Self-Preservation 1 by Claudio Naranjo

Ichazo called anguish to the passion characteristic of the one conservation. However, he preferred to use the word worry. It could be said, in fact, that in this type of person concern is a real passion. And it's not just behavior that can be described as worrying too much — or even feeling a need to worry — but they worry about things that are okay, and sometimes spoil what they touch by trying to fix what doesn't need fixing. This need to worry can be understood as an exaggerated need for foresight and to have everything under control, in turn motivated by a fear that its survival or conservation will be threatened. In reality, the image he has of himself is that of being too imperfect and that is why his activity becomes a constant and obsessive improvement of himself. His anger, on the other hand, hides behind a friendly benevolence and an attitude of service that does not allow his anger and resentment to show through. That is, it transforms his anger into goodwill.

Social 1 by Claudio Naranjo

The character one social is very different from the other subtypes of E1. This is the result of a characteristic designated by Oscar Ichazo — from whom I learned — as inadaptability. For a long time I preferred to simply use the word rigidity in describing this character, referring to something akin to a kind of schoolteacher mentality, and also to what Wilhelm Reich saw when he spoke of an "aristocratic character"; it's just that the word rigidity describes a behavioral style or a specific personality trait rather than a need or passion. Therefore, it remained pending for me to formulate a neurotic need from which the rigid character would become understandable. In this search, the case of a woman who, in addition to being an intellectual and cultured woman who was part of the philosophy department of a university, spoke with a marked American Midwest accent, was very illuminating. And it was striking that she, despite having moved to California a long time ago, she continued with this strong accent that is usually associated with people with little educational level. Being a social character, it could be said that her inadaptability was expressed in it; but how to understand such a behavioral trait from an underlying motivation? In this case, since people tend to adapt their way of speaking to that of the environment, it was worth asking: why did she care so little about it? It was enough for him to ask me that it became clear to me that the answer lay in his general attitude of feeling right. He acted as if the thought “my form is correct” implied that it is up to others to adapt. And this was also noticeable in the fact that he made language errors that did not correspond to his cultural level, which could be easily understood as a result of that attitude of believing himself to be someone exemplary. However, the feeling that I am right does not constitute a motivation, or a passion. And if we want to explain the contrast between a conservational one - who, as we shall see, is the perfectionist proper, in view of his chronic awareness of his imperfections, which leads him to perfect himself -, and the social one - who already feels perfect and therefore it can make serious mistakes—, we must go back to the need for superiority, by virtue of which the social adopt the position of impeccable and perfect. The social one has a real passion for feeling “I'm right, and you're wrong”; and this, in turn, implies a certain power over others, because when he can make others feel that they are wrong. It is as if he were saying, “If you are wrong, then I have more right than you to dominate the situation.” It is a great technique, that of dominating through making others feel that they are wrong, and it can be understood as an alternative to the dominance that the sexual one establishes through mere assertiveness in taking possession and feeling with it. corresponding right. But, since these characters feel above all an implicit moral superiority, it is useful to point out the great difference between morality and moralism: what is immoral in E1, apparently so upright and honorable, lies precisely in that its apparent morality is nothing more than moralism.

Sexual 1 by Claudio Naranjo

Oscar Ichazo used the Spanish noun cello (zeal) in reference to the characteristic passion of the sexual, and this is a word that has a double meaning. When speaking of an animal in heat (that is, in the estrus phase), the word denotes great sexual excitement; In reference to personality, when we talk about doing things with zeal, we mean something similar to care, care, dedication or fervor. Thus, it is understood that heat, in its broadest sense, is something analogous to the intensity with which the animal in heat seeks the object of its instinct. We would say that a sexual E1 is characterized by a special intensity of their desires that makes them urgent, vehement. If we want to understand why anger in the sexual sphere results in this jealousy, we can say that anger potentiates desire by lending it its aggressiveness. In other words, anger gives any desire a special strength and intensity, so that the person feels not only strongly drawn toward its satisfaction, but feels entitled to it. The result is a type that is characterized by a strong spirit of domination and conquest. I will explain it with a collective behavior: when the emerald or diamond mines in South Africa were only exploited by Europeans, many objected that this was not fair, since such wealth belonged to Africans. However, many people—completely convinced—replied: “what good is it going to do for them? They have no culture!” And it seemed obvious to them that it was the Europeans to whom the diamonds belonged in view of their civilized character—which contrasted with the supposedly barbaric character of the primitives. The same thing happened with the Spanish conquerors, who in the name of their very Christian emperor felt authorized to take the gold from the Aztecs or the Incas. Similarly, some people feel more entitled than their neighbors to the good things in life, to the satisfaction of their desires or even to exploitative behavior. And in this there is not only vehemence of desires, but an illusory and exculpatory conviction that this satisfaction justifies aggressive acts. A young man in one of my groups explained that when he was about six years old, he liked to put his penis between his sister's buttocks. His mother told him: “No! Don't do that!” And he answered: “Why not?” Never before have I heard such an anecdote from a little boy: “Why not?” Because we live in a sufficiently repressive culture so that it is usual that, when children are reprimanded by their parents for sexual activities, they experience it as a shame, and sometimes even with a guilt that leaves traumatic traces. For a sexual one, however, the strength of the drive is sufficient for the person—as in the case of the lustful enneatype—to be more willing to question the censure of authority than the strength of her desire.

