The Complete Enneagram: 27 Paths to Greater Self-Knowledge

indicates issues and themes from childhood that must be consciously acknowledged and owned so that we can move forward and not be held back by unfinished business from the past.

Nines “merge” with others, but what does this mean? Merging happens when Nines “take in” the positions, feelings, and desires of another person to the point that they feel like they’re their own. They lose the boundaries between themselves and other people. This is especially easy for Nines because they usually don’t know what they want and can hav

to understand what they may have needed to go to sleep to in themselves in the past to get along in the world.

And overadapting to others eventually creates a sense of dissatisfaction that can leak out through passive-aggressive behavior and lead to the kind of conflict the adaptation was designed to prevent in the first place.

Nines can actually find it more relaxing and grounding to be by themselves,

as a way of avoiding the conflict that might arise if they overtly refuse a request, they can often say yes when they mean no. In this way—by passively resisting what others want them to do—they hold on to a sense of independence and avoid being controlled by the desires of others even while seeming to be adaptive and flexible. They may also be una

When there isn’t very much awareness around the move to Three, it can occur as an anxious and confused sense of “doing” in response to extreme situations of not having done enough.

Our human (egoic) tendency is to want to feel good (and to avoid feeling bad) about ourselves. But without a way of recognizing, accepting, and addressing all of who we are, including the Shadow side and difficult parts of our experience, our personal growth stops and we remain asleep to our potential.

They dislike feeling controlled, but like structure and clear lines of authority.