An Intro to Enneagram Type 8
Learning to balance strenght - and manage power
I. Introducing Type 8!
8s are the leader archetype of the 9 types. 8s have a natural strong energy, are self-confident and courageous, want to impact their environment - and build a legacy. 8s want to achieve where others have given up before them – and enjoy a bit of risks and adventure in their lives. 8s have a great sense of justice, are not afraid of saying what they mean - and won’t hesitate to take a conflict if they feel they need to.
8s have big and generous hearts, and often claim a protective role to the people around them. When 8s are healthy, their guidance and protection make others feel safe and taken care of. When they’re NOT healthy on the other hand, 8s use their instinctual power and assertiveness to dominate their surroundings rather than support it. Now, their protection does not seek to empower – but rather to subdue people. Unhealthy 8s are concerned with staying in control and keeping the lead, and can be very aggressive to those who don’t accept their leadership.
8s are part of the instinctual triad, and face issues with control, aggression and repression. I’ll address all of those below. I’ll also talk a lot about the 8s fear of being vulnerable, and how that imprisons them in a strong image – where they end up carrying everyone else on tired shoulders.
While 8s can come across as tough, at their core they’re very generous and vulnerable beings, with grand hearts and a lot of care for others. The 8s work is to learn to TRUST their world with their softness, and let their hearts guide their way.
According to Riso and Hudson (Personality types - Don Richard Riso and Russ Hudson. 1996), 8s corresponds to the extroverted intuitive type in Jungian psychology.
PS: I want to make a little disclaimer before we dive into the 8. Because while we know the 8th archetype as strong and assertive - and much of this essay will be oriented around the 8s vitality, some 8s doesn’t appear assertive at all – initially. These 8s have usually CHOKED their strength to fit in, and because of that they’ve lost touch with much of their vitality. Now, they don’t look like 8s at all, but rather like 5s: secretive, withdrawn and challenging to come to know. If that resonates with you, I recommend you read up on the 8 movement with the arrows into 5.
II. The childhood pattern of the 8
8s grow up with an ambivalence to their mother figures. They neither identify with her, or separate completely from her. Because of the ambivalent relationship, 8s don’t really feel they have any natural place in the family dynamic. And so, it becomes very important for them to CREATE their place, by taking on a role where they know they’ll be needed – and loved.
Young 8s are sensitive children with a natural high energy, and to find their role in their families, they claim the position as “little protectors” - a role complementary to their mothers. Drawing on their strong energy, they make it their task to protect and guide the people around them: their siblings, their friends, even their parents. By doing that, the 8s create a feeling of being needed, and a role where they feel… safe.
With their strong appearance and protective behaviors, young 8s attract friends that enjoy being under the wing of the their leadership. But… many children also feel THREATENED by the 8. Basically, the 8s natural physical endurance, assertiveness and strong willpower, make them…very vulnerable for jealousy and enemies. To some children, the 8s tough appearance nearly invite conflicts and attacks.
An 8s childhood is often marked by painful conflicts with their peers, and many 8s can recall a particular situation where they concluded once and for all: The world must be up against me! The constant conflicts they face build an assumption in the 8s that: they have to be strong to survive – and that they need to stay on guard and always be ready to defend themselves.
III. 8s are part of the instinctual triad
In this video I introduce type 8!
8s are part of the instinctual triad, together with 9s and 1s. In their triad, 8s are the ones that OVEREXPRESS their instincts. 8s have strong gut feelings, a natural strong vitality, and a powerful charge behind their words and actions.
While their energy and vitality are beautiful traits, they’re also the source of much of the 8s troubles. I've mentioned how 8s from an early age attracts enemies and conflicts into their lives. And while 8s seldom understand this themselves: They’re not innocent victims in those conflicts. Rather contrary: without understanding so, the 8s are often the ones INITIATING the conflicts.
The thing we need to know about 8s, is that behind their tough appearance – hides a very soft and tender heart! 8s get easily offended and disappointed (probably more so than others) – and due to that: they tend to interpret situations where people mean no harm: as an offense.
And as the instinctual beings they are, the 8s standard response to such offenses is: To attack!
For example, a person can make a slightly rude comment to the 8, not meaning to be cruel, but rather to be funny, for example. But the 8 doesn’t catch the joke. Rather, feeling hurt, they feel they must defend themselves, and answer the joke with a full-blown rage-attack!
