Confidence and The Enneagram
A Guided Meditation For When You're Feeling Shaky
Which Enneagram Types are the most and least confident?
This is the kind of question I get sometimes. I get the impression that I frustrate some people with my refusal to keep my answer to two sentences. There are confident people of all types out there. But only to the extent that “confident people” exists as a category. I don’t think confidence is always an inherited trait like eye-colour, though it may be in some people.
There are certainly people who are more assertive than others, with habits of attention geared more to what they can do than what they can’t, and who don’t get caught up in self-sabotage. Working as a coach has taught me how context-specific confidence can be, though. One client (whose permission I have to share this) with the confidence in herself to get an Ivy League degree absolutely wilted at the thought of telling her church that she couldn’t keep volunteering with their choir.
The idea that you can be confident in one area and nervous in others is not a mind-blowing revelation. Fiction is littered with high-achievers whose wits and vocal chords turn to scrambled eggs when confronted with an attractive stranger. I bring up the observation that confidence can be context-specific to push back against the idea that any type or types has a unique claim to it.
Generally speaking, the assertive triad on the Enneagram, types Three, Seven, and Eight, have habits of attention focused more on success than the fear of failure. In some cases, this may make going after what they want may come more naturally to people of these types than it would for some Fours or Sixes. Some Fours may be reluctant to risk damage to a delicate self-image, while some Sixes may have to navigate considerable self-doubt and skepticism about their plans and goals.
These are crude generalities, though, and they may be rooted in how we define and recognize confidence in our culture. Look at some of the words I’ve used so far: assertive, go after, confronted. These are extraverted words that convey a certain kind of recognizable confidence, but don’t capture the quiet, subtle confidence in one’s judgment it can take to not do something or to keep silent when its tempting to chime in.
I believe confidence is most often an outcome of developing the capacities needed to do something well. We tend to feel more confident doing the things we enjoy and feel good at because practicing them is pleasurable and comes so naturally. Conversely, we are more likely to feel uncomfortable doing the things we avoid. Confidence invites exposure, which builds more confidence in turn. Fear tends to avoid exposure, which serves to make the thing being avoided even more nerve-wracking.
This is where the Enneagram becomes useful to a discussion of confidence. Every type has gifts they often put to use, along with corresponding blind spots and areas of discomfort. Examples of what the nine types feel more and less confident about could include:
Type is likely to be confident about:
Type 1 - Standing up for what you believe is the right way to do something.
Type 2 - Putting yourself out there to make a connection with someone.
Type 3 - Pursuing achievements and accomplishments.
Type 4 - Exploring someone’s pain and emotional depths.
Type 5 - Spending time alone with your own interests.
Type 6 - Your capacity to be loyal and prepared.
Type 7 - Things working out just fine (often a self-fulfilling prophecy).
Type 8 - Calling the shots.
Type 9 - Being able to go with the flow and adapt.
Type may be intimidated by:
Type 1 - Letting something you think is important slide.
Type 2 - Directly acknowledging what you want and need.
Type 3 - Slowing down.
Type 4 - Acknowledging your own ordinariness, and sometimes your own gifts.
Type 5 - People and situations that require a lot of energy.
Type 6 - Trusting your own judgment.
Type 7 - Getting stuck with something uncomfortable.
Type 8 - Letting your guard down.
Type 9 - Being in the spotlight.
How Do I Become More Confident?
My immediate piece of advice to anyone of any type is to be more specific. What problem are you experiencing that being more confident is supposed to solve? For example, my client mentioned earlier had trouble setting boundaries to reclaim her time and thought confidence would be the answer to that.
Once you’re clear on the problem you’re trying to solve, what is a specific small thing you can practice so that you can build confidence in that area over time? If you’d really like to meet somebody new but don’t feel outgoing, can you start just saying hi to friendly-looking people you pass on the street and gradually build from there towards the kinds of people you’d like to meet?
Last month, I did a presentation to a group of coaches on confidence, specifically what to do when clients come to us wanting to become more confident. Part of that presentation was a guided meditation to notice what confidence and its absence feel like in the body. I’m happy to share that meditation with you as well. I recommend saving it for when you have about 20 minutes and some quiet solo time.
I Take It Back, Maybe “Confident People” Do Exist
Something powerful can happen after several cycles of focusing on a specific thing and building the muscles and experience needed to grow confident in doing that thing. Experience and confidence builds in your capacity to learn and develop anything. A belief can start to form in you that, “No matter how good or bad I am at this right now, I can invest time, energy, and a bit of discomfort into it and make progress.”
This is how I would define a confident person: someone who is willing to acknowledge areas that matter to them where they are shaky and then invest attention and action in those areas. This meta-confidence (confidence about one’s capacity to build confidence) may come more naturally to some, but can be cultivated by anyone.
There is no Enneagram Type that couldn’t benefit from this. Anyone of any type can do it.