I’m going through a bit of an identity crisis. The enneagram is a personality test, and for years I thought I was Type Nine: the Peacemaker with a Need to Avoid. I even wrote up a long blog post about how much I fit that Type. But then I got curious and wondered if INFJs are often Type Nines….only to find out they’re generally Type Fours. So I did a little research and was horrified to discover that I feel a lot like a Four. Naturally I then took two online tests, and it turns out….I’m a Four, with strong Nine tendencies.
What sucks is….Nines are awesome. They’re inclusive, good at adapting, and calm under pressure. Fours, on the other hand, are the WORST. Everything I read about them was just reading all the things I dislike about myself. They’re impetuous and moody, dreamy and unsatisfied. It turns out, I am a Four who desperately wants to be a Nine and has therefore cultivated Nine qualities in her life. But I’m a Four, the Individual with a Need to be Special.
FOURs draw their vital energy from others. Their life question is: “What do you think of me? Do you notice me? Do I catch your eye?”
Reading Richard Rohr’s chapter on Fours in The Enneagram: A Christian Perspective had me underlining everything and then burrowing my face into the couch. Being a Four is being so needy! And…I am! And I hate it! Unfortunately, I later learned that Fours are super hard on themselves, so my reaction to hating being a Four just means I am even more of a Four than I thought!
The life of Fours is primarily shaped by longing: the longing for beauty and the wish that the world and life would fit together into a harmonic whole.
Well, this isn’t so bad. This is super true for me, and this is something I really like about myself. I feel deeply, I know how things ought to be, and I want to get them there. I have vision!
In their childhood Fours have often had the experience of the present being unbearable and meaningless.
OH MY WORD that’s my childhood in a nutshell. Baby Tricia, sitting in corners reading, feeling overwhelmed and overlooked. Ugh, I’m the worst. Realizing I’m a Four is like realizing all the things I dislike about myself are not tangential aspects of myself that I’m moving past, but instead they are Unalterable Facts that make up the very Core of Who I Am. That’s horrifying.
At times the anger over a loss that has been suffered is so deep that it cannot be tolerated. Instead unredeemed Fours direct it against themselves. They believe that for some reason they are themselves guilty for experiencing rejection and privation, and so they consider themselves “bad.”
At least this is explaining a lot of my inner world. This is all…very true. You don’t like me? It’s not because you’re a jerk or we’re incompatible – my heart automatically confirms that I am gross and uninteresting.
Possession brings Fours little joy. Longing is more important than having.
YES. Hey, another good thing. I’m super non-materialistic. I never really put those pieces together, but it’s true. The longing that defines my life can be bad with people: “oh, I have you? now I don’t want you” but it’s really good when you’re talking about inanimate objects. Not so much with people, though, but I’m skating past that.
Fours revere great authorities: important poets, musicians, gurus, counselors, who have something “deep” about them or are something “special.” Only this sort of “inner authority” counts. Formal authorities that aren’t backed up by their personality make no impression on a Four. Their nose for the “authentic” is infallible.
Hahaha, yup. Impress me with your intuition and genuineness and I will follow you and defend you to my death! Enforce rules just because and at best I’ll roll my eyes at you.
Fours’ greatest temptation is to strive frantically for authenticity, often drawn to the simplicity of nature and children. Um. Why is that a temptation, if temptations are negative? OH NO, even worse, I’m not just a Four, I’m an unredeemed Four who can’t even see where my own problem lies! And now I’m overreacting with self-hatred, which is such a Four thing to do.
And Fours tend to use artistic sublimation as a defense mechanism:
Feelings are not expressed directly, but indirectly through symbols, rituals, and dramatic styling. This is supposed to alleviate the pain of real grief and the fear of rejection.
OH NO, very accurate.
This is how self-conscious Fours sometimes appear; inside them a child is struggling with feelings of inferiority: ‘I don’t deserve to be loved. I have to make an impression so that I’m not overlooked and abandoned again.”
This literally just happened in Sunday School earlier this week. We were talking about my upcoming fundraiser, and inside I thought, “No one is going to come.” So instead, I said, “It costs $10 to hang out with me” and did a dumb little shoulder shimmy. OVERCOMPENSATING = my life story.
Fours avoid ordinariness: everything that is current, conventional, and normal. The requirement of being like everyone else can unleash downright panic among them. That is why they refuse to change even more stubbornly than the other types…It’s as if they thought, “I don’t know who I am if I’m like all the others.”
The pitfall of Fours is their melancholy, a “sweet sadness” that lies over their whole lives like a fog. Fours have to be depressed and suffer from time to time in order to be happy…The greater the pain and the depression, the more creative Fours can become.
