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While I share a lot of decluttering ideas and minimalism inspiration on this blog, I also love to explore how the concept of clearing clutter can apply to our minds and inner selves. When you clear psychical clutter, you feel relief, freedom, and clarity. I find that this goes double for mental clutter, though we don’t often talk about it. And learning about your personality type, in particular the Enneagram types, is one of the best ways to start on a mental decluttering project.
If you’re looking to pursue personal development or even self actualization, you need to first understand yourself. I find that personality psychology is a powerful tool to gain that self-understanding.
I’ve written before about Myers Briggs personality types, and I think the Myers Briggs Type Indicator is a fantastic tool. But the Enneagram is a unique personality typology system that helps you understand your basic needs and core fears – beyond your conscious self.
The posts linked below will help you understand the Enneagram types and to provide practical guidance for how you can live more intentionally based on your Enneagram personality type.
What is the Enneagram?
Before we get into the resources below, I’ll quickly address what the Enneagram is for those who aren’t familiar. Of course, reading one of the books about the Enneagram recommended below will help you gain even more insight into the system.
Enneagram theory holds that humans exhibit nine core personality types. Each type shows behavior patterns built around avoidance of a core fear. Even though people are much more diverse than simply nine types, the nine core fears lead to similar strengths, struggles, and overcompensations.
In addition, each Enneagram type can look quite different in different individuals, depending on their levels of psychological health and maturity. Each type possesses incredible strengths as well as the potential for pitfalls and problematic behavior.
If you don’t know your type already, you can take a free Enneagram test to help narrow it down. However, online tests are not always accurate.
I recommend that you read the posts below about each Enneagram type, explore a site like The Enneagram Institute, or read one of the recommended books about the Enneagram to explore all nine options before you define yourself by one.
What Are the Best Books About the Enneagram?
If you’re new to the Enneagram, before jumping into the personality type-based advice below, a great place to start is reading books about the Enneagram types.
This post introduces six of the best books about the Enneagram, so you can decide which is most likely to resonate with you. It explains the content and structure of each book, as well as pros and cons.
And importantly, it points out which books are best for beginners and which are more appropriate for seasoned Enneagram nerds.
While the core content explaining the Enneagram system and the nine Enneagram types is essentially the same in each book, each author approaches explaining the system quite differently. This post helps you determine which book will be the most enjoyable and informative for you individually – before you buy.
What You Need to Let Go as an Enneagram 1
The rest of the posts recommended in this roundup center on advice for clearing psychic clutter for each of the Enneagram types.
Philosophies like minimalism, intentional living, and essentialism center on delineating what is truly valuable to you from “noise” that’s just distracting you from those few valuable pursuits.
These posts explain the “mental clutter” each of the Enneagram types is likely to unintentionally collect and hoard for way too long.
This post about the Enneagram 1 describes the basic needs and core fears of the type. It then outlines four habits and beliefs that this idealistic and discipline-focused Enneagram type can “declutter” for a freer, more relaxed, and more fulfilling life.
What You Need to Let Go as an Enneagram 2
If you’re an Enneagram Type 2, you are a natural helper. Generous, loving, and maybe even people-pleasing to a fault, you tend to give a lot of yourself. And you may not get as much in return as you would hope.
This post about the Enneagram 2 will help you understand what motivates your behavior – both the basic needs you’re trying to meet and the core fears you’re trying to avoid.
It will also guide you through four habits and beliefs you likely picked up during childhood to help you survive. But which now just weigh you down and create “clutter” in your mental landscape.
It explains how an Enneagram Type 2 can let go of this clutter to achieve more genuinely fulfilling and reciprocal relationships.
What You Need to Let Go as an Enneagram 3
The Enneagram 3 is naturally good at, well…most things. These high achievers value success and are willing to put in the hard work required to reach their ambitions. While they excel to a high degree in whatever they choose to pursue, they can end up feeling oddly unfulfilled by all the conventional trappings of success.
If you’re in this boat, this post about the Enneagram Type 3 is an excellent place to start your personal growth journey.
It explains why you may not feel fulfilled despite achieving all your goals. And more importantly, the hidden beliefs in your subconscious mind that can lead you to reach for the wrong things.
Once you’re aware of these beliefs, you can choose to let them go and pursue things that are truly meaningful to you, regardless of what anyone else thinks.
What You Need to Let Go as an Enneagram 4
If you’re an Enneagram 4, you are truly unique. Often artistically talented and emotionally sensitive, this dreamy type can feel isolated from those around them.
This post about the Enneagram Type 4 explains why you feel pain so acutely and the reasons you can’t seem to “fit in” with everyone else.
Once you understand the core fears and basic needs behind these feelings of isolation and hurt, you can consciously “declutter” some of them.
