Overview
In daily functioning and in relationship to their own soul, Type 9 habitually dissociates or numbs their own needs to preserve an illusory experience of harmony. Type 9 avoids conflict and “rocking the boat” by conforming to others’ priorities, going with the flow, and seeking answers outside of themselves. 9s deadens self-awareness as a defense mechanism, which protects them from confronting the core deficiency central to their ego structure and prevents them from inhabiting the authentic presence and love they long for.
At healthy levels of development, Type 9 is at one with themselves and excels at creating harmonious, connected relationships. They convey a natural ease that enables them to be skilled in interpersonal conflict and which reveals the encompassing acceptance and love endemic to this type. Going beyond healthy levels of development, the 9 is an emissary of Boundless Love.
Character Traits & Descriptions
Adapted from the work of Russ Hudson and Claudio Naranjo
The Peacemaker: "The Easygoing, Self-Effacing Type: Receptive, Reassuring, Agreeable, and Complacent". - Russ Hudson.
Going With the Stream – laziness of the psyche and the spirit, a loss of interiority, a refusal to see, resistance to change, psychological inertia, inattention to personal needs, excessive yieldingness to the demands and needs of others, giving up of oneself, taking oneself lightly so as not to weigh on others, given up the wish for recognition, bound by custom and regularity. - Claudio Naranjo
Pathways to Essence
Adapted from Keys to the Enneagram and Facets of Unity, by A.H. Almaas
Essential Endowment: Boundless Love
Boundless love is the spiritual ground of love that forms the basis for the many types of love people experience. It is solid, holding, and pervasive; nothing is excluded from boundless love. When this quality is present, a deep inner relaxation and comfort seem natural and easy. This expansive love holds and surrounds us. In fact, when experienced fully, it becomes clear that this love is the very substance of consciousness–it is what we are and it is infinite, boundless.
Ego Ideal & Avoidance - Idealizes harmony, comfort, and security to avoid feeling incomplete and unimportant.
Passion: Laziness - Being generally reluctant to do things or to bestir themselves, inattention to self, self-neglect, a fundamental inertia about the state of one’s soul.
Virtue: Action - Being involved in overcoming the inertia of the personality towards growth and spiritual realization.
Holy Idea: Holy Love - "This is the perception and the understanding that this true reality is the existence of love, it is love, and its action is loving. Another way of putting it is that the universe functions according to benevolent laws. Seen from the perspective of Holy Love, the whole universe is pervaded by, held by, created by, and constituted of, a consciousness that is loving." - Facets of Unity, ch. 9. See also ch. 17.
Specific Delusion: Localized Love - Love is a local phenomenon, occurring at particular points of time and space – resulting in the belief that love is conditional. One person can have it while another cannot.
Specific Difficulty: Unlovable - Feeling a sense of inferiority, accompanied by shame about oneself, and a sense that they are not lovable.
Specific Reaction: Falling Asleep - Not being present to their experience by functioning in reactive and defensive ways.
Dynamic Core Elements
Adapted from the work of Sandra Maitri
Ego Trap: Seeking - Seeking answers and gratification outside of themselves.
Anti-Self Action: Forgetting - Primarily, this manifests as self-forgetting, which ranges from losing a sense of their deeper, authentic self to simple forgetfulness in daily functioning.
Ego Lie: Conformity and consideration of others - Nines mechanically conform to prevailing currents and make decisions based on their perceptions of others' experiences rather than their own.
Defense Mechanism: Narcotization - Or a numbing and deadening of inner awareness.