My therapist colleague Melinda Olsen (Inviterra Counseling) and I are writing several blog series about the Enneagram, a comprehensive yet compact personality framework that reveals our reactive, “autopilot” patterns of thinking, feeling, doing, and relating.
In this series, someone from each Enneagram Type (Types One through Nine) will be sharing about their own journey of discovering and using the Enneagram for deep healing and personal growth.
In this post, Alyssa Harris, the CEO and founder of The Karuna Lab Life Coaching services, has written about Enneagram Type Five.
Here are the other posts in this series that are published so far:
Type 1 - Joshua Chan
Type 2 - Melinda Olsen, LMFT
Type 3 - Morgan Hancock, LMFT
Type 4 - Joanne Kim, LMFT
Type 6 - Jonathan Siu
Type 7 - Stefie Dominguez
Type 8 - Marianna Torres
Type 9 - Lorren Siu, LMFT
What’s it like to be an Enneagram Type Five?
Knowledge is Power
One of my favorite song lyrics is from Erykah Badu’s song On & On; It Goes “If your knowledge were your wealth then it would be well earned.” Enneagram Type Fives have a compulsive need for knowledge. We love diving deep on topics and learning from experts. Fives want to know how things work, what the origin of things are and why everything is the way that it is. One of the best things about Fives is our curiosity. In our brains, a problem well-stated is half solved, and every problem has a solution.
Fives also adore books! I actually prefer a hard copy book over my phone many days. Reading is one of the ways Fives recharge to face another day.
Enneagram Type Fives can be perfectionists and often feel like we don’t know enough to speak on or create from our areas of interest. We get easily activated when circumstances deny our desire to learn more and instead force us into action. It’s easy for us to forget that experience is the best teacher, and to instead fall into the trap of knowledge gathering in an attempt (consciously or subconsciously) to avoid taking action. Theories are allowed to be wrong; that’s the nature of theory. Often, we don’t give ourselves the same grace we give theories. Taking up the space needed to learn by doing feels very uncomfortable to Type Fives. We’d rather frontload the learning, then try to make our first attempt perfect. Very rarely does that happen, and its nice to have other Types in our lives that can remind us: done is better than perfect.
Reserved and Detached
Detachment is our gift, and detachment is our curse. Fives often come off very aloof and detached. To a certain extent, we are. Fives are not great at small talk, and we don’t find much value in it. We’d much rather get to what you know and what makes you tick. We understand that everyone is an expert in something, even if they don’t know it. You can teach me something, and I’m ready to learn! So at social gatherings we’re often looking for deep dive conversations, which aren’t the social norm with strangers, which is why we’d rather avoid them.
Our (unspoken) dedication to intellectual integrity can also make us seem a bit aloof or too frank for social situations. Fives put a lot of thought into why we believe what we believe, or settling into the idea of “I don’t know”. So, when someone makes a definitive claim, we often have questions. Many people find the directness of a Five’s inquires off-putting. Generally, we don’t mean to offend, we just want to understand.
The upside to our detachment from emotions is that we can typically see situations with clear eyes. We see the problem and the emotions the problem is causing in two different frames, which allows us to offer fair solutions and help those involved digest the medicine of the situation. However, the downside of our detachment from emotions is that we are also detached from our own emotions.
Thinking Dominant
Fives are thinking dominant. We love living in the infinite world of ideas. We desire to be intellectual trailblazers and show people what’s possible in our chosen fields. Our deepest desire for our learning is that it will stimulate and benefit those around us.
We live as if “I am my thoughts”. We can become overly identified with our thinking and conceptualize and pathologize a problem instead of taking action to solve it. I’ve found that the key to breaking out of our negative thinking feedback loop is to share the thoughts with someone you trust. They can often help you find flaws in your logic or shine a light on the very specific set of things that must go wrong and the very specific order they must go wrong in for our worst case scenario to come true.
When did you first realize you were an Enneagram Type Five?
Two years ago, I worked with a life-coach for about 18 months, and one day in session she asked what my Enneagram Type was. I had never heard of Enneagrams before, but in true Five fashion I replied “Let me do some research and I’ll get back to you on that.” And that’s exactly what I did. I took quiz, after quiz (you know, for validity and reliability purposes) and got the same answer each time. Five was always my dominant type! However, there are parts of me that identified with other Types like Six and One.
What do you wish people knew about Enneagram Type Five?
Because of our endless thirst for knowledge, sometimes talking with a Five can feel like an interview. We don’t mean to pry or make people uncomfortable by skipping the small talk, we are just lovers of stories, experiences and knowledge. We know each person has a story to tell and something we can learn from them, so we naturally probe. If you want to put us in the hot seat, ask open ended questions that give us a chance to talk about whatever rabbit hole we’ve fallen down most recently.
Also, please tell us good job! Often, we come off as if we don’t need the feedback of people that are not our superiors, but all feedback is appreciated. We may not give you the response you were expecting because we intake the stimuli and process it later, in private. But your reassurances will make us happy on the inside.
One thing you’re working on to grow beyond your Type?
I’m working on balancing my relationship with the external world, my body and my feelings. I have the natural inclination to ignore or pay little attention to those things, but they are medicinal. The external world is a rich bevy of stimuli, that can teach me just as much as a book. So I am practicing just observing the outside world, and accepting more invitations to social events. My body is my ultimate teacher, and I became detached from it in childhood. I let the mind rule. So now I am using more somatic practices like daily stretching and yoga as a low stress way to get more entuned with my body. My feelings have also historically been avoided, so I am practicing speaking about the way I feel without conceptualization or reasoning. Just matter-of-factly allowing the emotion to be present, instead of numbing or avoiding. Lastly, I carry a few thoughts with me, laminated on an index card, everywhere I go and revisit them often. They are:
You are a future self of one of your younger selves who wanted to know more.
There will always be more to learn, but you have a finite amount of time to experience.
Empathy, not information, will help heal your anxiety.
Your thoughts, while based in reality, are not reality. Reality is reality. Your thoughts are your thoughts.
Compassion will provide you with healthy relationships (especially with yourself!), and healthy relationships help keep you thinking clearly.
Alyssa Harris is the CEO and founder of The Karuna Lab Life Coaching services where she helps overthinkers reduce their anxiety and stop being ruled by their harsh inner critic so they can finally take intentional action towards the life of their dreams. You can connect with Alyssa through her Instagram or her website:
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© Copyright 2023 Joanne B. Kim. All rights reserved.
JOANNE B. KIM, LMFT
Joanne is a Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist and Certified Brainspotting Practitioner in San Jose, CA. She helps people EXHAUSTED by anxiety, shame, and an allergic reaction to anger create VIBRANT relationships where they matter, too.
Many of her clients are:
(1) the highly responsible, conscientious, and empathic types
(2) Enneagram Type Ones, Twos, Fours, or Nines
(3) Highly Sensitive Persons (HSPs)
The most common words spoken by those who’ve sat with Joanne:
“I thought it was just me. I’m NOT crazy!”
“I can finally figure out what to do with all these feelings!”
The three Enneagram instincts (Self-Preservation, Social, and Sexual) instincts show up in the way we engage our lives and creative endeavors. Check out this conversation with Rim from The Empowered Sensitive and Creative Podcast!