“I was just sitting here”, the 8 thinks, “with my soft and tender heart; and then you suddenly attack me with your words like that!”. From the 8s perspective, their attack is just a natural defense - a “fair response” to the insult. But… chances are that the other person (and everyone else) sees it quite differently. From the perspective of everybody around the 8, the other made a joke, and the 8 answered by violently attacking them!
While the 8 sees the other as the perpetrator, most people watching the situation from the outside… will see THE 8 as the perpetrator. And these kinds of situations tend to happen around the 8, again and again… and again.
The attack-as-defense-response is in many ways the crux of the 8th archetype. Where other types withdraw, or try to adjust, or put on a mask confronted with pain and hurt: the 8s strategy is to attack that which hurts them. And this strategy brings most 8s into lots of trouble.
To be healthy, 8s need to recognize the aggressiveness of their attacks – and realize how impropriate some of their responses are. Actually, by refraining from attacking people the moment they feel threatened, much of the conflicts around the 8s will… silence.
In general, all 8s have a lot to gain from understanding the IMPACT their powerful energy has on others. Cause most 8s… have no idea how aggressive and intimidating they appear to others. Most of the times they get in trouble, 8s are just being themselves, and doesn’t really mean to harm or offend anyone. But because they’re so outspoken, so unafraid, and because they have so much assertiveness in their word and actions, their ways of expressing themselves quickly feel overwhelming for people around them.
Basically, all that energy quickly becomes a bit too much for people.
There’s this gap between how the 8s see themselves, and how they appear to others, that a healthy 8 must bridge! Indeed, to realize that gap is one of the greatest rewards from recognizing oneself as 8s. By realizing how offensive our strong energy can appear to the people around us, responses that have puzzled us our whole life… might unravel.
In order to draw on their vitality as the resource it really is, 8s need to learn to BALANCE their instinctual force: With their hearts. Rather than just moving on their instincts without thinking, all 8s gain a lot from giving a little space between the impulse and their action - enough time to check in with their surroundings: Is the force they're ready to enter the situation with… necessary? Will it serve them – and the people around them? Or can they say or do whatever they need to say and do, with a bit more softness about it?
By making a point of keeping their hearts open and LISTEN to their surroundings before they channel all their energy into their space, 8s will naturally adjust their energy charge to be… appropriate for the situation.
After doing this for a while, most 8s realize something very important. There’s nothing wrong with their energy itself. The trouble is that when they move about totally instinctively, they disconnect from their hearts, and forget to listen to what's actually happening around them. And without listening, the 8s responses become inappropriate – and thats when they get in trouble with their surroundings.
IV. 8s repress their vulnerability
All the types in the instinctual triad have issues with repression and aggression. The thing the 8 represses is – maybe you guessed it already? - their vulnerability.
With a childhood often marked by conflicts, many 8s walk into adulthood having landed on the firm conclusion: that the world’s a harsh place – where they must fight to survive. “If I show my vulnerability” 8s conclude “for sure I’ll be attacked”. “The smartest thing to do here, is to grit my teeth together, be as indifferent as possible to hardship and struggle –and not let anyone see my weakness. That's my survival strategy.»
In general: The tougher the 8s childhoods environment has been, the more the 8s will have felt violated in their innocence, and the tougher the 8s tend to become.
I think many of us can resonate with the 8s habit of carrying an invisible armor around our soft sensitive beings – to protect ourselves from harm. Oftentimes, we have brought with us this armor from early and painful experiences meetings with our peers. And while we might still need to protect ourselves sometimes nowadays too, in most cases these armors just become a habit, something we keep on us at all times as an automatic response to… existing.
But the problem with such armors, is that they can make people around us forget that we are just as soft and vulnerable as everybody else! And with that, our armor begins to serve the opposite purpose: Rather than protecting us, it leads people treat us more roughly!
This is definitely the case for the 8. In fact, while 8s put on their tough attitude to DEFEND themselves to a harsh world –their tough attitude ends up being more of the beginning to the 8s troubles – than the solution to them. Because as the 8s push their vulnerability away – other people don’t see it either. They just see this strong, assertive, outspoken person who doesn’t seem to hesitate taking a fight. They see a nearly invulnerable being, one who seems to be incapable of being tired, overworked... or hurt. And so, people treat them accordingly.
