Soft Front,
Strong Back
Written By: Whitney Warne
“90% of that description checks out but avoiding vulnerability? I don't see that in myself."
My friend and fellow Enneagram Eight said this to me after I read her a description of Type Eights that I'd been working on. I know this person incredibly well, and in my true Whitney fashion, I started to form a grin.
"Oh yeah?"
We had just spent the previous three hours locked in a deep discussion about a current work pain point.
She was sharing the challenges arising from taking on a new partner in her already established business, mainly her resistance to her new partner's divergent vision for the company. She lamented that she wanted to find a way to make this work because her partner brought so much to the table, but she was struggling to figure out how to allow her partner's agenda into the vision and decision-making process without sacrificing the stability of the business she'd spent the last three years building.
My grin widened, and my stare was laser.
"I think you are confusing emotional transparency with vulnerability. Eights can be very emotionally transparent. Meaning, they can communicate their true thoughts and feelings, but very much struggle to be vulnerable, which requires the Eight be open to self-disclosure in a circumstance where they perceive potential risk. I see transparency in you, but not vulnerability. And I realize I'm the pot calling the kettle black right now," referring to my own Eight struggle with vulnerability. (Surprising I know. I, too, am an Enneagram type Eight. Most leaders are.)
"Okay, I concede the point, but I still don't see how I'm not vulnerable. Give me an example."
My friend is a Self-Preservation Eight who has a type Three-feeling center but leads decision-making with her type Five-Thinking Center. From her perspective, everything should be concrete, thought-through, practical, and winnable.
I drew in a breath and let my canon question fly:
"Is there any person or circumstance in which you follow?
She just stared at me.
"What do you mean?"
"Do you trust anyone else to lead you? Would you be willing to relinquish decision-making power and let someone take the lead? Could you willingly let someone take care of you?"
Her gaze intensified with her understanding.
"No. No one. I wouldn't even follow you."
I chuckled at the truth I already knew.
"And there we see your lack of vulnerability. To follow, to allow someone else to take the lead, to sit humbly and quietly as someone else determines the direction in which you must go, requires incredible vulnerability for an Eight."
For someone who is not an Enneagram Eight, this probably seems apparent.
But without high self-awareness, the Eight can't see their stronghold on control and how it acts like a fortress around them. Because Eights see the world as a tough place where only the strong survive, the Eight ego constantly whispers to them, "Don't show any weakness, any crack in your capability, or opening where you might be taken advantage of. If you do, you risk being driven off course or backed into a corner where you can't dig yourself out. Worst of all, you might have to clean up a mess you didn't create."
At our deepest core, Eights fear navigating someone else's consequences.
The side effect is that it makes them leaders who are ready and willing to take the blame, fall, or hard path as long as it comes with the solution of their choosing. The Ego hides and protects their fear of being weak or vulnerable by encouraging them to design a life as commander and chief who is always in charge.
And here you see the Eight's ultimate personality bait and switch. The Ego protects the soft center of the Eight by projecting a personality that reads, "I am the toughest one in the room."
But here's a little secret: The more an Eight embodies an image of unwavering power and control, the more you know that Eight isn't buying the image. Rather, they are selling it as a distraction.
My friend and I just stare at each other. She then took it upon herself to circle back to our prior conversation.
"What I'm hearing you say is that my work in integrating my partner into our business is learning I can accept someone else's consequences and not pre-solve their problems. Oh, and I get to learn to feel safe following someone else's lead while they potentially put me at risk?"
I slowly nodded up and down, unsure of how she would take this realization.
"Soft front. Strong back," I said to her as she was processing.
When Eights starts to grow their vulnerability, they realize their current strategies to gain power and control only feels like protection and it comes with the consequence of being isolated. Eventually, the Eight starts to feel the weight of their never-ending battle to be "The Only One" and this realization, that the battle may never end if the Eight doesn't learn to fight it differently, often delivers the reluctant Eight to the knees of change.
When the Eight starts to wake up, they can see that their over-dominant approach to life leads those around them to feel and therefore act disempowered, keeping others from standing shoulder to shoulder with the Eight in leadership. When Eights learn to soften and admit to their weaknesses, they create space for others to rise and stand with them. Over time, as the Eight learns to follow, not just other people, but their deepest desire to trust others and feel safe in their presence, the Eight begins to allow others to be there for them as equals and trusted partners.
My friend's eyes had a glaze of overwhelm as the recognition of what was a stake spread over her. "I understand what I'm supposed to do, and I understand why I'm supposed to do it, but seriously, how do I just sit there and listen when I already know the right answer?"
And here it was. The ultimate question.
My friend understood the problem and the solution, but how to actually get there required an entirely new path for my friend. A path she hadn't ever practiced walking down. A path she had yet to pave, and so I dug the trenches to get her started:
Accept that this new style of communication is going to feel fake for a while.
Fake it till you make it is not a bad strategy. Faking it, if used consciously, can allow us the space to practice new ways of expressing ourselves that may work better than the old. No one has ever gotten good at anything without a desire so deep that they were willing to fake it aka "practice" until the pattern felt personal. Accept that this "practice" will be uncomfortable. You may want to quit every 60 seconds. Hell, you may quit every 60 seconds. Start again every 61 seconds and you're still doing better than if you'd never started at all.
Set an intention at the beginning of the meeting.
For example: I am going to listen and be curious. I'm going to be the champion. I am going to be on their side, regardless of what I believe to be right. I am going to explore another’s perspective without using mine as the filter to judge the validity.
Practice responding completely differently than normal.
Once the meeting starts, you are going to sit and listen, and you are going to interrupt yourself when inevitably the judgmental thoughts arise. Think of it like doing a live meditation with Andy on Headspace. Just notice the thoughts and release them. Don't give them any weight or validity.
When you fuck up:
When you interject, reroute, tell them it won't work, cut them off, take over the situation, listen with judgment, dismiss, or placate... pause yourself in the moment and acknowledge your breakdown. Explain how you are working on being an open space for their contribution and strength and as you work on responding differently, they can support you with their patience and understanding as you work to repattern responses you've been practicing for decades.
Bonus: By admitting you are working on something hard for you, you have opened the space for others to be vulnerable about their growth areas as well. Watch as your admission creates a ripple effect of permission to grow.
I paused to breathe and take in the room and my friend. Over the evening, the sun had gone down, the lights had dimmed, and she and I were lost in our own world of solving the problem of what it means to be Eights as leaders and business owners who also want to be supported and cared for but are just learning how to open ourselves us to receiving this.