How the Enneagram helps a person become more balanced by Understanding the Three Centers of Intelligence

The Enneagram is a personality system that describes nine different personality types, each of which has its own unique set of motivations, fears, and desires. It also identifies three centers of intelligence: the head (center of thinking), the heart (center of feeling), and the gut (center of instinct) as a way that these types process life. Learning about the Enneagram can help a person be able to identify their dominant center which means recognizing whether they primarily operate from their head, heart, or gut intuition. This understanding can be a valuable tool in helping a person understand how to become more balanced in these three areas.

Bringing Balance to the Gut Center Types

Types 8, 9 and 1 are the gut center types and they become imbalanced in that they mainly use their gut instincts to process information. They tend to express themselves honestly and directly and their underlying concern is control and when they don't feel they are in control they experience the emotion of anger. To become more balanced these types need to learn to process information with with their head and their heart and not just their gut instincts.

The Challenger: Type 8s feel anger when they detect injustice and then they move into action before stopping to think things through. One way that the Type 8 personality can bring balance to their life is to stop and consider what they are thinking and feeling before making decisions. When the Type 8 learns to open their heart and become emotionally vulnerable, it helps them to consider other people's feelings and release the need to always be in charge.

The Peacemaker: Type 9s experience anger when people feel separated or overlooked. Although they process information through the gut center, they are often out of touch with their full range of instinctual energy and are asleep to their anger because it disrupts their need for peace. For Type 9s to bring more balance to their lives they need to begin practicing processing and releasing their anger to help them awaken to their own desires.

The Perfectionist: Type 1s experience anger when they detect imperfection. They internalize their instinctual energy by trying to come across in a better and more dignified way. To bring more balance to their lives they need to monitor over thinking about what is not perfect and instead work towards becoming a more objective thinker.

Bringing Balance to the Heart Center Types

Types 2, 3 and 4 are the heart center types and they are imbalanced in that they operate most out of their feelings and mainly use their heart center or emotions in order to process life. They desire attention and since their primary concern is their self-image, they can struggle with the emotion of sadness when they aren't perceived the way they would like to be. To become more balanced these types need to learn to process information with not only their heart but also with their head (objective thinking) and with their gut instincts.

The Helper: Type 2s seek affirmation through connecting with or helping others and they feel sadness when they aren't seen as being loving or caring because that is how they feel accepted. They often block their own feelings to focus on the feelings of others. To become more balanced they need to focus on keeping their energy within themselves and not on other people's emotions. They need to strengthen their ability to think more objectively and listen to their gut intuition, not just their feelings.

The Achiever: Type 3s seek affirmation through their achievements and feel sadness when they aren't seen as successful because this is how they feel valued. Although they use their heart to interpret the expectations of others, they often are so busy that they don't take time to consider or process their own feelings and desires. To bring more balance to their lives they need to allow themselves to be affected by experiences and to work on learning how to process their feelings and express their emotions.

The Individualist: Type 4s seek affirmation from being special and they feel sadness when they aren't seen as being unique because this is how they feel significant. They operate primarily from the heart and are connected to deep feelings. To bring more balance to their lives they need to focus on not overthinking their feelings but instead focus on using thinking to gain objectivity.

Bringing Balance to the Head Center Types

Types 5, 6 and 7 are imbalanced in that they operate most out of their head center or thoughts. They desire safety and share a common struggle with the emotion of fear. To become more balanced these types need to learn to process information not only with their head but also with their heart and their gut instincts.

The Observer: Type 5s seek security through knowledge, understanding and time alone. They over use their head center by trusting in their inner world of analysis as a way to avoid their fear of scarcity and the outer world. Since they prioritize mental analysis over feelings or doing things, they can bring more balance to their lives by intentionally practicing sharing their life and emotions with others.

The Loyalist: Type 6s seek security in knowing all possibilities of what could go wrong and having a support system in place. They are out of touch with their full range of intelligence since they are focused on fearful things so they have trouble trusting in their own insight. Strengthening their ability to connect to their gut intuition helps them to loosen the need to constantly gather information and depend on the reassurance of others.

The Enthusiast: Type 7s seek security by avoiding the inner would of anxiety and look to the external world to experience fun and excitement. They have a fear of being trapped in painful feelings which keeps them busy doing fun things to avoid anything negative. To bring balance to their lives they need to practice learning to sit with negative feelings and be fully present to the here and now.

Learning how to become more balanced is a key factor for Personality Growth

Learning about how your enneagram type can become more balanced by processing life through all three centers of intelligence is a big part of the growth process for each personality type. To return to a place of balance, a person needs to learn to quiet their mind, calm their heart and bring stillness to their body. Many enneagram experts suggest implementing a meditation exercise such as centering prayer or using a deep breathing practice to help bring a person back to to a more centered place. As a person learns to be aware of when they become reactive and get off balance, they can learn how to internally adjust themselves to return back to a place of equilibrium and show up more present in each life circumstance.