The Enneagram Got Instagrammed. Here's What Got Lost.
It takes a lot to impress you in the personal growth space these days. You didn't just fall off the MBTI turnip truck, and you know how these things work: you take the assessment, get your result, read the description and think huh, that's pretty accurate, and then spend the next few weeks seeing your type everywhere. But then, slowly, you start noticing the edges. The way it fits at work, but not at home. How it was more true about you in your twenties but less so now. The times it describes you on a Tuesday but not a Wednesday.
And then it just kind of... sits there. Accurate-ish. Interesting, but not exactly revolutionary.
So when the Enneagram started showing up everywhere — the reels, the carousel posts, the gift guides by type, the "things twos wish you knew" content — of course, you weren’t wooed like those bright-eyed-and-bushy-tailed-19-year-old-MBTI-virgins.
And when you took the quiz during a work call, you were 40% paying attention to, you weren’t surprised when it turned out to just be one more way of sorting people into boxes that mostly fit but don’t quite hold. No harm, no foul. Self-folding laundry isn’t real, and neither is the perfect personality typing system.
But what if what you took wasn’t actually the Enneagram?
What You've Seen On Instagram Is Not the Enneagram
I love a good carousel of Enneagram memes as much as the next person, and I bet you’ve probably even saved a reel or two that made you think “HA - I feel equally seen and offended by that lol”. And that’s the thing about Instagram Enneagam - it’s not wrong exactly. If you’re a one, you can be a little Monica Geller-ish sometimes. If you’re a two, you probably got a little Marie Barone going on somewhere. Are those flattened stereotypes recognizable? Absolutely. But they’re also about as deep as a dollar store horoscope.
Instagram Enneagram tells you what you do. But the actual Enneagram tells you why. And why you do what you do doesn't change based on your role, your relationship, your decade, or your mood. What you avoid, what you protect, what you value most — that tends to be the same thing whether you're in a board meeting, a fight with your partner, or a hard phone call with your mother on a Tuesday.
The Enneagram Is Not a Quiz
Here’s the other bone I have to pick: the Enneagram isn’t something you take. It’s something you study. You study the system — the types, the motivations, the fears, the focuses of attention, and orientations to time. In studying it, you identify yourself within it. It's an active process of self-observation, not a report you receive and apply.
The quizzes are, at best, a starting point — and a limited one at that. Because here’s the thing - the quizzes are wrong. A lot. Way more than people realize.
It’s not hard to understand why, either - quizzes have a hard time getting at motivation with any nuance or depth, and most people are prone to answering according to their current mood or an aspirational sense of self. Besides that, taking a quiz is a static process, not a dynamic one. The quiz can’t follow up on something, clarify, or push back. It can’t say wait, tell me more about that. So quizzes often reflect your self-concept, not your type. And those aren’t always the same thing.
Which is why you don't show up to the Enneagram as a passive recipient. You show up as a student. Studying the Enneagram (or better yet, working through it with someone) is completely different. It's more like a conversation than a scan.
Why This Matters
Now, if you’re thinking “Okay okay - I get it. There’s a difference between Instagram Enneagram and “real Enneagram” but honestly - why should I care?”
Well, I mean, wouldn't it have been nice to know what the actual f*** was going on a little earlier, you started sweating through your sheets, and your hair started falling out. You couldn't think straight or remember your middle child's name, and your ears were inexplicably itchy, and your mouth felt like it was on fire sometimes.
You were waking up at 3 am every night, and if you so much as sniffed a glass of wine you had to pop some advil, so you got a sleep study, and saw an ENT, and bought a new line of hair products (the cost of which you briefly considered using Klarna for just to soften the sting) and cut out all gluten, dairy, sugar, and caffeine (which, in hindsight was maybe a bad idea to do in the same week). Then one day, your gym bestie casually mentions that she just saw her OB, who told her she should get her hormones tested, and suggests that maybe you should too, because while she’s not a doctor, some of those things sounded like symptoms of PERIMENOPAUSE?
And then you found out all of those things are symptoms of perimenopause, and suddenly, 27 “health problems” became one, very normal and predictable phenomenon. One pattern showing up 27 different ways.
That’s what the enneagram does for your inner life. Your emotional, relational, mental, spiritual, this-is-just-who-and-how-I-am internal life.
And even without it, given your propensity for introspective work, I know you'll keep working on things. The resentment that keeps showing up in your closest relationships — you'll keep working on that. The way you stall on certain decisions — you’ll keep working on that, too. The specific targets and flavor of your self-criticism, the way you avoid conflict in your friendships, the things that make you disproportionately angry — you’ll keep chipping away at each one, separately, in a silo.
But that’s a lot of effort, with modest results.
Why the Enneagram Works When Other Personality Tools Don't
There’s a reason the Enneagram (and this blog) caught your attention in the first place - and personally, I think it’s because you wanted MBTI to be the thing. Or StrengthsFinder. Or the DISC assessment - you wanted all of them to be the thing, and you took each one with the hope that this would be the framework that finally made everything make sense. And each time, it was interesting - but so is a trip to your friendly neighborhood psychic.
But that thing you’ve been hoping for all these years - a blueprint of your internal wiring that holds true across every domain, every relationship, and every decade of your life? It exists. It’s called the Enneagram. It just takes more than a quiz to get there.
If you've been doing self-awareness work and still feel like the pieces aren't adding up — that's often what's missing. Good Woman Therapy works with people who are ready to go deeper than the surface.
Other Services Offered at Good Woman Therapy
Curious to learn more about the Enneagram or IFS therapy? Send me a message! As an IFS therapist, I love helping women and fellow therapists navigate their everyday lives with greater ease using Internal Family Systems Therapy, and I specialize in therapy for stress & overwhelm, inner critics, perfectionism, peacekeeping, and relationship concerns. My office is located in Ballwin, MO and I help everyday women navigate their everyday lives with greater ease by offering both in-person counseling as well as online therapy to clients throughout Creve Coeur, Ladue, Town and Country, Chesterfield, and St. Peters. I also provide online therapy Missouri-wide to clients outside the St. Louis and St. Charles County area. You can view my availability and self-schedule a free, 20-minute consultation on my consultation page.
