I’ve taken many personality tests in my life, and I retake the same ones periodically, just to see how many personalities I can accumulate. But, perhaps thankfully, I’m quite consistent. One of my favourites is the Enneagram (my favourite favourite is Animal In You but that’s another post), for which I test as an Enneagram Nine – “The Peacemaker.”
I’m sure there are many types of people out there who love personality tests, but I have the feeling that we’re of the same breed as those who love Tarot Cards or horoscopes. Sometimes an obscure calculation by the gods or an algorithm lands upon truths about ourselves for which we cannot find the words on our own. It’s not that every personality test result or horoscope reading is 100% accurate or prescriptive. It’s more like throwing stuff against a wall and seeing what sticks.
So what stuck from the Enneagram Nine? The defining of our most basic desire as “to have inner stability and peace of mind.” The Enneagram Institute goes further to explain that Type Nines:
“….demonstrate the universal temptation to ignore the disturbing aspects of life and to seek some degree of peace and comfort by “numbing out.” They respond to pain and suffering by attempting to live in a state of premature peacefulness, whether it is in a state of false spiritual attainment, or in more gross denial. More than any other type, Nines demonstrate the tendency to run away from the paradoxes and tensions of life by attempting to transcend them or by seeking to find simple and painless solutions to their problems.”
A lot of dark things were experienced this year, running the gauntlet from career to health, from family to romance, from existential to physical. But what is most distressing that strikes me most in December, perhaps even more so in this month because it has never left me throughout the course of the year, is the knowledge that this onslaught is not going to end. I don’t mean that life will always be this hard or crushing. Of course there will be happy periods and beautiful moments to be had. However, along with that comes the certainty of awful periods and terrible events, of likely increasing levels of intensity. The basic desire to maintain an inner peace is becoming more difficult to execute. Or what if I never had it in the first place? That’s the most disturbing thought, when something critical is not what it seemed. What I’ve always prided as my ability to withstand stress and to be chill, to not be faded by what I have deemed “silly” matters, may not be true peace but a façade that cracks under enough real pressure. Perhaps I’ve never solved a single problem in my life, but instead painted a rosy coloured tarp to drape over it and hide it from view, or just amputated it entirely without so much as a memorial service.
This is the crux of most horror movies. Think “Get Out”, “Us”, “Rosemary’s Baby”, “Joker” – what stays with the viewer after the movie ends is the creeping paranoid thought that everyone we trust, even the person with which we share the most intimacy the most in the world, may have insidious motives to be in our lives. “Fleabag” riffs off of this central exploration as well, though replacing others with the self. What could be more terrifying than realizing you – yourself your being your understanding your narrative – are not at all who you thought you were?
The Wendy Way 