Enneagram Type 4

The Sensitive, Withdrawn Type: Expressive, Dramatic, Self-Absorbed, and Temperamental. The Individualist, Eternal Walker Of The Inward Halls, Who Can Create A Masterpiece And Has To Trespass Inner Currents To Reach The Natural Self.

Fours are introspective, expressive and original. They prize being true to themselves and define themselves over what makes them different from others. Fours are very in tune with their feelings and feel comfortable with the whole spectrum of human emotion. They have an amazing potential to uncover the hidden beauty in the world and help others see it, too.

As much as Fours are aware of what they are feeling at each moment, they can get lost in their emotions and have trouble connecting with the rest of the world. This can make them moody, withdrawn and overly dramatic.

Enneagram Type 4s are fascinated by the world but don’t truly understand it, which makes them feel that they’re not from here. Who are Enneagram type 4s and what are they doing here? These are the recurrent questions they ask themselves and the world around them.

If every type had its own song, Enneagram 4’s would be the song “Creep” from Radiohead, which includes the lyrics, “I’m a creep, I’m a weirdo. What the hell am I doing here? I don’t belong here.” This song somehow represents the way The Individualist feels without the excessive drama or the sadness of its melody. It’s amazing how big their personal museum is. They spend so much time there—exploring, taking notes, trying to decipher their true original self. Type 4s watch as everything they think comes to life and becomes part of their script. Enneagram type 4 have tons of potential and the energy of a volcano, but they are limited to using it only in their imagination. However, they believe that nobody would understand why and how they think, anyway. Hey, weirdo Type 4, do your thing! Show your skills to the world.

Enneagram Type Fours feel they are only worth it if they are faithful to themselves. But, who are they? Type 4s are people that like to fantasize and imagine stories, who live in a place where things are well under control and reactions are well-managed. What happens if they go out and do something unexpected? How would they deal with it? Will they be consistent? Will they repeat themselves or be someone else? What happens if a Type Four discovers new reactions, new feelings, new ways that wash them away from the shore? Type 4s find this scary and an unnecessary risk, so they withdraw to their inner selves. The Individualist has an amazing and singular ability to connect to their feelings, and that power is hard to manage. Sometimes they identify strongly with their feelings, so they may end up getting too attached to them. Type 4s are so much more than what they feel. Taking their feelings and displaying them creatively could be a great chance to channel these feelings and to open the way to Type Fours’ core.

Fours are unique. Not just in the ordinary “everybody is an individual“ sense of the word. Fours see the world in a way that’s different from those around them, which makes them feel like the world never truly “gets“ them. They put great effort into finding their most authentic and true self. Their rich emotional life lets them seek ways to express their feelings that convey the mystery they feel in themselves.

Fours have a wonderful eye for the beautiful, the intricate, the special. They care about meaning and depth and don’t stay on the surface. This also allows them to embrace and sit with the darker sides of life without the need to sugarcoat it. Fours are comfortable with feelings that other people experience as threatening. Yet in their search for authenticity and the right expression of their many emotions, Fours can also forget that there are other people with feelings and needs too – they can be quite self-absorbed. Additionally, their love for the extraordinary can quite easily tip over into becoming eccentric, their emotion-based identity can turn into emotional volatility.

We have named this type The Individualist because Fours maintain their identity by seeing themselves as fundamentally different from others. Fours feel that they are unlike other human beings, and consequently, that no one can understand them or love them adequately. They often see themselves as uniquely talented, possessing special, one-of-a-kind gifts, but also as uniquely disadvantaged or flawed. More than any other type, Fours are acutely aware of and focused on their personal differences and deficiencies.

Healthy Fours are honest with themselves: they own all of their feelings and can look at their motives, contradictions, and emotional conflicts without denying or whitewashing them. They may not necessarily like what they discover, but they do not try to rationalize their states, nor do they try to hide them from themselves or others. They are not afraid to see themselves “warts and all.” Healthy Fours are willing to reveal highly personal and potentially shameful things about themselves because they are determined to understand the truth of their experience—so that they can discover who they are and come to terms with their emotional history. This ability also enables Fours to endure suffering with a quiet strength. Their familiarity with their own darker nature makes it easier for them to process painful experiences that might overwhelm other types.

