason every single person needs to fit into one of 16, no reason every person does need to fit into one of the 9 enneagram types, etc.

    But that doesn't erase that there are real insight into patterns that exist. More just that you have to read between the lines rather than taking things entirely on face value.
    I still think that's not particularly insightful, which is why I said "true and insightful." To the extent it's true, it tends to seem like it's just rehashing obvious stereotypes even if they do have some sort of basis in reality, and to the extent it tries to go beyond that, it seems to generally be extremely wrong. There are IEIs and SEIs etc., but there are people who don't fit into any of these stereotypes for a given system, and there are people who are process-oriented and results-oriented, but they might not be the types the systems say they should be. Enneagram might say that Sp 3s are people who try to accumulate wealth because they were deprived in childhood, but the idea that people who are deprived in childhood go on to try to accumulate wealth like Scrooge McDuck or the Rothschilds is not a remotely new idea and enneagram doesn't seem to have anything new to say about it that's consistently true. Is this an image-based behavior and also rooted primarily in the desire for self-preservation? I don't know why it would be, but enneagram makes these claims.

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    The Prismatic Mirror FaeSoleil's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Coeruleum Blue View Post
    I still think that's not particularly insightful, which is why I said "true and insightful." To the extent it's true, it tends to seem like it's just rehashing obvious stereotypes even if they do have some sort of basis in reality, and to the extent it tries to go beyond that, it seems to generally be extremely wrong. There are IEIs and SEIs etc., but there are people who don't fit into any of these stereotypes for a given system, and there are people who are process-oriented and results-oriented, but they might not be the types the systems say they should be. Enneagram might say that Sp 3s are people who try to accumulate wealth because they were deprived in childhood, but the idea that people who are deprived in childhood go on to try to accumulate wealth like Scrooge McDuck or the Rothschilds is not a remotely new idea and enneagram doesn't seem to have anything new to say about it that's consistently true. Is this an image-based behavior and also rooted primarily in the desire for self-preservation? I don't know why it would be, but enneagram makes these claims.
    To a lot of people, these are new insights - and that is why typology has initial appeal.

    Just because you've grown jaded to "obvious stereotypes" doesn't mean there isn't meaning there.
    C’est ainsi, je ne danse pas pour vous,
    Mais seulement pour le vent.

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