Bonus Episode #6: How each Enneagram type is struggling, thriving and can grow in grace during the pandemic

In this episode, we’ll dive into, how each type:

is struggling,
is thriving,
and can grow in grace during this crazy season.

If you’d like to skip to your type or the type of your spouse or a friend, here are the approximate timestamps for each type:

Type Eight: 2 minutes
Type Nine: 6 minutes 30 seconds
Type One: 11 minutes
Type Two: 16 minutes 45 seconds
Type Three: 21 minutes 45 seconds
Type Four: 26 minutes 20 seconds
Type Five: 32 minutes
Type Six: 38 minutes
Type Seven: 43 minutes 45 seconds

If you’d like an overview of what the Enneagram is, what it isn’t, and how it can help you grow spiritually, grab a free copy of Your Quick Start Guide to the Enneagram. It breaks down each type, how to determine your type and wing, and what you need to know to become who God created you to be. You’ll slowly shed who you are not to become the person God intended. Grab it here!

Before we get started, please know that I’m not an Enneagram expert, merely a lover of it. What I present to you is based on my own research, feedback from men and women of each type, and peer review.

There is nothing Eights like less than being told what to do and that’s exactly what’s happening in this pandemic. Your movement of where to go is restricted and your options of what to buy at Target are limited.

To cope, you may feel like you can make up your own rules because you don’t agree with the rules in place or deny the news you don’t like. If the experts say to limit your movement, you’re going to the grocery store once a day!

You also are focused on controlling what you can, like your schedule and routines.

This is also a tremendous time for growth as God slowly and gently teaches you about His sovereignty and matchless power. This is the perfect time to really learn, way down deep into your bones, that He holds the whole world together and you don’t have to.

Graciously reviewed by Celia Manns.

You love connection and, boy, are you getting a chance to connect during this season! You are excellent at giving support and you love being with your people.

While you are experiencing unprecedented access, time, and memory-making with your people, but you feel the tension rising as your people argue, fight, and complain. Tension you could live without.

To cope with this tension, you forget your own preferences and plans so you can focus on your people, which means there’s harmony and comfort, even if it’s a false connection.

You would rather have a false peace than tension any day of the week. You are neglecting yourself at a time when self-care is essential.

This is also a time of tremendous growth for you spiritually. God grows us through change and adversity and you have an opportunity to share your preferences and express your anger knowing your people still love you. It may be awkward, but in the end, working through what’s frustrating you will be worth all the effort and deeper connection you crave.

Graciously reviewed by Melanie Zeeb, Karen Gauvreau, and Abigail Calvin.

Is it okay to say that you find this season a bit challenging? You feel incapacitated and unable to help.

Here are all the ways that Ones feel out of control:

You have no control over whether others follow the rules and best practices put in place like social distancing and wearing a mask.
You’re not in charge of where you go or what you do. Much of what you want to do is closed.
You feel as if you’re doing nothing well because you didn’t have time to plan and recalibrate for a change you didn’t initiate.

To cope, you typically resort to rules and routines, but that rug feels like it’s been pulled out from under you. In your anger and frustration, you may be overly scheduling and color-coding any bit of daily life. And you’re probably on your 17th schedule by now!

This is also a time for growth. You may — emphasis on may — now have more time to do what you typically neglect: play, be silly, have fun with your family.

God can use this time to strip you of some of your busyness so you can slow down and realize how much you enjoy this slower pace and how truly special your people are.

Graciously reviewed by Rebekah Fedrowitz, Anna Saxton, and Robin Brown.

The pandemic is both a blessing and a curse. You love helping others and people need help and support the most during a crisis. You’re the one checking on other people, sewing face masks, and picking up groceries for neighbors. Because of your ability to genuinely listen and care for others, people are drawn to you.

However, because of social distancing, the ways you are able to care for others is limited, which you find really irritating.

To cope, you find yourself repressing your needs to meet the needs of others. Right now is all about others and very little about you.

This is a prime opportunity for growth for Twos. What an incredible time for God to strip away the false belief that expressing your own needs and asking for help is bad. He longs to hear from you and for you to grow in real connection with others.

Graciously reviewed by Reychel Garren and Tanya Dean.

As one Three to another, this time is a gift! This is an ideal time for spiritual growth because you have fewer places to go, expectations to meet, and people to impress so you now have the opportunity to let Jesus tend to the emotions you’ve neglected for so long.

For a Three, this is a time of lightness.

