My Enneagram: 4, 1, 7

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This continues my personal take on the Enneagram, started last week with the post on types 3, 6, and 9.

4, 1, and 7 are referred to as the “frustration” trio, or triad if you’re fancy. These types all have an idealized vision of how things should be, and experience constant frustration at the gap between their ideal and reality. The 4 tries to close it by cultivating specialness, in themselves and their experience. The 1 tries to close this gap through perfection and correction. The 7 tries to close it by reframing everything as positive and seeking constant novelty.

4: The poet, the romantic, the dispossessed one.

Strengths: Depth, creativity, originality. The true aesthetic orientation: a divine discontentment that creates much of humanity’s great art and culture.

Weaknesses: Victimhood, moodiness, indulgence. Bitterness. “I’m such a disaster,” says the 4, either smugly or despairingly, after another predictable act of self-sabotage.

Core fear: You are fundamentally flawed and irredeemable, and all the preening you do only serves to accentuate this. You’re as disgustingly normal as everyone else, and yet you still can’t figure out how a person should be.

On the group hike of life, they just happen to be taking their own route, which seems roundabout but satisfies their private goals.

Difference is a funny thing to base your identity on. Because you need someone to notice the difference, an audience to find you semi-relatable. Too close and you merge, losing your distinct markings. Too far and you’re just a complete unknown. This is the strange dance of the 4. They want to be seen and admired, but not reduced or figured out. If you can grasp this wonderfully perverse instinct, so much about the 4, a type that is otherwise confounding, becomes logical. All the peacock-ish adornment, in costume and mannerism, combined with the tendency towards isolation and guardedness — it’s the straightforward product of a conflicted strategy.

The instinct towards specialness creates a natural contrarianism. If you tell them to go left, they will develop a fondness for right, or at least apply a little rightward nudge to the trajectory. Falling into your agenda completely can represent an existential collapse. This applies more generally to gender, political, and professional scripts. They will find a tweak on your way, even if they don’t realize they are mutating the instructions they are given. And when things get too stable, too figured-out, average 4s often blow shit up. They’ll sabotage relationships, find ways to get fired, uproot themselves continuously. This is a defense against ordinariness. Better to destroy the mundanely pleasant circumstance before you catch yourself enjoying it.

Many 4s are drawn to outcasts — schizophrenics, disgraced starlets, nerds, bad boys, cult leaders, monsters in cinema. These figures represent true authenticity, a disconnection from the impositions of societal order. They are unplugged in a way the 4 can’t quite be, completely. Equally, the 4 is drawn to what is aristocratic, rare, refined, and timeless. “Broke with expensive taste” is thus a common 4 pose, whatever the underlying net worth is.

They are easy to spot. Fully 1/3 of people introduced to the Enneagram misdiagnose themselves as 4s, but this is instantly dispelled once you know a few. Of the types, they have the most characteristic energy. It is like standing on the beach at twilight — an abyss is calling. To get a sense, listen to Fiona Apple trying to explain herself. (Although note that 4s can act, as can any other type, so you might not glimpse this energy upon first meeting.) They often have a fondness for aliases, and/or are fussy about the pronunciation of their name. They are often defensively sarcastic. Their melancholy is rich and lovely, unless they have chosen to blame it on you. Among my age cohort, 4s are often interested in androgyny, but I suspect younger 4s might be leaning back into traditional gender expression to squirm away from the expectations of liberal parents.

Follow them into the darkness. More than any type, the 4 is unafraid of negative emotion. This makes them wonderful companions in the dungeons of human experience — they can make you feel accepted when all is lost. You’re completely soothed, not because they are trying to fix your despair, but because they don’t see it as an issue. I receive coaching from a wise 4, and he never fails to catch me out in my falsity, partially because of what seems like an intrinsic desire to glimpse the depth I’m so eager to obscure.

They live with a sense of absence, a nostalgia for something beautiful that hasn’t happened yet. This is created by their constant urge to search for what is whole, rich, real — the catch being that this is the only 100% reliable strategy for missing out on real transcendence. On an interpersonal level, this feeling of absence manifests as painful self-awareness. They look out at people getting by normally and wonder: am I too special for this world, or just more fucked up than average? My coach, Gareth Holman, comments: “If you’re an outsider, you freak people out, but you can also illuminate them. If you’re insecure, it’s hard to be that person.”