And this is where I realized I was definitely a Four, because these are the topics of conversation that I had over and over again with my counselor.
“Do you like being depressed?” she would ask.
“Well, no. But yes?” I answered. “I think I’m just scared that if I conquer my depression, then I’ll be useless. I’m most creative when I’m sad.”
WHAT A FOUR.
Since Fours as a rule direct their aggressions against themselves, it often happens that they are disgusted by themselves and their bodies…Partnership with an unredeemed Four is, to be sure, irritating and requires tolerance.
OKAY, we’re moving on, this is super depressing. No wonder we Fours are depressed all the time! We’re awful! Let’s find some good news.
The gift, or fruit of the spirit, of redeemed Fours is balance. At twenty-five Fours have already lived through all emotional spaces and experiences from agony to ecstasy. They know all the nuances of feeling and understand the human soul better than anyone else. If they muster the discipline to bring their emotional life into balance, they can become impressive personalities….
Healthy Fours are capable of a depth of feeling that most of us have no access to. If they can make this genuine emotionality fruitful, if they can express in concentrated fashion their sense of the beautiful and the really painful, then real works of art will be created. They no longer serve mere self-representation, but express something universally valid.
“Mere self-represenation”….like this entire blog? Oh whoops, there I go focusing on the negative. No, but okay. Balance! Deep emotionality! YES, at the least, I am very good at appreciating this. I don’t think I’ve created a great work of art, because my creativity is usually very self-obsessed. But I can appreciate emotion, and I’m comfortable in it, even when it’s deep and dark and scary. Which is, I think, why I was a good counselor. “Some days I think God hates me, and I wonder if life is worth living,” a client would say. “Yeah, wow. That’s a hard place to be in. Let’s talk about that some more.” Oh look, the very next paragraph:
Redeemed Fours are better than most others at understanding and guiding people in psychic distress. They are not intimidated by the difficult, complicated, or dark feelings of others, since they themselves have lived through it all.
I’m a mess, but it’s because I’m a mess that I am a safe place for others. That’s nice, I guess.
Without Fours the world would be deprived of the greater part of its art and poetry. When they learn to serve others with their gifts, they will make an important contribution toward “redeeming the world through beauty.”
Well, that just makes my soul sing. I want to redeem the world through beauty!
Okay, so. It has become increasingly obvious that I’m super definitely a Four. I thought I was a Nine because I wanted to be a Nine – aloof, all-encompassing, above it all. Instead, I’m a Four, stuck in the mud, flailing around and wailing quite a bit. Just to be sure, I used the Enneagram Institute to see why I had misidentified myself as a Nine, and they said this:
The principal reason these types may be confused is that they are both withdrawn types. Fours withdraw from others so that they can protect themselves and give themselves time to deal with their emotions. Nines, on the other hand, are withdrawn in the sense that they remove their attention from people or situations that threaten them, disengaging themselves emotionally so that they will not be anxious or upset. They cut off their identification with others (or never identify with them in the first place), identifying instead with a private idealized version of reality. Average to unhealthy Nines tune out any unpleasantness by dissociating from whatever upsets them, whereas Fours do just the opposite, brooding over their anxieties in an attempt to come to terms with them. Fours are certainly not detached from their emotions–just the reverse, they are keenly aware of them, perhaps too much so.
#confirmed
I’m still feeling bummed about myself and my newly acquired identity, so I’m going to list their website’s qualities of a healthy Four. I may be a mess, but where can that take me? I NEED HOPE.
(At Their Best) Profoundly creative, expressing the personal and the universal, possibly in a work of art. Inspired, self-renewing and regenerating: able to transform all their experiences into something valuable: self-creative.
Self-aware, introspective, on the “search for self,” aware of feelings and inner impulses. Sensitive and intuitive both to self and others: gentle, tactful, compassionate.
Highly personal, individualistic, “true to self.” Self-revealing, emotionally honest, humane. Ironic view of self and life: can be serious and funny, vulnerable and emotionally strong.
Mmmm, okay. That’s cool. That’s me sometimes! Okay. Okay! I’m a Four. That’s not the end of the world.
Have you found your enneagram personality type? HAVE YOU DOUBLE CHECKED IT? Leave a comment and let me know what you are!
It Is Trish 
Hahahahahah im a 9…
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…. 😦 😦 😦
The root sin of 4s is Envy, and I am FEELING IT.
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I am also an INFJ, and a type 4! I didn’t appreciate how spookily accurate these personality tests are until I read your post. I focus on the good qualities of being a type 4 though – I don’t tend to think of myself as ‘self-absorbed’, but in order to be creative and self-aware, I guess you need to be to a certain extent. But I don’t think these types make up everything a person is – I think you can be a 4 and a 9. Sadly I am nowhere near a 9 haha, I think I’m inclusive, but I am terrible at adapting and coping with pressure.. just terrible!
