The Wisdom of the Enneagram

by Don Richard Riso

Over time our identification with a certain set of qualities (such as strength, empathy, peacefulness, or spontaneity, to name just a few) becomes fixed, and our type’s characteristic sense of self is established. The feelings and states that comprise our sense of self are those we think are necessary for achieving our Basic Desire. The more we identify with our sense of self, the more we become locked into it, and the more we forget that other choices and other modes of being are available to us. We start to believe that we are this pattern. We focus on only certain qualities from the total range of our human potentials as if saying, “These qualities are me, but those are not. I am this way, but not that way.” Thus we develop a self-image, a self-definition—a predictable personality type.