Their success depends on what they do with this essential yearning. Think about Bob Dylan. There is a constant sense of searching for the answer in his music. Did he ever find any answers? Not as far as I’m aware; and yet, he took the yearning as a continuous prompt for further search, and forever changed our culture in the process. 4s can become outrageously productive and original if they fall continuously into the yearning, really embrace it as a fuel source, rather than taking it seriously as a sign of inadequacy. Adrienne Lenker and Karl Ove Knausgård are two current examples of 4s who have settled into this mode, to profound results.

It’s common to note that 4s can be dramatic, finding occasion for large emotions in light of relatively minor developments. (Returning to Dylan, he wrote “When the Ship Comes In,” a song of divine retribution, upon being given guff by a hotel clerk.) Are these jags of emotion “false?” That doesn’t quite get it right. It’s more like the 4 can create aliveness, contact reality more thoroughly, through being a feverish tourist of their experience. This Wallace Stevens line captures the dynamic: “They said, ‘You have a blue guitar, you do not play things as they are.’ The man replied, ‘Things as they are, are changed upon the blue guitar.’”

The woo angle is that the 4 can realize that the ache of separation is, itself, a part of the wholeness of presence. The yearning is literally made of the substance it desires.

When unhealthy, 4s start looking for a lover or savior to thrust their ungainly cravings at, like neurotic 2s. When healthy, they take on the responsibility and standards of a healthy 1.

My instinctive reaction to 4s is to be fascinated, often at a slight distance.

1: The perfectionist, the critic, the saint in training.

Strengths: Integrity, honesty, energy. High standards and the resolve to follow them. A bullshit allergy, in themselves and others, that sometimes makes genuine heroism the only option.

Weaknesses: Suppression, moralism, disowned pride, stress. Score-keeping and pettiness. Explosiveness and dysfunction resulting from failed efforts at self-containment.

Core fear: You will never find a way out of your corruption and mess. All of your purported goodness is a thin veil over the roiling mass inside, and this is true of the world, also. Better hang onto that separateness, who knows what would happen if you lost that thing!

On the group hike of life, they have figured out the objectively correct route, a virtuous path that few follow with them.

They are characterized as the religious or moralist type, but this is best thought of as a consequence of their core mechanism, not the root of it. At their heart, 1s are conflicted, torn between their intense emotions and their rational superego. They are their own rigid parents, whipping themselves into shape with guilt and shame. This creates a natural yearning for clear codes of behavior, and a sense of pride when their corrective internal agenda is successfully maintained. Meanwhile, they are threatened by the chaos of others, who ought to do the right thing, as they do.

This inner battle also creates a deep sense of shame and grief — the shame and grief of self-submission. The beaten-down part of the 1, the tempestuous locked-away child, is still in there. Thus, a predictable vicious cycle: when this shame is encountered, its chaotic power triggers more suppression. A 1 can easily spend their adult life this way, because the coping mechanism so often creates high performance in work, and an orderly, if not fully satisfying, way of relating to others. Meanwhile, this can create resentment: while they keep everything bolted down, everyone else is just coasting along in their sloppiness and self-indulgence.

They turn anger, fear, and shame into competence and diligence. If you look carefully, you can see this process happening in real time. Something imperfect comes into the 1’s world, either the misdeed of someone else, or an undesirable emotion, or a mess in progress. They purse their lips, clench their jaw, or take a sharp inbreath. Then, they respond, turning the rigidity into a coolly chosen next move, with just a hint of barely noticeable fury. I think of this as “calm lightning,” and I find it to be captivating and a little scary. (Reader, I married one.) Unfortunately, the inner accompaniment to this process is often a scathing critical voice.

If you are not moved by the genuine integrity of the 1, then you are not paying attention. In this haphazard world, so many of us are looking for an excuse for our sloppiness, but 1s are constantly attempting to rise above it. When this works, they can be machines of loving grace — the whole drama of the 1 is visible in this video of Thomas Keller. Ironically, to maintain this rarefied level of performance, 1s have to be forgiving and kind towards their normal human needs, and normal human sloppiness. Otherwise, burnout, addiction, or another form of involuntary self-restraint will follow.