Actually, the best thing the 8 can do to build a more gentle world for themselves, is to let some of that armor go: and show their world that they’re human too.
As we all do, 8s too long to be seen and received in their softness. But since most 8s have few positive experiences with showing that vulnerability, they subconsciously fear that by letting go of some of their protection, people will rush to harm them. In the 8s perspective, showing themselves as vulnerable is like throwing themselves into a lion’s den – ready to be ripped apart.
But rather, when 8s start to experiment with opening up to their vulnerability, the contrary tends to happen: As the 8s let their armor down, people treat them more gently!
Slowly, this helps a healthy 8 to realize WHY people were so harsh around them all that time: not because the world is cruel by default, but because the 8’s tough behaviour unconsciously INVITED people to threat them harshly. When the 8s begin adjusting their responses and their attitude, their surroundings will alter too – and the 8 can finally relax, and regain trust in the goodness of people around them.
V. Stuck in the role of “The strong one”?
Underneath the tough attitude of the 8, lies a deep-seated unconscious assumption that their strength: Is their only contribution to their world. This assumption is something 8s bring with them from their upbringing: where they felt taking on the role as a protector and making a need for themselves was their only way to secure themselves against abandonment. “If people NEED me, it’s less likely they’ll leave me”, the 8 thinks to themselves.
Unless 8s have worked through this complex, they’ll unconsciously believe that unless they fill their role as a strong, almost-invulnerable and protective being... nobody will care for or about them. And with this assumption running, it becomes incredibly important to the 8 to stand strong under pressure, to go on faced with challenge, and to not reveal insecurity or weakness to their world.
Because they put so much importance in being strong, it can be very hard for 8s to understand others vulnerability. The 8 just doesn’t realize that for most people, being tough just isn’t as important as it is for them. And so, as 8s look around them and compare their persistence to others display of weakness, many 8s end up concluding to themselves: “Wow. other people are really… weak.”
To many 8s, it actually looks like they’re the only ones capable of getting anything done in this world! Secretly frowning upon everybody elses vulnerability, many 8s (often unconsciously) harbor a deep disrespect towards others. Feeling they have to take care of everything they’re so much stronger than everybody else, 8s feel that nobody around them can really be… trusted.
The problem with this disrespect is that it gets self-fulfilling. Feeling they have to carry everything in a landscape of weakly people, 8s get in trouble with building equal and nurturing relationships. In fact, many 8s tend to attract people that ARE indeed a bit weaker than themselves – someone who will see through the 8s disrespect because they’ve got something to GAIN from the 8 taking charge. Whereas others – who COULD have been the 8s equal, don’t want to be around the 8s arrogance.
Caught up in unbalanced relationships, 8s will feel the continuous pressure of responsibility – with no opportunity of relief or support. And over time, their “I’ll-have-to-do-it-on-my-own”-attitude … is bound to deplete them. Because after all, even the 8s energy reservoirs aren’t endless.
Yes, it’s true that 8s have more energy than most, and yes, they may be better than others to keep their tough posture faced with challenge – because that’s so important to them. But that doesn’t mean 8s are the only capable ones in their world!
To receive support – 8s need first of all: need to trust that support is possible! To come into harmonious relating with their worlds, 8s need to let go of the subtle disrespect of people around them, and learn to empower and cooperate with people around them! In fact, cooperation – that for many 8s looks to be their biggest mare – are their biggest teacher. For the moment 8s can allow themselves to be EQUAL in the cooperation, everything will shift.
VI. The 8 shadow: When the leader becomes the underdog
We usually perceive 8s as potential leaders, someone who walks in front of the gang. But unhealthy 8s are seldom leaders – they just WANT to be. Rather, an unhealthy 8 is more typically: an underdog.
Eventually, true power can only come from COOPERATING with our world. Unhealthy 8s haven’t sorted out the cooperation part yet. They’ve lost entirely trust in their societies - and in the people around them. Unhealthy 8s are terribly wounded, and cannot see how to rebuild the communication and trust between themselves and their world.
But yet, they want their power – and they want to be in charge.