While an Enneagram 4 is never going to “basic” or part of the crowd, this post will help you pinpoint your true identity – beyond your perceived flaws. It shows you how to live in a way that is truly authentic to you, not simply counter to the norm.
What You Need to Let Go as an Enneagram 5
The Enneagram 5 is the brainiac of the Enneagram types. Cerebral and innovative, this type can become so focused on their intellectual pursuits that they end up isolated from those around them.
This post about what to let go as an Enneagram Type 5 shines light on the subconscious beliefs that lead to your tendency for secretiveness, cynicism, and social isolation.
This post will help you reflect on which of these beliefs you want to keep and which may be causing more harm than good. It shows you how can pursue your intellectual interests while at the same time leading a full and active life outside of the mind.
What You Need to Let Go as an Enneagram 6
The Enneagram Type 6 is one of the most difficult Enneagram types to nail down. They can express a variety of behaviors and character traits – even contradicting themselves at times. But once you discover you’re an Enneagram 6, you can see how all these behaviors have a root in your core fear of, well…fear.
The Enneagram 6 is responsible, trustworthy, and hard-working. They’re excellent at getting groups together and motivating them to work toward a common cause. At the same time, they tend to be anxious, indecisive, and distrustful of others.
This post about the Enneagram Type 6 explains how all these qualities can exist within a single person. As well as how they’re all rooted in a need for security and a fear of ending up on their own without guidance and support from others.
The post helps you understand how the habits you developed to placate your anxiety don’t in fact help you achieve peace of mind. Instead, they create “psychic clutter” that makes your mind a noisy and unsettled place. Once you can see these beliefs and habits clearly, you can start letting them go to create a more confident, decisive, and serene life.
What You Need to Let Go as an Enneagram 7
If you’re an Enneagram Type 7, you’re fun, spontaneous, and a jack of all trades. You love to stay busy and aim to have as many interesting and enjoyable experiences as you can.
Yet you’ll find throughout this flurry of activity that you maintain a sense of emptiness. A feeling that you’re running from something important.
Consciously noticing that feeling is the first step toward personal development. This post about the Enneagram 7 shows you how your fun-loving nature can be covering up darker feelings.
Of course, if you’re an Enneagram 7, you don’t want to notice those darker feelings. But the post explains how what you’re running from is actually not that scary if you face it head-on. It explains how to let go of habits that keep you spinning your wheels, so you can pay attention to what truly matters to you.
While you may fear that letting go of the distractions will lead to emptiness, the opposite is true. “Decluttering” these inessential activities actually frees up time and mental energy for you to focus on the few things that actually fulfill you.
What You Need to Let Go as an Enneagram 8
If you’re an Enneagram 8, people would describe you as “intimidating.” You’re powerful, confident, and decisive. You take pride in the fact that no one can mess with you.
However, this tough, prickly exterior ends up limiting your life over time. You find you aren’t able to form truly intimate relationships with others. And frankly, your need to be totally in control at all times is exhausting.
This post about the Enneagram Type 8 describes how your strong persona is a cover for a core fear of being controlled or hurt by others. It shines a light on all the heavy armor you’re carrying and demonstrates how your life could be much easier and more enjoyable if you set down your burden once in a while.
It also shows how some of the behaviors that kept you safe in childhood now simply isolate you and prevent you from forming meaningful connections. When you can see those behaviors from a conscious perspective, you can choose to let some of them go.
What You Need to Let Go as an Enneagram 9
The Enneagram Type 9 is the most serene, easygoing, and agreeable of the Enneagram types. Often, people see the Type 9 as an admirable Zen-like character who is “above” all the petty nonsense that others fall prey to.
This post about the Enneagram 9 shows how those positive qualities of detachment from ego and ability to get along with others can ironically hold you back in life.
It describes how you likely developed certain beliefs and habits to survive childhood. And how these behaviors are now almost certainly causing problems in your life. In particular, conflict with others – which the Enneagram Type 9 detests!
It suggests five beliefs and habits you can “declutter” in order to unleash your personal power and create a life that truly brings you joy – not just peace and complacency.
What Do You Think?
Which of the Enneagram types best applies to you? What do you think about the advice shared in the post linked above? What’s your best advice for personal development? I’d love to hear from you in the comments!
You May Also Like….
How to Live Intentionally as a Personality Type INFJ
How to Declutter Your Home Based on Your Myers Briggs Type
10 Eye-Opening Self-Reflection Journal Prompts for an Intentional Life
What is Essentialism? This Simple Idea Can Level Up Your Life
What Does Essentialism Mean and How Does It Compare to Similar Movements?
Loved Essentialism? Here are 5 Thought-Provoking Books to Read Next