Nevertheless, Fours often report that they feel they are missing something in themselves, although they may have difficulty identifying exactly what that “something” is. Is it will power? Social ease? Self-confidence? Emotional tranquility?—all of which they see in others, seemingly in abundance. Given time and sufficient perspective, Fours generally recognize that they are unsure about aspects of their self-image—their personality or ego-structure itself. They feel that they lack a clear and stable identity, particularly a social persona that they feel comfortable with.

While it is true that Fours often feel different from others, they do not really want to be alone. They may feel socially awkward or self-conscious, but they deeply wish to connect with people who understand them and their feelings. The “romantics” of the Enneagram, they long for someone to come into their lives and appreciate the secret self that they have privately nurtured and hidden from the world. If, over time, such validation remains out of reach, Fours begin to build their identity around how unlike everyone else they are. The outsider therefore comforts herself by becoming an insistent individualist: everything must be done on her own, in her own way, on her own terms. Fours’ mantra becomes “I am myself. Nobody understands me. I am different and special,” while they secretly wish they could enjoy the easiness and confidence that others seem to enjoy. Fours typically have problems with a negative self-image and chronically low self-esteem. They attempt to compensate for this by cultivating a Fantasy Self—an idealized self-image which is built up primarily in their imaginations. 

In the course of their lives, Fours may try several different identities on for size, basing them on styles, preferences, or qualities they find attractive in others. But underneath the surface, they still feel uncertain about who they really are. The problem is that they base their identity largely on their feelings. When Fours look inward they see a kaleidoscopic, ever-shifting pattern of emotional reactions. Indeed, Fours accurately perceive a truth about human nature—that it is dynamic and ever changing. But because they want to create a stable, reliable identity from their emotions, they attempt to cultivate only certain feelings while rejecting others. Some feelings are seen as “me,” while others are “not me.” By attempting to hold on to specific moods and express others, Fours believe that they are being true to themselves.

One of the biggest challenges Fours face is learning to let go of feelings from the past; they tend to nurse wounds and hold onto negative feelings about those who have hurt them. Indeed, Fours can become so attached to longing and disappointment that they are unable to recognize the many treasures in their lives.

Enneagram Fours act like a self-guardian, like a protector of their innocence and emotions. They feel everything intensely, always cultivating something inside of them, unsure if anyone out there will be truly able to support and understand them properly. To Fours, it is better to stand by themselves and not ask for any help or compassion because they believe no one can provide it. Type 4s are different. Their inner trips are special, chaotic, and surreal. They naturally manifest their inner world into artistic creations and try to smooth their environment over with aesthetic details because Type Fours are hypersensitive and everything wakes up their feelings. Because of this, they interiorize those feelings and tend to take things personally.

Healthy Enneagram Type 4

Healthy Fours realize that despite their differences, they are still connected to everyone else on a deeper level. Because they have become familiar with their own darker nature, they can now help others process painful experiences that would overwhelm other types. By not being ruled by their emotions anymore, they become disciplined enough to bring all their amazing ideas into reality. The profound beauty and insight of countless works of art are the result of Fours who have solved their deepest yearning: They have found their true self, and with it, their place in the world.

Accepting your vulnerabilities is a gift. Enneagram Type 4s are good with that. They recognize their darker side. It’s ok; that is what makes them human, right? Everyone has the right to be themselves. The Individualist is done with fiction; it has come to an end. They are self-aware, they have the power to contemplate their thoughts and feelings, to embrace them but also to let them go when necessary. Type 4s know that their true selves are beyond that. Intact. Safe. Healed. Wise people tend to know that no matter how well they know fears and how much compassion and love they have, in the end we are who we are: humans. We need to encounter other people, contradict ourselves, get our hopes up, and even experience the unexpected. Type Fours are ok with that because they are profoundly connected not only with the personal side but with the universal, too. In other words, they are like a lizard that can regenerate itself.

Healthy Levels:

Level 1 (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.

Level 2: 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.

Level 3: 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.

Average Enneagram Type 4

The average Four spends a lot of time exploring their own emotions and the fantastical worlds they find inside themselves. They are more comfortable with being alone than in crowds. While they often see themselves as uniquely gifted, average Fours also still believe they will never be able to lead the “happy“ life everyone else has. Average Fours want emotional responses to their own emotionality. They try to build their identity on their feelings, which is problematic insofar as feelings are unpredictable and unstable. That’s why the average Four is often plagued by sudden mood swings and the sense of not being sure of who they really are.