There is a notable division within the type, between extroverted-leaning and introverted-leaning 1s. The former are your pastors, teachers, and campaigners—moving the world towards goodness and order through relationships. The latter are your craftspeople, chefs, philosophers, and architects—righting the universe through more private labor. Both kinds can be natural founders, in the profit or non-profit worlds: entrepreneurship is a potent method of sending a message. Though the two subtypes are superficially different, they are united by the obsession with the straight and narrow path: punctuality, honesty, consistency.

The bitter irony of 1s is that they are the type most desperate to seek divine grace, but most capable of blocking it by remaining in a stance of perpetual judgement. I’ve met a number of 1 meditators who systematically miss what is really meant by the Zen maxim: “Without thinking of good or evil, in this very moment, what is your original face?” My wife comments: “There’s something I’ve come to see as central to the 1 character, which is a default stance of ‘no’ towards the world — things aren’t good, you can’t let them in to pollute you. This makes it really hard to accept grace and come to see holiness in the everyday.”

Looseness and ambiguity bothers them. “What are we doing here” is a key question 1s are asking, with the answer hopefully coming in the shape of a standard that they can meet, exceed, then enforce. This makes 1s terrific organizers and managers. However, there are two key failure modes. The first is arbitrarily arriving at high standards others don’t agree with, and then becoming furious at others’ lack of compliance. The second is trying to create false order in domains that are resistant to order — or a simple refusal to believe that such domains exist. This is an intellectual deficit they share with the 5, a blinding desire for reality to be neater than it is.

Their emotional distance isn’t personal. It’s just that they let you into their emotions only to the degree that they’re letting themselves feel them. This is often not apparent to them, because an apparent defense mechanism is a shitty defense mechanism. And when the 1 opens up, you see a beautifully childlike quality, like a kid getting out of detention. (It also just is a kid getting out of detention.)

The woo angle is that from the perspective of their shadow, their ego is the thing blocking the light — the inner ugliness is redeemed and transformed only when you actually own it.

When unhealthy, their inner drama takes on the quagmire quality of the neurotic 4. When healthy, they take on the lightness and fluidity of a high-functioning 7.

My instinctive reaction towards them is admiration, and a bit of confusion. They are as different from my type as can be, and I so appreciate their striving. But I’m also like… why?

7: The optimist, the dilettante, the socialite.

Strengths: Positivity, curiosity, versatility. Speed and buoyancy. The person who can genuinely fall in love with everything, and wants you along for the ride.

Weaknesses: Gluttony, flakiness, cowardice. Glibness, vacuity. The person who can convince themselves they’re in love with everything in order to avoid deprivation or pain.

Core fear: You are cold, bored, and alone, pigeonholed in a dreary pen, while everyone else is having fun without you. You stopped moving long enough that someone can finally see you, and, oh look, you have such obvious limitations.

On the group hike of life, they can’t decide whether the smell of eucalyptus is the most beautiful thing ever, or the wildflowers, or your boots, and they would like to discuss all the options.

Much of the character of the 7, my type, becomes clear if you extrapolate the consequences of one odd property. We are stimulated and pleased by change, whatever it is. This is unusual — if you list the factory setting human fears, change is supposed to be one of them. But when change is merely amusing, everyone you haven’t met could be a best friend, every skill you haven’t learned could be your new personality, every city could be your new home. This is a superpower which is also a hideous temptation. Almost before you begin to feel pain or boredom, you can already think of a dozen opportunities for stimulation. When I’m trying to type someone, I sometimes ask them: “if I kidnapped you, took your possessions, dropped you off in Russia, and told you that you had to find your way to Myanmar, would you find this fun?” An instant and genuine “yeah” is a 7 giveaway.

The tempo is fast. It is a hungry, impatient speed. I am thinking to get to the end of the thought, reading to get to the end of the book. After a beautiful experience, I think, “thank God that’s over,” and dash to the next thing. As a result, we are natural generalists. I’ve forgotten about more interests than many people ever have. Recently, my wife was talking to a friend about structural issues with science funding, and he said, “Sasha has a great whitepaper about this.” I thought he was joking, and then I realized that I actually had coauthored such a document, during the five weeks when I was thinking about a career in public policy. If he hadn’t mentioned it, I may never have thought about it again.