Self-Preservation 2 by Claudio Naranjo

If the emperor wants me, let him pay me, because the honor of being with him alone is not enough for me. W. A. Mozart

Social 2 by Claudio Naranjo

I often have long conversations all by myself, and I am so clever that I sometimes don't understand a single word of what I am saying. Oscar Wilde

The social E2s are noted for their ambition to be in everyone's hearts and to be publicly recognized as people of reference. They seek attention directly and confuse being taken into consideration with being loved. They may act in a provocative or unfriendly manner so as not to be ignored. Or marry influential people and focus their energies on the couple's goals, raising their children to succeed in this world. Mother models and competent wives are common in this character close to E3 and E1. There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about. Oscar Wilde The social instinct of the E2 is expressed in the motto “I am a friend of everyone.” There is a powerful desire to be valued by all the people in their social sphere. They enjoy introducing people and organizing meetings at home. They are very efficient at making themselves necessary and experts at creating networks; today they could be called influencers. The others are surprised at how they treat almost everyone, from the cleaning staff to the manager they don't know at all, with a close familiarity that makes them trustworthy. Another motto applicable to this subtype is “information is power,” and they make it their own from childhood. They enjoy putting themselves in the center of attention in the social sphere, and have a great need to be remembered, fearing going unnoticed or feeling excluded. They become intimate with valued people in the group, to the point of being indispensable support. If they feel insecure about their power of social fascination, they cultivate new skills. They try to impress by giving advice; spiritual, financial, medical... or with allusions to important people as if they knew them intimately. This puts them in trouble, because the desire for it to be known that they are friends of VIPs can lead them to be indiscreet and reveal confidences. Social E2s who are more trapped in their character structure can frustrate their loved ones by being scattered, having such a wide range of contacts, and not really paying attention to anyone. They are paternalistic and like to do favors, but making it very clear to the other person everything they have done for them. “What would you do without me?” They are the classic accomplice who covers up the misdeeds of an important person so that they feel indebted.

Sexual 2 by Claudio Naranjo

In Madrid I never set foot on the street, because every time I appeared at the door of the Ritz, a legion of gentlemen threw their cloaks on the ground so that I could walk on them, placing before me a carpet that had no end. Mata Hari

The sexual E2 moves between seduction and aggressiveness, and combines fascination and sensuality. It is the most explicit, spontaneous, and wild of the three subtypes. Just as the social E2 seduces from the intellectual, and the conservation, from tenderness, the sexual does so from the carnal. It's invasive and if they want something, they take it, just like sexual E4 or E8. They clearly put their empathy at the service of seduction more than out of true interest in the other. They know how to weave webs from which it is difficult to escape because they become passionate when they are in conquest. They are a person who knows they are special and wants to be unforgettable; their only desire is to be adored again. Their basic interest is finding romantic union, fusion, and they confuse being desired, where they are a master strategist, with being loved and valued. They may be a prodigal and indulgent parent, or a passionate and attentive lover, or both. If they encounter resistance they press and provoke, to disarm the objections. They can also accuse in a furious manner, approaching the E8. Behind their outbursts of anger lies the melancholic desire for a total and enveloping connection with the other, an aspiration close to E4.

Self-Preservation 3 by Claudio Naranjo

When considering enneatype three in a panoramic way, we are struck by its social and sexual manifestations. But when we meet people of the conservative E3 type, we cannot exactly say that we are dealing with a third type of vanity, because just as the proud of the conservative subtype do not seem proud, the vain of conservation do not seem visibly vain to us either -and I have come to characterize them as countervailing, using a language analogous to that of psychoanalysis when it introduced the notion of the “counterphobic” character, which hides its fear through visibly audacious attitudes. Over the years I have found that the same is true in the case of conservation of each of the passions. In E1, for example, the fact that he does not seem angry and that he masks his anger while defending himself behind benevolent attitudes is striking. The case of the conservative E3, which seems not very vain, resembles that of someone who is so determined to be a good person (that is, to follow the perfect or ideal model of the good mother, the good housewife, etc.) such a way translates into an implicit taboo on vanity. Therefore, it can be difficult for an inexperienced person to recognize a conservation E3, who could be confused with an E1 or other traits. If we ask ourselves what is his neurotic need, what does a conservational three need above all else, it might seem that he would try first and foremost to be good; but that is a universal commandment, present in almost everyone's life (although some people rebel against it). More specific to E3 conservation is the concept, underlined by Ichazo, of security, and it seems to me that a threatened security makes these people also develop a special autonomy. Since they were not taken care of enough, they learned to take care of themselves, and later they also take care of others. There is an atmosphere of security around E3, and they are often people you turn to for advice, as they seem to specialize in problem solving. This passion for security can oversimplify their lives, however, by narrowing their interests to what is most practical and useful. Furthermore, when you want to give efficiency too much priority, you end up making efficiency itself efficient.