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I have a blog post coming up in the next couple days about learning to be okay with being a Four. I think a lot of my initial freak out was simply from being so wrong about my type. Which, like a Four, I place a lot of value in knowing myself, and to have been so wrong really threw me!
But yes, I’m starting to really appreciate what it means to be a Four. While it definitely includes all the things I dislike about myself, it also includes everything I love about myself! I appreciate that about the enneagram – more than other personality types, it feels more honest in telling you your struggles and your talents.
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Look forward to reading the post! Yeah I feel the same way, but I think these personality tests have helped me to come to terms with my flaws (rather than denying they are there, which I think is what I did before haha…). I definitely feel like I know myself better than I did before after doing them (I know some dismiss personality tests as pseudo-science, but I’ve found them pretty accurate so far!)
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Haha, yes. Who’s to say pseudo-science isn’t also extremely interesting and beneficial? I’m not going to swear my personality type is 100% accurate, but I am going to glean a lot of self-awareness from it.
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This might help you out. https://www.enneagraminstitute.com/misidentifying-4-and-9/
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The four types are a lovely bunch of people, I know because I am one. Your enneagram type is only the door you go through to access all the essential qualities of the 9 types together. Knowing all you can about your type is ultimately what is going to set us free. I also had the same reaction when I discovered I was a four type and to be fair, 4, 1, and 8 types really do get dumped on a lot because I think the unhealthy levels of these types are easy to spot whereas the healthy levels of these types do not get as much attention.
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I think you’re right! I have learned to really appreciate all three of the types you mentioned, because I (a 4) work most closely with a 1 and an 8. And we are awesome! We’re really passionate and get our work done well, and it’s helped me see how using our gifts for good can be a really amazing thing to see.
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Thanks so much for this post, I just came through the EXACT realization (even my husband read about a nine and said, “this is obviously you”) but although I look like a nine on the outside, I didn’t fully relate to the inner motivations and struggles. All these years the nine persona was my mask. Even after reading books and listening to podcast, I still didn’t feel settled, until today, I googled it and found for post, oh it was so good to read your process, I think it’s going to make it a lot easier for me to handle the initial emotion (although I will probably brood over it for a while, lol).
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I’m honored to be a part of your journey toward accepting your (possible) 4- ness! Brood all you want (we’re very good at that!) and eventually, I am certain that you will see how amazing you are, emotional and individualistic as we are! I’m always up for a bit of a chat here in the comments of you need a place to process things. 😊
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I loved this post! I also believe I am an INFJ and a 4 and I could do relate to the way you were processing all of this discovery. It really helped me to feel like I am not alone in my “crazy”! (So 4 of me to say that, right?) See, you helped the world through your 4-ness!!
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I’m so glad we’re crazy together. 😀 Solidarity!
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Oh my goodness!!!! Holy crap! I am having this same realization after a long hard downward spiral and being so confused that I was a 9. I am totally a 4! And agreed that my initial reaction was “ oh nooooo! 4s are the worst!” but am now so happy to realize I wasn’t going insane and I’m not broken, I was just digging way to far into my feelings along with drinking! I love that people think I’m a 9 but so happy I can identify better with a 4!
So happy to see that others have had this mindblowing realization as well! Thanks for posting!
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lol…I believed I was a 4 for a long time. At some point, others talked me into believing I was a 9 (I’m INFP). Now, I’m back to knowing I’m a 4 again (thanks to my therapist, who is also a 4). What you wrote really made me smile and every bit of it rang true for me.
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LOL I literally had the same awful identity crisis. The 9 to the 4 and had your same exact reaction. I LOVED “being a nine”. But, I am slowly loving being a 4 [: We are special and emotionally intelligent beings, flowing with creativity and a love for life.
INFP (almost TJ) 4w5 SX.
-tim
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It would be so interesting to know if this is a common 4 phenomenon…and if so, why do we want to be 9s so badly?
I think I’m going to have to write a blog post about that! Thanks for the idea. 🙂
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Hi. My english is not very good. So, forgive me. But I really like to let a comment here. I am a 4, and it was a real shock to see the description of how feel and see thing in such an accurate way. I felt naked, disturbed, sad, happy and relief. All at the same time. I have told about the enneagram to my friends. One of them immediatly identify himself as a 4. And we had great conversations about being how we are. But then as a troubled 4 I fucked this friendship. And, wow, I really miss talking about this. Thanks for the post and sharing your experience.