We like to play a little dumb. In truth, 7s can be formidable — our resilience and curiosity makes us fast learners, and our restlessness often takes the form of abundant creativity. Our allergy to structure and routine is counterbalanced by our effortless, endless motivation to pursue our genuine interests. But we like to pretend we’re less capable than we are, because owning up to our true capabilities would mean adopting a mantle of responsibility. Of the 7s I’ve met, a suspicious number are talented people unconsciously (or consciously) choosing mediocrity as a defense, and it is a mode I can also lapse into if I am trying to outrun my anxiety.

To soothe myself during insomnia, I used to look up cities in China on Wikipedia. There are so many cities in China with over a million residents. You can get interested in each one. You can look them up on Google Street View or YouTube to sample the pedestrian experience, maybe while listening to a Melvyn Bragg panel discussion on Zoroastrianism. Or you can just think about how “Ulaanbaatar” has far too many “a”s in it. In this mental spinning, what is real fascination, and what is just decorative distraction? It took a thousand or so hours of meditation for me to start teasing this apart. And even then, it is not always obvious.

We can be quite caring, because we want you to join in on the good time. I am uplifting without even trying to be. Your mood cannot drag me down. When my wife had a brief cancer scare, and she texted me about it, my mind was instantly filled with a rapid-fire montage of how I would lift her sorrows. I thought of a great “you have cancer” party we could host. I considered the wig possibilities. But we can also be extremely insensitive, because we expect the world’s moods to be alterable and flickering as ours, and we don’t take the time to consider our remarks. Occasionally I say something hurtful, and then am surprised that I am being listened to.

Negative emotions are magnified enormously — one dreary afternoon, and we are convinced that our whole life is a tundra of despair. Everything good in life can be ruined unless we learn to stop taking this perception seriously.

Our appetite for dodging this despair gives us a reputation of being hard therapy cases. Our central defense mechanism is fun, and the world rewards it. Okay, it does not age gracefully: the 48-year-old restaurant manager still doing cocaine on a Thursday is a 7. But the 7 is quite capable of spending their whole life in flight from themselves, while simply experiencing this as the world being interesting. I went through a few genuinely traumatic circumstances without ever really noticing my pain. Instead of grieving, I got on planes, stuffed my face, wrote a book, had three crushes per month. And then when I stopped and felt my heart for the first time, I was shocked — I had been laughing and laughing, walking around with a knife wound.

To have a rich life, 7s need to thwart their central instinct and commit. To a vocation, sure, and a relationship, yeah, but most importantly, an honest reckoning with our real limits. As I type that, a chill runs through me: limitation as a concept makes me uneasy. And yet, every iota of true value in my life has come from it. Meanwhile, in periods of my life when I allowed myself to be a free agent, nothing real happened. It turns out that compulsive optionality maintenance is not true freedom. But you cannot force 7s to get that message — I received it suddenly one day by the grace of God. Sometimes, I meet 7s who are still frantically trying to feed their hungry ghost, and I think, “oh, I hope the comedown from that realization is gentle.” Anthony Bourdain’s life and death are both instructive for the 7 who wants to understand how they can thrive and, equally, explode.

The way I’ve tricked myself into appreciating depth is by adopting the position that complexity is where infinite adventure actually lies. Fortunately, this appears to be true.

The woo angle is that if you really relax all the way, like all the way, you discover the ultimate prank, which is that consciousness is made of bliss, and that candy-floss giddiness you were manufacturing was never necessary.

When unhealthy, we take on the self-suppression of a neurotic 1, in an attempt to rein in the gluttony. When healthy, we take on some of the depth and seriousness of an actualized 5, and maybe just a touch of asceticism, for a treat.

My instinctive reaction to 7s is pretty gendered. When I meet 7 women, it is often like meeting a sibling: there is an instant click which is completely platonic. (Thank you to two such women, Carly Valancy and Jenny Huang, for their help with this piece.) When I meet 7 men, unless they are uncommonly healthy, I see my own psychology and instantly break out in hives.