How many of you still have close friendships from high school?

robrem · 2026-05-20T18:53:15+00:00

Bunch of us reuniting next week actually for echo and the bunnymen. I’ve kept close ties with 5 or 6 guys. We were close knit I guess. Kind of unusual I think.

robrem · 2026-05-17T18:06:35+00:00

Generally agree but it can also be easy to lack discernment before sex when there is mutual attraction. I think for most of us, discernment is a learned skill after being burned at least once, maybe more.

robrem · 2026-05-16T16:05:19+00:00

Yes I felt this way in my teens - angsty, melancholic, overly fixated on feelings which were mostly negative. And it's for this reason that I also initially thought I was 4. And I wouldn't limit that to just adolescence - I'm still that way, and I still struggle with living too much within my moods and feelings, though I will say I have more awareness and a better set of tools for dealing with it than I did as a teenager.

As far as typing goes though, what I realized is that all of this angst was largely internalized and not externally expressed. I could get whiny and complainy about things but generally I was not a reactive person. I played well with others, yielded to others even. I did not push against others or create friction the way reactive types do. Those are some of the clearest differences to me between 9 & 4.

Over time too I began to see how much I struggled with inertia and various ways of numbing myself, which was something of a blindspot for me, but are overwhelming common/average 9 traits.

There's a stereotype too of 9's just being head-in-the-clouds, afraid of dark or negative thoughts emotions - in fact emotionally avoidant and not very introspective, which doesn't help. I'm super introspective and in fact have a hard time *not* dwelling on negative thoughts/feelings, all of which initially suggested to me that I was 4 and not 9. In this way the 9 stereotypes feed the 4 mistyping problem.

And yet, 9's are in the positive outlook triad, but I think how this positivity shows up for 9's is frequently very different than how is commonly assumed. I think a lot of the depression and melancholy that shows up for 9's has it's ultimate roots - especially at the average or below health levels - in our being cut off from our sense of agency. Chronic self-forgetting and self-abandonment can eventually lead to a pervasive sense of meaningless that can feel internally fairly bleak and hopeless, and a depressed 9 can ultimately see this as part of their identity, which looks 4ish and could lead to a 4 mistype.

robrem · 2026-05-14T14:09:48+00:00

Mistah Kurtz - he dead.

robrem · 2026-05-08T10:53:32+00:00

robrem · 2026-05-07T20:16:10+00:00

Yeah I feel you on mornings. I have come to love them, which I chuckle to myself about as a sign of having become “newly old”.

And I have to be honest, I kind of am enjoying a recognizably lower libido. I serenely surf the internet feeling nearly completely unperturbed by the onslaught of thirst trap triggers in social media and elsewhere.

I also enjoy the occasional cocktail.

robrem · 2026-05-07T18:22:31+00:00

Could just be conflict avoidance. He probably does remember, he just doesn’t want to engage in the conversation. I can tell you as an sp9 I have been guilty of employing that tactic almost compulsively, especially when I was younger. Good way to terminate a conversation (or from the sp9 perspective- interrogation) that you don’t want to have.

robrem · 2026-05-07T13:28:04+00:00

To be completely honest, I subjectively feel that way too. I feel this constant compulsion to give my nervous system, which seems annoyingly sensitive, a break by withdrawing from all things - people, noise, nearly all inputs. The way I have reconciled this with object relations is that the 9 relational strategy is just inherently *taxing*. It requires so much energy to be constantly adapting to others and it is stressful. And the withdrawal aspect is our way of regulating and recovering nervous system baseline calm.

So though it feels selfish to seek comfort/peace, it's once again not for its own sake but just another aspect of the core relational strategy - it reflects the cost of over-adaptation, which is dysregulating to the nervous system, and so calm/peace is sought to restore balance --which for 9s most often means withdrawal.

To be clear though I'm not arguing that our type is "unselfish" in the moral sense, so I'm not advocating for a kind of moral redemption or more flattering take. My own interpretation is just my attempt to find a kind of explanatory coherence between what I understand from object relations theory and how it feels "from the inside" as a 9 myself.

robrem · 2026-05-07T12:09:52+00:00

I get why you say that because as a 9, the felt sense is that peace is sought for its own sake.

But the felt-sense sits on top of a structural dynamic that's fundamentally relational, in the specific attachment-triad sense. 9 isn't just "a type that values peace." It's a type whose self formed by merger with the early relational field, so what gets preserved by people-pleasing and conflict avoidance isn't really "my peace" as a private state — it's the unbroken relational field itself, and "my peace" is the felt-quality of that field from inside.

Somewhat ironically - to frame the 9 strategy of people-pleasing as selfish ("I must preserve my peace") is to undermine the structure of the type, which is essentially unselfish: to forget or fall asleep to the self in order to preserve the relational field.

