Type Nine - The Peacemaker

Profile by Don Richard Riso and Russ Hudson - The Enneagram Institute

The Pleasant, Self-Effacing Type: Receptive, Optimistic, Complacent, and Disengaged

Basic Fear: Of loss and separation
Basic Desire: To have inner stability "peace of mind"
The Nine with an Eight-Wing: "The Referee"
The Nine with a One-Wing: "The Dreamer"
Potential Neuroses: Schizoid, Dissociated and Dependent Personality Disorders

Key Motivations: Want to create harmony in their environment, to avoid conflicts and tension, to preserve things as they are, to resist whatever would upset or disturb them.

Healthy
Deeply receptive, accepting, unselfconscious, emotionally stable and serene. Trusting of self and others, at ease with self and life, innocent and simple. Patient, unpretentious, good-natured, genuinely nice people. Optimistic, reassuring, supportive: have a healing and calming influence—harmonizing groups, bringing people together: a good mediator, synthesizer, and communicator. At Their Best: Become self-possessed, feeling autonomous and fulfilled: have great equanimity and contentment because they are present to themselves. Paradoxically, at one with self, and thus able to form more profound relationships. Intensely alive, fully connected to self and others.

Average
Fear conflicts, so become self-effacing and accommodating, idealizing others and "going along" with their wishes, saying "yes" to things they do not really want to do. Fall into conventional roles and expectations. Use philosophies and stock sayings to deflect others. Active, but disengaged, unreflective, and inattentive. Do not want to be affected, so become unresponsive and complacent, walking away from problems, and "sweeping them under the rug." Thinking becomes hazy and ruminative, mostly comforting fantasies, as they begin to "tune out" reality, becoming oblivious. Emotionally indolent, unwillingness to exert self or to focus on problems: indifference. Begin to minimize problems, to appease others and to have "peace at any price." Stubborn, fatalistic, and resigned, as if nothing could be done to change anything. Into wishful thinking, and magical solutions. Others frustrated and angry by their procrastination and unresponsiveness.

Unhealthy
Can be highly repressed, undeveloped, and ineffectual. Feel incapable of facing problems: become obstinate, dissociating self from all conflicts. Neglectful and dangerous to others. Wanting to block out of awareness anything that could affect them, they dissociate so much that they eventually cannot function: numb, depersonalized. They finally become severely disoriented and catatonic, abandoning themselves, turning into shattered shells. Multiple personalities possible.

Wings by Thomas Condon - The Changeworks

Nine With an 8 Wing
Awakened Nines with an 8 wing have a modest, steady, receptive core. They are charged by the dynamism of 8 - when focused on goals they often have great force of will. Get things done, make good leaders. May have an animal magnetism of which they are only partly aware. Can seem highly centered, take what they do seriously but remain unimpressed with themselves. 8 wing can bring a strong internal sense of direction. Relatively fearless and highly intuitive. Generally not intellectual unless they have it in their background. When more entranced, they manifest the contradictions of the two styles expressing them in sequence. Could be passively amiable like a Nine and then turn horribly blunt like an 8. One moment they are opinionated or nasty, next moment kindly and supportive. Often don't hear their voices when angry. Can have a sharp, grating edge. May be slow to anger and then explode. Or angry but don't know it; may confuse being assertive with being rude. Placidly callous - both styles support numbness. Tactless and indiscriminate and indiscreet. May be unwittingly disloyal, spilling everyone's secrets. Sexual confusion, sometimes they are driven by lust.

Nine With a 1 Wing
Tend to have been "model children." Instinctively worked to please their parents by being virtuous, orderly, and little trouble. When awakened, they have great moral authority plus good-hearted peacemaking tendencies. Often have a sense of mission, public or private, that involves working hard for the welfare of everyone they are committed to. Principled expression of love. Desire to contribute, do little harm. May be well-liked, modest, endearing, gentle yet firm. Some have great grace and composure with bursts of spontaneity and sweetness. Elegant simplicity. When entranced, they tend to be self-neglectful. May go passively dead and operate from a dubious, fractured morality. Dutiful to what they shouldn't be. Play the good child, disappear into contexts, settle for being overlooked or just partly recognized. Passive tolerance of absurd or damaging situations. One-sided relationships where the Nine gives too much. Rationalize, minimize, tell themselves they had a great childhood, everything's fine. Placid numbness creeps over them. Intolerance of their own emotions. Gradually deaden their soul.

Instinctual Variants by Thomas Condon - The Changeworks

Self-Preservation
Preoccupied with physical comfort, maintaining habits and satisfying appetites. The image of the lazy couch potato goes with this subtype. Strategy for getting along is to ask as little of life as possible. Can have a love of the minimal and enjoy the repetition of known routines. Distract themselves with pleasant domestic activities. Live conservatively. Consume food and drink for anaesthesia. May have large appetites, drug addictions, be physically slow moving.

Intimate
Focused on an ideal of romantic union. Get lost in one relationship or in the yearning to have one. High expectations of partner. Sometimes sound melancholy like a Four. Prone to jealousy. May settle on someone and then grow critical and have a wandering eye. Can also deny their partner's flaws and idealize them to stay in union. Another scenario involves multiple relationships, searching from one person to the next. Sometimes the Nine can't decide between two people. Triangulation. Paradoxically, this subtype can be fickle because they are so easily disappointed.

Social
Social Nines tend to gravitate toward groups and then have conflicts about joining or staying apart. Can enjoy group energy and interests but may be also aware of the group's expectations. These the Nine will both play along with and resist. When immersed in a group, social Nines can lose themselves, trying to become all things to all people. Gregarious but may start to resist being too heavily influenced, to compensate for their sense of lost identity. Can sometimes resent how the group doesn't really see them. May fixate on what others think of them. Or resent the group and make fun of it. Some social Nines stay basically uninvolved but hang out at the group's edge. Frequently there's lots of activity. May get caught up in roles - a stronger connection to 3 goes with this subtype.