Social 3 by Claudio Naranjo

For the distinctive passion of E3 social, Ichazo proposed the term prestige: we can say that the three social is someone who has the passion to shine — not only through work, but also in the way they present themselves to others. It is as if he had an intrapsychic propaganda department. By bringing the desire for prestige, understood as a passion for social recognition, to a need for applause from everyone and not just from a few, it consumes excessive energy that naturally interferes with spontaneous action. None of the E3 subtypes are described in the DSM-IV, which surely reflects the fact that the corresponding traits, oriented towards good performance, practicality, and success, are idealized by modern culture, in which it can be say that the social three, in particular, has become the modal personality of the secular and technocratic world. Social E3 is the most chameleonic of the subtypes of the three. He is also the most vain of the vain. Regarding the other E3, he is a strong and reactive character, lover of power, even if he manages it not directly, but through the people he supports.

Sexual 3 by Claudio Naranjo

For the passion of the sexual three, Ichazo used the words masculinity or femininity, depending on the case. Rather, I used to explain it as an excessive attempt to conform to cultural (perhaps Hollywood) images of masculine and feminine. Today it seems to me that the fundamental pathology of these people lies in the fact that, instead of acting from an instinctive freedom, they put all their passion in the thirst for love and in the corresponding seduction through complacency or the image that is supposed attractive and exciting. The result of this is that the woman, being too aware of pleasing the man, loses the ability to enjoy her. Also added to this character is a certain passion for the family that, despite not appearing as a defect, embodies an exaggerated need to please that perpetuates self-alienation. Of the three subtypes, sexual is the most dependent. He does not usually show aggressiveness and does not tolerate being rejected. His seduction is intended to be welcomed and confirmed, confusing the value of himself with the attractiveness of his body.

Self-Preservation 4 by Claudio Naranjo

Different from the "sufferer" (social E4) and the "insufferable" (sexual E4) is what is called the "suffered" (or “long-suffering”) in Spanish, an expression that speaks to us of a capacity for self-frustration and endurance. Instead of being a very tearful person, the sufferer is one who does not complain and avoids crying in front of others, and who has learned to swallow a lot and endure pain without blinking. How could we explain this in terms of motivation? What need can push a person to become a masochist? It is something like saying to a parent or loved one: “Do you see that I am not complaining? Do you want me now? Do you see what a good boy, what a good girl I am?” The E4 conservation aims to make virtue of resistance to frustration. Many times I have explained it with an anecdote from Lawrence of Arabia, according to the famous film, which shows him in an office in Cairo lighting someone's cigarette and then putting out the match with his fingers. Someone asks him surprised: “What are you doing?” And he explains that, in this way, he trains himself to endure pain. He had developed from childhood this supposed virtue of stoically enduring pain, and it surely served him during his exploits, which earned him the fame of a great hero, for not even among the Arabs had anyone known how to withstand the harshness of the desert in such a way. In the E4 conservation, supporting is a passion, but how to explain it? I think the key is in the introjection of greed. The visible envy that presents the sexual E4 as a demanding and insistent oral aggressive, becomes here a counter-envy directed against the person himself, now in the form of a self-demand that is also self-devouring.

Social 4 by Claudio Naranjo

The contrasts between the E4 character types are the most striking, since its different subtypes seem more differentiated than in the other passions. When I explain this topic in Spanish, I usually say that there are “sufferers, long-suffering and insufferable”. The sufferers are the social fours. The social E4 is a person who complains too much, is very tearful and often puts himself in the role of a victim. In the DSM-IV, a category of person given to self-sabotage is suggested. The characteristic pointed out by Ichazo for this character is shame, which descriptively seems to me to be a success but it is not enough to describe a neurotic need. Certainly, these are people who underestimate themselves, and therefore feel less than others. But how do you explain why these people are so given to self-blame and to comparing themselves unfavorably with others? The answer, it seems to me, is found in what Melanie Klein called the depressive position, through which the boy or girl prefers to blame himself instead of unloading his rage against the mother, whom he needs exaggeratedly. In a similar way, we can consider that the social E4 is one who prefers to swallow his own poison instead of externalizing it towards the loved ones; he has learned to introject his aggression in view of an exaggerated affective dependence.