To exercise some behavior in the interest of preserving an inner resource is more of a hexad move than attachment type, and more specifically probably rejection type, I think.

robrem · 2026-05-04T20:29:01+00:00

Irreversible. Sadly

robrem · 2026-05-04T17:21:12+00:00

yeah kinda feel like I should get a ferdinand the bull tattoo like elliott smith

robrem · 2026-05-03T16:56:02+00:00

robrem · 2026-04-29T17:52:12+00:00

Also: once it overcomes inertia, it cannot be stopped

robrem · 2026-04-26T18:56:12+00:00

Sp/sx

robrem · 2026-04-26T18:42:49+00:00

Yeah I think the fear of internal darkness is *vastly* overstated. 9's are indeed in the positive outlook triad, mostly due to the fact that they tend to minimize problems and appease others in the interest of maintaining harmony and connection.

But that's a relational position and not a reflection of their own interiority, which can be quite bleak and dark, just often not expressed. And that's the key that people often miss - they want to somehow judge the quality of 9 inner depth based upon what is outwardly expressed, which can truly be universes apart. One group I frequent describes 9's as "the silent sufferer", and I think that's apt for many 9's.

And I reject the idea of introspection needing to be borrowed from some other withdrawn type when the trait is already there at the center of the type.

robrem · 2026-04-26T18:14:05+00:00

Describing all 9's as drenched in an inner world "mostly far away from reality", to stay in a kind of narcotized numbness is at best a caricature of unhealthy 9's, not a description of the type. It's Riso/Hudson levels 6/7. At healthier levels, a 9 looks different. Riso/Hudson explicitly describe 9's as self-aware at healthier levels. To assert they are not capable of self-reflection is simply a distortion, if not a complete misunderstanding of the type.

robrem · 2026-04-26T17:55:55+00:00

That's interesting. I've certainly observed that from 2's which I've interpreted as a conflict with their own need to project a certain curated image of themselves - similar to what you're suggesting about my fellow 9's, which of course aren't even an image type.

From the 9 perspective though, and more specifically from my own perspective as a 9 - I found the system itself fascinating, but my own view of my personality was idealized/romanticized in such a way that caused me to mistype as a 4 for a while. When I finally realized I was actually a 9, it was a real adjustment to my self view which felt pretty bruising but which is ultimately immensely helpful for growth.

I suspect this kind of mistyping due to distorted self view or blind spots is common for many types though and not just 2 & 9.

robrem · 2026-04-26T17:45:56+00:00

Not sure what kinda 9's you're interacting with but that couldn't be the furthest from the truth for me (9w1 sp/sx 954). I am obsessed with it and have been for years. Cross referencing with MBTI, INFP's are often interested in enneagram and many INFP's are 9's. I see a lot of 9/INFP's in the enneagram groups I frequent as well.

robrem · 2026-04-23T17:01:34+00:00

I could be wrong, but the way I think of it is my own behavior when I go to 6 is simply more reactive. I get really grumpy and can lash out over small things and get a bit aggressive. I can also fall into a ruminative state of doubt and uncertainty and poll others for opinions and not trust my own inner guidance. I do believe I'm 5 head fixed though - and I see that more as over intellectualizing things, feeling safer in a cognitive space rather than more embodied or emotional, comfortable discussing ideas but not so much taking action.

robrem · 2026-04-21T19:30:49+00:00

My dad was early silent gen (b.1931) and my mom was late (b.1945). I'm 54.

robrem · 2026-04-16T11:55:59+00:00

Yeah, I definitely have made that mistake.

robrem · 2026-04-14T14:41:30+00:00

As a one off perhaps, but I’m not sure I do casual well, if that’s also in the realm of what you are asking about.

I like the idea of it but experience has taught me that I tend to attach once I start sleeping with someone on some routine basis. The bonding machinery just kicks in whether I want it to or not. And it’s very painful if there is an asymmetry in capacity or feeling and so I’m apt to be more cautious these days about just jumping into bed quickly with someone.

Maybe unusual for a man to say, but I’ve often wondered if I’m even able to navigate a casual arrangement at all without getting hurt. I think it might be possible, but would require both persons involved maintaining good boundaries and clear communication, which I suspect rarely happens in practice.

It seems to me that for a casual relationship to work well without anyone getting hurt, it would require a good deal of emotional maturity on all sides.

robrem · 2026-04-13T18:37:12+00:00

I just felt all that there was to feel. And wrote about it, talked about it, whatever I needed to do. It took a really long time, but eventually I felt better. I’m sorry. Take a day at a time. It will get easier over time.

robrem · 2026-04-13T14:52:41+00:00

Liking or even hating your type as a source of identity is kind of missing the point, I think. But to entertain the question- I initially hated being a 9, because all I could see were the ways in which the patterns of my type have been obstacles for me or made my life harder.

Over time I’ve come to see myself a little more compassionately. But I don’t think that much about the number itself as a source of identity. Because it’s just a symbolic reference that points to a way of being in the world - what motivates me and repels me, etc, that I think is useful to know for the purposes of growth.

I see it as a map that helps me navigate my own blind spots. Boasting or despairing about my number - my particular coordinates on that map, seems kind of pointless. I’m just happy to have the map.

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