Enneagram of Personality and how it works

According to the Enneagram, everyone is born with one dominant type that is shaped by genetics and life experiences. The system also claims not everyone is just one pure type. Therefore, you may share traits of one or both of the types adjacent to yours. For example, if you’re a type one, you can wing with either a nine or a two.

There are theories like Tritype that “basically looks at an individual in terms of three types. An individual identifies the dominant type from each center (i.e., one type from the gut center: 891, one type from the heart center: 234, and one type from the head center: 567). A preferential order to those three types is also identified.” This theory was developed by Katherine Chernick Fauvre and David W. Fauvre.

Each of the nine types can be located in three distinct triads or centers of intelligence. Types eight, nine, and one are in the instinctual triad. The instinctual triad focuses on their relationship to anger. Types two, three, and four are located in the feeling triad. This center of intelligence centers on their relationship to shame. Lastly, the thinking triad focuses on their core emotion of anxiety.