Sexual 4 by Claudio Naranjo

If the social E4 suffers more than the other subtypes from feeling guilty about any desire, the sexual E4 turns against shame by becoming shameless in order to satisfy its intense desires. Therefore, even if it is embarrassing, it will knock on every possible door. He becomes insistent, even against frustrations, as if he thought according to the saying that the baby who cries the most is the one who suckles the best. "The more I complain, the more I'm going to get," he seems to think. It's just that this strategy, which works well in childhood, doesn't work as well in adult life. People who are too insistent, demanding, demanding, tend to be bothered and rejected, and thus their vicious circle arises, in which rejection leads to protest and protest to rejection. Ichazo's name for the characteristic passion of sexual E4 was hate, which is descriptively appropriate for these people who are so expressive about their anger. But this may not sufficiently explain his motivation, which is why it seems better to me to speak of competition, or competitiveness. We could characterize envy of the sexual subtype as aggressive oral envy, which bites. Psychoanalysis speaks of "cannibalistic" impulses. It is not only wanted, but it is wanted with anger. This is the sin of Cain, our ancestor: “I envy you and therefore I kill you”. I envy the rich, and I start a revolution. I envy your intellectual superiority, and for that I will cut off your head (then... I will seem taller!) And when we talk about cutting heads, we are talking about the invalidation, the contempt, the aggression that is expressed in the devaluation of what enviable, as in the case of the fox and the supposedly green grapes.

Self-Preservation 5 by Claudio Naranjo

The need to retreat is a clear characteristic for the conservation five. But keep in mind that every E5 subtype has some of that: some need to retreat. In the case of conservation, the passion has a lot to do with finding refuge, erecting high walls that separate you from a world that can invade you, that can take you out of a precious little world that hides inside you. The idea of self-preservation becomes clearer if we imagine them as strong supporters of cave retreat. The E5 conservation extremely limits his needs and desires, since each desire could mean a dependency status for him. Like each conservation subtype, this one is also linked to survival and to the concrete, attached to objects and personal space; but like E5, which is the most mental of the mental characters, it is in thought, in incessant reflection on how to survive and live by limiting external disturbances, that it finds the greatest refuge.

Social 5 by Claudio Naranjo

If the E4 are so intense, that this makes them very differentiated or contrasting characters, the E5, on the other hand, in their usual lack of intensity, appear to us as more difficult to differentiate between them. In reference to the passion of social E5, Ichazo used the word totem, which I find very evocative, a good image. But the passion of the social E5 is something similar to the need for the essential, the sublime, we could say, instead of the need for what there is. Totem indicates both height and the character of being a constructed object rather than a human being. The height of a totem evokes a tendency of these people to look up, towards the ideal, and to relate to the most outstanding and prominent among people, something like Midas wanted everything he touched to turn to gold. The tragedy is that, by seeking the social E5 a super value, it implicitly despises ordinary life and ordinary people. He is only interested in the quintessence of life, the elixir of existence, the ultimate meaning. But in this orientation towards the stars he becomes someone who is little interested in life here below... He becomes, therefore, too spiritual, since affective impoverishment, which moves away from compassion, is precisely contrary to spiritual achievement. Thus, in this character, a polarity is established between the extraordinary and what does not make sense, so that nothing makes sense until the extraordinary or magical is reached.

Sexual 5 by Claudio Naranjo

The word trust would be the basic issue for the sexual five. Among them there are many poets or artists. Nijinsky was such a five. He had an extreme expressiveness, but cut in many ways. If you try to find the difference between the sexual E5 and the other subtypes of the five, it will not be easy. But if you go into conversation with them, you'll hear them say that they feel very passionate about a person; usually about a person they can't find in their lives. Here occurs a case similar to the extraordinary in the search for the social five — the extraordinary would be what is at the top of the totem pole: the sexual E5 seeks a very tall exemplar. The same goes for love: this subtype is on a quest for absolute love, and their quest is so strong that if you are the one being sought, it is very difficult to pass the test. If someone is looking for the absolute, it is very easy for him to be disappointed. We have to understand this passionate search in the sense of trust, of being able to trust the other: the sexual E5 is looking for that person who will be for him and with him, regardless of how or what, far beyond normal vows of an engagement or marriage. The thought of the sexual five is that he has to be able to present himself to you with the worst of his inner world, and that you, as his partner, should maintain complete equanimity in the face of his inner monsters, since he loves you so much… So he lives the love of a couple as a kind of ideal, but it is an ideal that does not exist in the world of humans. The sexual E5 is quite romantic — this is the minus five of the E5s. They can be very similar to the other five until you hit the romantic point: then a vibrant inner life will be awakened. Chopin can be a good example of it. Who if not the most romantic among composers? Chopin was more of an aristocrat. He was a bit stiff. Someone who knew him quite well—Liszt's mistress—said of him that she was like an oyster with icing: he wasn't very open, he wasn't open to deep intimacy, except with one or two people in his life. Chopin came from Poland and came to France as a teenager, but he did not make any new friends in France. He was in the center of high society, and his whole sentimental life was replaced by music.

