The Enneagram — Nine Types, Nine Core Motivations
The Enneagram maps nine personality types, each organized around a core fear and desire, arranged on a nine-pointed figure with dynamic lines of growth and stress. A guide to the system, its modern and contested origins, and how its passions converge with the kleshas of yogic psychology.
The Enneagram describes nine personality types, each defined not by behavior but by an underlying motivation — a core fear and a core desire — and arranged on a nine-pointed figure whose connecting lines trace how each type shifts under growth and stress.
Key Insight
The Enneagram's distinctive move is to sort people by why rather than what. Two people can act identically for opposite reasons, and the Enneagram cares about the reason — the core fear each type is organized to avoid. This is why it reads less like a description and more like an exposure: it names the defensive strategy beneath the personality, which is also the doorway to changing it.
Sources
- Riso, Don Richard, and Russ Hudson. The Wisdom of the Enneagram: The Complete Guide to Psychological and Spiritual Growth for the Nine Personality Types — Bantam Books, 1999.
- Palmer, Helen. The Enneagram: Understanding Yourself and the Others in Your Life — HarperOne, 1991.
- Naranjo, Claudio. Character and Neurosis: An Integrative View — Gateways/IDHHB, 1994.