At Their Best:
Perceptive, responsible, loyal, compassionate, strategic, and courageous.
When Struggling:
Hypervigilant, indecisive, defensive, self-defeating, pessimistic, and paranoid.
What Type Sixes say about themselves:
- I am preoccupied with safety and security concerns.
- I greet everything with a doubting mind and contrary thinking.
- My vigilance, active imagination and intuition help me anticipate and avoid problems.
- I question authority and people until they gain my trust.
- I procrastinate because I fear making the wrong decision.
From www.narrativeenneagram.org
We each feel that we must show up in a certain way in the world in order to deserve love.
These are internal messages that resonate with Sixes:
BASIC FEAR: Of being without support and guidance.
BASIC DESIRE: To have security and support.
BASIC PROPOSITION: “You can assure life and certainty by avoiding harm (the phobic stance) or facing it (the counter-phobic stance) through vigilance, questioning, and either battling or escaping perceived hazards.”
AVOIDANCE: Uncertainty or rejection
FOCUS of ATTENTION: What could go wrong, worst-case scenarios and how to deal with them.
- Positive aspect: The ability to quickly spot potential problems and troubleshoot with innovative solutions.
- Negative aspect: The tendency to get caught up in overly-negative worst-case-scenario thinking.
Strategies For Growth:
- Observe your habit of mind or focus of attention with as little judgment as possible. Ask yourself, how do I question and doubt in my internal dialogue? How am I magnifying situations in my head? Remind yourself that you have the ability to trust yourself and make good decisions for your own self.
- It can be scary to trust others, but work on becoming more trusting. Find at least 1-2 people that you allow yourself to get close to. This will mean risking rejection, but the risk is worth taking.