Self-Preservation 6 by Claudio Naranjo

The E6 conservation is the opposite of the E6 social. This one is warm and ambiguous, insipid, sappy. It does not come to him to say that this or that is white or black. It takes a lot of courage to say something is black or white. For him it is better to say: “oh, there are several types of shades of gray in between. And I don't really know what kind of gray we're talking about, because life is very complex.” And so he can go on endlessly, always beating around the bush. We have a person here who needs a lot of protection. He is afraid of not being protected, a fear that manifests as insecurity. And his characteristic passion is the need to have something similar to friendship: a little warmth. What characterizes the E6 conservation among the three types of the six, is precisely this search for heat. They are teddy bears. They want to feel the embrace of a family, to be in a warm place, in a familiar environment where there are no enemies. In social contact there is a kind of alliance formation of “I am not going to hurt you and you are not going to hurt me”, “I am your friend, be my friend”. Freud said that such alliances were the essence of friendship, but of course they are only the essence of a neurotic friendship: coming together in the presence of a common enemy, huddled together in the face of danger. The “I support you and you support me” phenomenon is humanly general, but the conservation six does this constantly, in its yearning for a small, warm world.

Social 6 by Claudio Naranjo

This is what I call a “Prussian character.” The social E6 is cold, very formal. Kant, for example, was a great philosopher. He was a Prussian, and the Prussians had that form of character which has a great love of precision and an intolerance of ambiguity. This is precisely the complete opposite of the Conservation Six, which is warm and too permissive of ambiguity. Among the Nazis there were many social sixes. His behavior is very visible: “this is the line, the party line, the line that defines who are the good guys and who are the bad guys... and what we need to do and we do it very efficiently.” In efficiency, the social E6 is similar to an E3. Ichazo used the word duty, it is more than just being concerned with duty, for the six socials are primarily concerned with the reference point. They have the mind of a legislator, clear categories. His intellectual orientation is to know very well where the north is, where the south is, and the west, and the east, and... And if they ever wanted to become human, they would first need to go crazy and forget all the landmarks. They need to forget duty — no duty at all — and connect with instinct and intuition, with life.

Sexual 6 by Claudio Naranjo

And here is the so-called counterphobic character: sexual E6 goes against fear. So we could call this neurotic need force. On a descriptive level, we can say strong in the same way that a conservation six can be branded as a weak person. One is a rabbit and the other is a bulldog: a counterphobic is much like a barking dog. It doesn't always bite, it barks more than it bites, but it has a fierce appearance. The need is not only to feel strength, but also to be able to intimidate. The internal program says that the best defense is a good attack. A very illustrative joke about it: a woman went to visit several psychiatrists because she heard wing noises in her bedroom that prevented her from sleeping. A novel psychiatrist gives him a gun telling him that he is going to end his phobia by shooting, “because you know you are stronger.” The next thing was a big scandal: the man killed his guardian angel. So these are the madmen who go against danger, who can kill anyone because anyone can become something dangerous.

Self-Preservation 7 by Claudio Naranjo

It is usually easier to recognize a sexual or social seven than a conservation seven. To refer to him, Ichazo used the phrase „the guardian of the castle”. He also uses the word „castle” for the five conservation — I preferred to use the word refuge, lair. But what is the meaning of the phrase „the guardian of the castle”? The E7 conservation is the person who makes alliances. Family could be an alternative word. But not in the true sense of the term, which is full of positive connotations. The word family describes an aspect of life. But, in the specialized vocabulary about the ego, there is a kind of family game that can be played. In it, the seven conservation build relationships with people based on ideas such as: „I will be family to you and I demand that you be family to me”, „let's get together, I will serve you and you will serve me”, „together, we can create a good mafia together”... I drop the word smuggling because this type of behavior can lead to cunning. It is a clear partisanship. There is an element of corruption very present in it. Self-interest, selfishness, is behind this alliance, even if it appears to be denied. Naturally, every ego form relies on a lie that makes it appear that it is not there. That is why confession is so good, so interesting for the work of the conscience — especially when the confession is public, because that is how one realizes that one can go on with everything, remain the same. So the conservation E7 is the opportunist, the person who has to find advantages, to profit. It is as if a threat to conservation hangs over him that has to be compensated. Therefore, gluttony, in this case, is expressed as an excessive concern to get out of this threat to conservation by making good deals and deals with every opportunity. A friend of mine was a dentist for part of his life. He seemed like a kind, friendly, talkative person. Some are very fond of the dental profession because they have each other's mouths shut all the time, so they can talk and talk as much as they want. Surely you have met very talkative dentists. They may not realize it - unconsciousness plays tricks. And it is typical of the seven conservation groups that they like to do something with their hands, something useful for others. They are practical. Talking and talking, the seven conservation soon discovers the other person's weaknesses. „I have seen that you have bought a new car, how are you doing?”, Says the dentist, „Well, it is an excellent car, I am very happy with it” – answers the patient – „but unfortunately I have to sell it”. „Ah, well” – the dentist takes advantage of it – „then I'll buy it for you!” It seems that with the seven conservation there is no conversation that does not lead to business. You do instant business because your mind is so alert to opportunity that you never miss it. His position is that of one who thinks that if you are not alert, if you do not keep your nose in contact with the wind to capture opportunities, you will be a loser.