Average Levels:

Level 4: Take an artistic, romantic orientation to life, creating a beautiful, aesthetic environment to cultivate and prolong personal feelings. Heighten reality through fantasy, passionate feelings, and the imagination.

Level 5: To stay in touch with feelings, they interiorize everything, taking everything personally, but become self-absorbed and introverted, moody and hypersensitive, shy and self-conscious, unable to be spontaneous or to “get out of themselves.” Stay withdrawn to protect their self-image and to buy time to sort out feelings.

Level 6: Gradually think that they are different from others, and feel that they are exempt from living as everyone else does. They become melancholy dreamers, disdainful, decadent, and sensual, living in a fantasy world. Self-pity and envy of others leads to self-indulgence, and to becoming increasingly impractical, unproductive, effete, and precious.

Unhealthy Enneagram Type 4

Withdrawing has a lot of shapes. More than going from, it is a matter of going to. Where do Type 4s expect to go when they escape from reality? Delusion and disappointment can bury them into a self-destructive state. Enneagram 4s don’t trust themselves; they’re full of doubts, so they end up getting eaten up by a really painful and cyclic self-hatred. Deconstructing the fiction The Individualist lives in can be too hard. Yes, they do have the powerful ability to connect to their feelings, but used in the wrong way this ability could be a really sharp tool. Type Fours feel so much envy for people that are outstanding, look great, and can achieve everything they want. It all seems so easy for everybody else, but why not for them? Why do they feel that they’re so far from everything and everyone? They didn’t do anything to deserve this reality. Enneagram Type 4s just want people to understand how intense their feelings are and how much they care about things. They want everyone to see their potential.

When they aren’t healthy, Fours become less and less able to break out of their feeling of being poor, misunderstood victims. As much as they want to belong, they focus more and more on their perceived deficiencies. They abandon themselves to their moods and go full drama queen (or king). Everything is subjected to their feelings of unfulfilled longing, even though they have no idea what they are actually longing for. Unhealthy Fours are unable to be happy because they can’t allow themselves to be – their unhappiness becomes their identity.

Unhealthy Levels:

Level 7: When dreams fail, become self-inhibiting and angry at self, depressed and alienated from self and others, blocked and emotionally paralyzed. Ashamed of self, fatigued and unable to function.

Level 8: Tormented by delusional self-contempt, self-reproaches, self-hatred, and morbid thoughts: everything is a source of torment. Blaming others, they drive away anyone who tries to help them.

Level 9: Despairing, feel hopeless and become self-destructive, possibly abusing alcohol or drugs to escape. In the extreme: emotional breakdown or suicide is likely. Generally corresponds to the Avoidant, Depressive, and Narcissistic personality disorders.

Growth opportunities that are typically associated with the Enneagram 4

• Recognizing and redirecting self-centered motivations

• Taking some time to reflect on the positive aspects of life

• Developing breathing exercises to help process overwhelming situations

• Understanding that other people can help them work through problems

Beware of self-absorption: You are often better at talking about all the fascinating things inside you than at listening to those things in others. Try to sit down and listen to someone else’s story. Maybe it will turn out that you are not as alone as you think in your experience of the world.

Taste the present: Nostalgia is a wonderful feeling, and the future will always seem better than the present. But the present is and will always be the only place where you can actually do anything. Next time you find yourself pining for the past or fleeing into the future, tell yourself: The only time to act is now. And then do something.

Appreciate the ordinary: You have a natural gift for finding beauty in the extraordinary and the unusual. But the world can be beautiful even when it’s unremarkable. After all, the ordinary makes up the vast majority of life and people. Try to look at something that wouldn’t normally have caught your attention and ask yourself: Where does the beauty lie in this?

Notice when you start comparing: Envy is the achilles heel of Fours. There’s always someone that seems to have that special something you think you lack. Next time you find comparing yourself unfavorably to someone else, remind yourself that they only have what they need to be them – while you have everything you need to be you.

Separate identity from emotion: Feelings are like waves in an ocean, ever changing and often blue. But beneath the waves the ocean stays the same, and blue is not the only color of the rainbow. So when that bittersweet taste of melancholy is threatening to eat up your enthusiasm again, remember that you are not your feelings. Don’t just be the waves, be the whole ocean.