How to find power when we feel powerless? We find people who feel even weaker than ourselves, and make ourselves their leader!
Because they don’t have much to lose, unhealthy 8s can be extremely brave in their critique of everything that’s wrong with their world. This provocative attitude resonates with others who also feel lost and on the outside. People who’re also wounded, hurt and angry tend to look up to the 8 for their willingness to PUT WORDS to everything that’s already wrong. And the 8s willingly gather these people around themselves, and take them under their protective wings. By addressing all the pain out loud, underdog 8s find their position of power in such collectives of wounded birds, being the one that speaks out what everybody feels – but no one dares to say.
Underdog 8s take people under their wing to build their own feeling of power. Driven by the rush of power and being in control, they won’t hesitate to proclaim: “There can only be ONE person in charge, and the only one here competent enough to lead… is ME. Unless you listen to me – you're out of here.” Among underdog 8s, people enter dependency contracts: the 8 will protect them… but only as long as they agree that the 8 is the stronger and smarter one – and they’re the weaker and flawed ones.
Also, where true leaders ENTER those situations they seek to upgrade, and do the work step by step by step to make things better, underdogs have no actual intention of changing anything. They just want to criticize and judge, to lash out on their “terrible” world, and to pinpoint everything that should’ve been done differently. They have no plan for actually CHANGING what they criticize, and no suggestions for a better solution. They have no intention to build anything constructive up – they just want to tear things down. Underdog 8s just criticize as a way to channel their aggressive energy. By fighting distant enemies and using their words to tear apart those structures that have hurt them - they get their sense of relief.
Underdog 8s may pretend to be kings. But if they suddenly had BECOME kings, would they’ve known what to do differently? Do they have any suggestions what to DO about the troubles they so eagerly criticize? No. Actually, they just want to complain about it. And feel powerful while doing so.
VII. The Mature Eight – From individuality to equality
With all that vitality, 8s are capable of establishing great things. But for that to happen, 8s have to learn to TRUST the goodness of their world. When 8s trust, they admit that the world deserves their support – and realizes that it even can support them back!
While 8s tend to lead their pack whether they’re healthy or unhealthy, there’s a significant difference in the STYLE of leadership between healthy and unhealthy 8. Whereas less-healthy 8s lead to dominate and to have control, healthy 8s take the lead because they have a vision: Something that they’re ready to set into the world. Healthy 8s have respect for the people they lead, and listen to them when they have something to say. They are open to constructive critique, dare to say sorry when they gone wrong, and ask for help and support when they need to. In short: healthy 8s have the courage to be… equal. They EMPOWER the people around them, and support others in finding their inner leadership. And from that, true leadership arises!
8s almost always have a heart for protecting the minority. Healthy 8s love lending their assertive voice and strong energy to fight for causes that are bigger than themselves. By speaking up for people who are weaker than themselves , 8s find a healthy outlet for their aggressive energy - and can make great contributions to the collective good.
Healthy 8s take on this kind of work because they want to contribute – not because being protective is the only kind of relationship they know about! And so, while healthy 8s may fight the cause of people weaker than themselves, they also focus on attracting equal-minded people. They find and develop relationships with people they can trust, and who’re able to support them back! Healthy 8s are very generous and give a lot – but they also make sure to BE supported, so they don’t deplete themselves.
Healthy 8s dare to let their armor down. They allow themselves to own other sides than just the strong invulnerable one, and have at least a few people around them who they they also can be soft and sensitive with. They are receptive to others and adapt their energy somewhat to their surroundings, and remember to: continously check in with their hearts. Healthy 8s have made friends with their vulnerability, and allow themselves to be weak sometimes. And because of that: healthy 8s learn to respect that OTHERS can be weak sometimes too.
This essay is a taster from my course: Shadow Work Through the Enneagram. In the course you’ll find an extended version of this essay: including the 8th type from healthy to unhealthy, an exploration of the passion of Lust, what we all can learn from the 8, and how the 8th type moves with the arrows.
The course includes intro essays for all of the 9 types, together with videos going deeper into each type. It also goes in depth of the Enneagram system: exploring the 9 passions, the arrows, the triads and the Enneagram history. You get all this together with a monthly zoom session and a complimentary one-on-one session with Idah. Read more and sign up to get a message when the course is ready HERE!