Social 7 by Claudio Naranjo

The social E7 is the counter-type seven, in the sense that it is difficult to recognize in him the passion of gluttony, because he strives to hide it with an altruistic behavior that, in some way, should purify him from the guilt of feeling an attraction to pleasure or to one's own advantage. This is an attraction that he tries not to feel by pursuing an ideal of himself and the world: he sacrifices his gluttony to be better and for a better world where there is no pain or conflict. The social seven are people who, on the surface, do not want to exploit others, do not want to be tied to their desires. They are very pure people, too pure. There are some sevens who are very concerned about their diet, about world hunger, and so on. New Age fashion was a hotbed of this seven social culture. It would seem that the individual had the intuition that he hides a pig inside himself and said, “No! I'm going to define myself as a detached pig.” This is the social seven. The word Ichazo used was sacrifice. But it is a sacrifice of gluttony. It is a postponement of desires before an ideal. The deception is that these people really have a great gluttony in recognition of their sacrifice. They want others to see them as very good. Now I am going to give a bad example about the social seven, since I will refer to the life of a true saint, highly revered in the Christian world. It is obvious that I am talking about San Francisco, who was this type of person. Saint Francis followed the kind of advice that William Blake gave: if we lived madness and followed it, then it would become wisdom. If the mad and neurotic man fully lives his madness, he would become a sage. It is a path. So San Francisco wanted to be good. Therefore, he did all the things that a seven needs for transformation: he lived miserably, he raised stones to repair the shrine, he kissed lepers... Nothing could be more horrible. So he did all the right things to detach himself from the seven of him. But if we examine the early life of Saint Francis, we will find a very revealing anecdote. Together with his monks, the saint built a kind of tent to take shelter. Suddenly it started to rain and Saint Francis and his monks went to the shelter to rest. But when they arrived they found a farmer with his cow inside the store. And Franciscan generosity was to give priority to the farmer and his cow. It seems to me that health, both mental and spiritual, has to do with loving what your neighbor asks of you. But when you love your neighbor more than yourself, then you are trying to be too good. This is very typical of nuns, and some social sevens can also get into that kind of stereotype of goodness, which consists of trying to be good according to a code or a social consensus. Perhaps humans today would be tempted to think that they have more rights than a cow, but perhaps we are wrong about this too: deep ecology has something to tell us about it. But where is the limit of goodness? There is a kind of kindness by applause, very typical of the social seven.

Sexual 7 by Claudio Naranjo

The sexual seven is not earthly, but heavenly. He is not interested in the things of this world. It is the gluttony of the things of a higher and more advanced world. The sexual E7 is what we could call a dreamer. To define it, Ichazo used the word suggestibility, which I understand as the passion to imagine something better than the desolate reality. It is the passion to enthrall reality, to fantasize, to paint things pink. In other words, it is a form of idealization. If the word for the social E5 is totem — totemize is a type of super-idealization — here it is rather an idealization of the common: the sexual seven looks at things with the optimism of those who are in love. They say that love is blind. It could be that the sexual seven is blind in the same sense. He is too enthusiastic. His passion is to dream, to go towards the sweetness of the imagined instead of contacting the ordinary and not so interesting reality. Carl Abraham, a collaborator of Freud who had a better eye than Freud for character description, spoke of a completely optimistic character in every way: “I’m fine, you're fine, everything is fine.” And of course this can be very therapeutic... for anyone who isn't a seven. Or, put another way: the virtuous life is good for anyone who is not a nun.