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INFJ and a 4w3. It almost felt as if I had written this post myself…you know cos I’m so self absorbed 😉
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Coming in way late, but yeah – I think I am a 4 who thought she was a 9 and I’m having a bit of a crisis! LOL. But really. I always thought I was a 9 too, longing for peace and hating conflict, but some of the 4 tendencies rang a little tooooo true for me..like..
“Average to unhealthy Nines tune out any unpleasantness by dissociating from whatever upsets them, whereas Fours do just the opposite, brooding over their anxieties in an attempt to come to terms with them. Fours are certainly not detached from their emotions–just the reverse, they are keenly aware of them, perhaps too much so.”
Ugh, please can I be a nine?
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No you can’t! ❤️ But the good news is our comfort with over-emotionalism has a good side too!
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Also, I’m an INFJ too.,
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This article was super entertaining to read, because I’m completely the opposite! I used to think I was a four, an I was super happy with that because it meant I was creative and expressive and have an immense imagination. All those things are things I value a lot in myself, so being a four just felt comfortable and right. Today I asked a friend who knew much more about the enneagram then me if she thought I was a 4w5 or 4w3 and she just kind of looked at me and asked “have you ever considered looking into being a 9?” I was surprised, but I decided to keep an open mind and look into it. Discovering I was a 9 felt awful! It hit all my flaws I’ve been subtly ignoring all my life right on the nail! How I avoid conflict and responsibility like the plague, how I’m prone to forgetfulness, how I’m lazy, how I avoid EVERYTHING, ect. Especially the stuff about how I’m often too afraid to put myself out there and be seen. Type 4 is really more who I wish to be, but I really am a 9. It was really hard to here because I wish I was someone who was unique and special. It was hard to come to terms with the fact that that’s just not who I am.
So this article was actually kind of empowering in a way because now I feel more confident being a 9. It’s really funny how we often are type we wish we weren’t because those are the types that we see our true flaws that we’ve always tried to avoid/ignore
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I love this!! How perfectly true and ironic that we could have the exact same but opposite experiences. Thank you for helping me appreciate my Fourness, and I hope you feel better about being a Nine!
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This made me laugh because it felt so personal, like you were in my head! I am a 4 who thought she might be a 9. Some say 4s are good at making decisions (I have no idea what they are talking about which is why I thought I might be a 9). Thank you so much for your honest exploration of this which shows that you are definitely a 4.
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Lol… For about 18 years I had thought I was a 9, even if some things didn’t fit so well. Then paragraphs 1 n 2 happened to me today.
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Thank you so much for writing this article! I instantly thought I was a 4 when I first took the tests, and was very happy about it, but another test later typed me as a 9, and I felt sad to not be a 4 anymore. The negative traits of 4 don’t apply to me; I always look at the world through rose tinted glasses, which apparently is a very 9 thing to do. . So I sadly shifted over to thinking I’m a 9, but goddamn no! I’ve never resonated with anything more than 4. Your article helped clear my doubt, thank you for that.
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so cringe and cliche.
https://www.enneagrammer.com/-blog/misconceptions-about-type-4
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so cringe and cliche. your writings literally screams 9 or even 2.
https://www.enneagrammer.com/-blog/misconceptions-about-type-4
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You’re totally entitled to your opinion, Lavender.
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you literally kept threw away my provocative comment, that means you unconsciously highly values on harmony, which it 100% a 9 trait in order to maintain this whole comment section into full of love, kindness and peace, right? come on, don’t be so denial.
you said being a 4 is painful, and yes you’re not wrong. especially if you know how it feels like to be one of them.
https://www.enneagrammer.com/-blog/misconceptions-about-type-4
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I’m not exactly sure what you mean. New commenters have to wait to be approved, which you have now been. I don’t check my blog 24/7.
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I have to comment because I have identified as a 9w8, but my counselor just said I was reminding her of a 4 in some of the things I was saying. I looked up the four and I was like- I wish! I aspire to that level of creativity, self-awareness and ability to express emotion.
Sometimes being a 9 you can feel trapped by your complacency and going along with others (why I developed my 8 wing). There’s strengths and weaknesses to every type. Own your uniqueness! You’re awesome!
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Coming to your party late, but just went through the same dilemma. Not positive, but pretty sure I’m a 4wing5 now. I read if you see stuff you hate, you might be seeing sides of yourself you dislike rather than ‘oh I’m glad that’s not me’ LOL. Still digging into it and diggin’ it!
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UGH I’M INTERNALLY STRUGGLING. For the longest time, like you, I have believed myself to be a nine. But then I read an Instagram post about mistypes, specifically 4s and 9s, and now I do not know who I am. I identify with aspects of both. Can you help me?
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