Normally, you cope by conforming to expectations and achieving, but now you have the amazing opportunity to discover who you are without external noise and input and ways to prove your worth. You’re a girl on lockdown who gets to come home to herself.

Graciously reviewed by Angela Powell.

This is a time that you can shine Type Fours. You are the most naturally empathic of all the types, which means you can understand and almost feel the feelings of those around you. You have the ability to understand the pain and hurt of others, and there is certainly a lot of pain right now.

To cope, you’re focusing on what you’ve lost. You think about what you had before and it’s gone. But you’re also focusing on the beauty in the pain.

You see — more than any other type — that through our woundedness and brokeness there is still an undefeated human spirit. You see the generosity, sacrifice, hope, and healing even in the hard. You hope that all of us will gain perspective and meaning during AND on the other side of the pandemic.

Graciously reviewed by Rachel Palmbush, Kim Cove, Sarah E. Westfall, Chelsea Rotunno, Andrea Rocati, Beth Lombardi.

The pandemic feeds into your world view that it’s best to be self-sufficient, that the world is a hostile + harsh place, and your home is your castle so it’s best to retreat there.

To a certain extent, you are living isolated because you’re not going anywhere and there are fewer demands for your time, but your people are depleting your energy reserves. You feel the most at peace when you have limited obligations and are on your own schedule, but that’s not your life right now.

You love collecting, organizing, and analyzing information and you certainly have a lot to plot, chart, and graph during this time.

To cope, you’re withdrawing into yourself, which can be helpful at times, but also unhealthy when you aren’t letting anyone into your emotional world.

The pandemic also gives you a tremendous opportunity to grow: to give God the time and space to remind you that you do need His love and the love of others. He is your faithful provider and wants you to know how many resources you do have — in Him and in your physical world.

Graciously reviewed by Leslie Traylor and Loretta Gjeltema.

The pandemic feeds into your worldview that the world is unsafe and you must be on your guard. This season may be the worst-case scenario you’ve ever thought through.

Your superpower is thinking about what might go wrong, strategizing ways to solve it, then preparing for it. In other words, Sixes, you have the potential to be the calmest in this crisis because you’ve already thought through all the options and scenarios. This may be your finest hour because you’ve planned and prepared.

But for some Sixes, it also may be the time of most anxiety because you’re worried about your health and safety and the health of those in your family. You wonder if you’ll ever be safe again.

To cope, you absorb and sort information and then imagine what might happen next. On one hand, this might be helpful to take data and act on it.

But for most Sixes, this just means you become preoccupied with research then formulating a plan then doubting that plan and doing nothing or frantically doing a lot of inconsequential activities.

Yet this is also an opportunity for you to grow by trusting in God’s sovereignty, that no matter how much data you have, only God can make you feel safe and confident. This may be a time when God strips away the blinders that keep you from seeing how capable, competent, and smart you are and how much agency you have to act on your behalf.

Graciously reviewed by Karen Rapp, Clarissa Moll, and Alexis Bailey.

A home-bound pandemic is the worst-case scenario for most Sevens. Where is the fun? How much more bored can you get? When can you see people again?

You’re coping by reframing the negative of the pandemic into positives: Look at all the new recipes I’m trying! I’ve always wanted to coordinated a Zoom happy hour and now I had a chance!

You also cope with the fear and stress of the pandemic by procrastinating on projects and chores in the pursuit of doing something more fun, a la baking and happy hours.

You love to brainstorm so you’ve come up with 12 new ways to have fun at home and you’re sharing them with all of us online.

(But let’s be honest: brainstorming them can be more fun than actually following through on them. Shopping for supplies for your backyard ballon-a-palooza is boring!)

Your imagination is in overdrive as you think of all the ways this pandemic could be really good in the long run and not as bad you as you imagine.

This time also provides an opportunity for you to grow when you realize you are fun all on your own. And your people are pretty awesome too! You may come to find that routines and rhythms aren’t as restricting as you initially thought and that you can do this. That this is hard and painful, but it hasn’t killed you yet.

Graciously reviewed by Mabry Gardner, Michelle Shaw, and Shelley Harrington.

Win a $25 gift card!

Anyone who hasn’t already written a review and does, is entered to win a $25 gift card to the place of your choice: either Chick-fil-A, Target or Amazon.

To enter to win,

Leave a rating or review
Email a screenshot to info@jillemccormick.com by 9 p.m. Central on April 30, 2020
I’ll randomly select one winner and email the winner.

Easy-peasy, lemon-squeezey!