Self-Preservation 8 by Claudio Naranjo

The most armed of all the E8 is the conservational. The word that corresponds to it is satisfaction: “I have to have it. This is mine. I have to have it." It is more an intolerance of the frustration of what he wants to have than the actual having of it. In this sense, it is somewhat like a characteristic of the sexual E1, who is also obsessed in the desire for him. But an E1 is very different from an E8. E1 is hypersocial, while E8 is completely antisocial. E1 is too concerned with the rules and the other too little. The E8 conservation pursues the satisfaction of your needs. He doesn't usually talk much. It is like the lion. A lion only moves when it is hungry. It seeks to satisfy its unsatisfied hunger and then sleeps for the rest of the day. Very majestically. It's like no nonsense, no words, no puns in a conservation eight. We could say that his need is that of an exaggerated selfishness. They are the people who know how to do business and know how to haggle to get ahead of everyone. There is the expression: a used car salesman. That is the art or the talent of the eight conservation. But it is also his need: he is a survivor, a term that has been used for eights in general, but is more indicative of the conservation eight. He knows how to survive in the most difficult situations. He knows how to get things, how to get away with it.

Social 8 by Claudio Naranjo

The social E8 is a kind of social antisocial. If we want to use the categories of modern psychology, the eight responds to the so-called antisocial personality: more or less, a person who is against social norms. Or rather a rebellious person. But a social eight is a type that is only explained in contradictory terms. It's like a child who became violent defending his mother against his father. His violence arose from solidarity. He has resonated a lot with the phrase of “thundering in the face of injustice”. The central theme of the social E8 was named by Ichazo as friendship. I do not like to use words that have a universal meaning or that we can associate with great meanings to describe specific games of the ego, since many times we end up using those words to justify these same games. So I feel more comfortable with the word complicity. It has to do with the word loyalty, like that of a child who allies himself with the mother to confront the father and who develops a strong detachment from the paternal bond, for which he surely becomes a difficult child at school. He rejects school because the entire institution is associated with a father-like authority, and he comes to experience intellectual detachment because the intellect is equally part of the father complex. Not surprisingly, patriarchal culture is made up of intellect, authority, and impulse control. Looking at the social eight with the mind of a Freudian, the concept of complicity will be better understood. We could speak of an Oedipus complex. We could say that the boy needs the love of his mother and that he has no hope of finding love in his father. Therefore, he concludes, “I am going to join with my mother against my father, I am going to protect mom, and I am going to get mom's love.” If we go into Freudian psychodynamics, we might also add that this mechanism is not, after all, composed of pure loyalty, but rather a matter of self-interest. But, for any person of this character, it is very difficult to go beyond the felt experience of simple loyalty. If we were to ask Karl Marx about the nature of his solidarity with the exploited, I don't think he would be receptive to the Freudian reproach, that he would say that he simply ganged up with his mother against his exploitative father. Or that his affinity with his mother was Oedipal and he had something to do with his own need for love. It is difficult to make an eight aware of his need for love. We are all moved by love. Each form of disturbed personality is an alteration in the way we act to find love. One acts too cute or too good at school, another is too perfect in his morality, and so on. In an eight, it seems that the main issue is renunciation, the abandonment of love. He thinks it's better to go for power, for pleasure, for what he wants, instead of waiting for love, instead of getting sentimental. For an eight, people who are looking for love are sentimental. So an eight is a character that veers towards the cynical, towards the rough, towards the harsh. Incidentally, eights are not usually interested in activities related to self-knowledge, since it is a little harder for them to develop this type of insight in their own emotional life: they have a lot of repression from the soft side, as if they had had to bury their inner child to be able to go out to life in an armed way, towards a struggle for existence, red in teeth and nails, as the Darwinists say. An eight is someone armed to the teeth.

Sexual 8 by Claudio Naranjo

A sexual eight has a tendency toward social detachment. He is a rebellious person, much more than the other E8. He is also a more provocative person, who flaunts, who proclaims that his values are different from the norm. This occurs with all eight, but in the sexual subtype, this tendency becomes a clear detachment from the intellect. The word to define it is possession. And I used to think that this also had to do with physical possessions, but later I realized that this passion is limited to grabbing the other: the sexual eight is very possessive in his relationships. This word also has to do with taking ownership of the entire scene: the sexual eight always wants to be the center. It is always fascinating. Their power comes from a greater seduction, from a greater power of fascination, which differentiates them stylistically from others. The other subtypes do not have as many colors in the feathers. In relation to the other subtypes, the sexual one is more emotional, while the conservation one is pure action and the social one is the only intellectual eight.

Self-Preservation 9 by Claudio Naranjo

We will end, then, with E9 conservation, for which Ichazo used the word appetite. It is obvious that these people tend to have bigger bodies, so it is very likely that they have a bigger appetite too. Sancho Panza is a literal example of E9 conservation and it is interesting that the belly was chosen by Cervantes to baptize him, being something so central to this character. Let's explore the idea that some person can be said; “as, therefore I am”. Each of the characters is open to this Cartesian approximation: “I think I am, therefore I am,” an E6 would say. “I suffer, therefore I am”, an E4 would say. Actually, they are very descriptive expressions about how each of the characters feels the emptiness of their being. Take the example of sexual E4, whose central theme is competitive hatred and goes around cutting heads. I could say: “I hate, therefore I am.” This main feature of each subtype is the one that best responds to this equation of solving the question of being through a substitution or a mirage of being. Human beings have all kinds of substitutes for being: a veritable fury of lollipops. We have all kinds of pacifiers that give us the impression that this or that is what we were looking for. And we miss our way because we run after these illusions that promise us to be where he is not. In the case of the nine conservation, there is an excessive resemblance to a little animal. It is not only about “I eat, therefore I am”, but also about “I sleep, therefore I am”, “I have, therefore I am”, “I am standing here, therefore I am”... The facts of life, everything ordinary, they have the ability to obstruct your consciousness. For him there is no metaphysical level. Somehow, the question of being has been erased from the life of a nine conservation. You can't talk about being with Sancho Panza. There is only his belly. The substitution of the mother's breast for the bottle has been so complete that there is no memory of maternal love in the vocabulary. So these conservationists are very loving people but deep down they don't have a sense of being loved. His resignation is the most prominent. And there is in them a kind of joy, a kind of tenderness that, however, is far from the full experience of love. Erich Fromm already says it: to have or to be. It is probably the same thing for them. In the world of the great bankers, for example, you see many friendly faces, with double chins, very practical people... This is Homo Economicus.

Social 9 by Claudio Naranjo

The social nine is a good-natured person. And what moves a good-natured person? What is behind these cheerful and light-hearted people? According to this map, the passion of E9 social is participation. What you need is to feel part of it. But anyone who has an intense need to do, to become part of something, is a person who does not feel part of anything. For the social E9, the experience of not fitting in, of feeling different, of believing that they do not have what it takes to be part of a group or a community, leads them to overcompensate, to express a kind of generosity, being very attentive to the others and the group. It is a character very gifted in satisfying the needs of others. And he becomes a good leader. The best type of leader, in the sense of being a good person, generous and sacrificed in the face of any type of responsibility that others want to give him. His passion is to do what is necessary to pay the toll that allows him to be admitted to the group. But, for this, a lot of effort is needed: the social E9 are the workaholics of the enneagram. They feel that they have to give a lot, but at the same time they have to be nice and pleasant. His internal motto is: “do not show the pain, do not put weight on the mind of another”. His expression is more happy than sad, but that does not mean participation, but a kind of partial participation: a substitute.

Sexual 9 by Claudio Naranjo

I would prefer to use the word union — the word Ichazo used — in a higher sense. Union means the response that we find in love, the desire for communion with the loved one. So such a word should not be used to describe a neurotic game. Therefore, I prefer to use words like fusion, confluence, symbiosis... The sexual E9 experiences the need to be through the other, the need to be through union with another, through fusion with another person. He uses the relationship to feed his being because he can't stand on his own two feet. A true union would require the two people to walk on their own two feet before they actually meet. But in this case a kind of substitution takes place. Because these people do not have their own place, their own being, and therefore they want to be in the world through the other. This makes them very affectionate people, but it is a suspicious affection, like one of the many forms of surrogate love that occur in the ego's repertoire. What stands out in the sexual nine is that they belong to no one: they are people who do not fully live their passion — in the best sense of that word. They are precisely too dispassionate. When the Beatles wrote the song “Nowhere Man”, perhaps they were referring to someone of this character. In Spain there is the “dead mosquito”: no one would notice that person, it is confused with the design of the wall paper. In English it is said that there are people who are like the flowers on the wall: they get lost in their surroundings. Elias Canetti wrote a book about characters called “The Listening Witness” and described someone who is obviously a sexual nine: “The Legacy never asks for a certificate and wouldn't get one either, since he's not going anywhere on his own business, he doesn't need them. It is true that he eats, but he does it in moderation and without causing discomfort. Nobody has seen him with his mouth open, he has the good sense to do it in a corner, without noise. He surreptitiously feels his teeth, he still has a few left”. It is a very cruel characterization: this person betrays his needs so much, is so focused on satisfying the needs of the other, that he has few teeth left. “People take a lot of photos on trips, and sometimes, when they don't have time to step aside, he's in the picture too, uninvited. The owner's family looks at her and makes a face. But also in those cases you can trust him. He himself takes the reels to develop and, when he returns with the photos, he has disappeared from them. How he does it is a mystery, they don't ask him and he doesn't explain anything, the important thing is that the owner's family stays like that in the family and the Legacy doesn't appear anywhere”. All this is a result of the need for fusion. You can merge with another person, with a group, or even with your own body. But at the cost of life, of the subtle level of life...