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Enneagram Type 2: The Giver
 Definitions used in describing each type
“Lost” essential quality:
An experience of the essential truth that all needs are satisfied through a universal will, which is greater than that of the individual.
Compensating
belief: You must give to receive. To be loved you must be needed.
Attention/coping strategy: Getting your own needs met by being needed and actively giving to others. Focusing attention on others’ needs and repressing your own.
Trap: Obtaining personal fulfillment through meeting other people’s needs.
Driving energy: Pride in being needed, even indispensable. Feeling you know what others need better than they do.
Avoidance: Disappointing people, becoming useless, being seen negatively by important others and being rejected.
Strengths: Generous, sensitive, helpful, energetic.
Paradox:
Giving more to others does not bring freedom and fulfillment for yourself, and being cut off from an awareness of your own needs prevents you from obtaining the freedom and fulfillment you desire.
Path of development:
- Pay attention to personal needs and wants
- Learn to receive
- Nurture a separate self
- Develop independence and autonomy
Ultimate task:
Realizing that love is not dependent on being needed, and developing a sense of humility that goes with not knowing what to give and being in need yourself.
More on Enneagram Type 2:
Enneagram Type 2 Practices
for Growth | Enneagram Type 2 Key Themes
Next: Enneagram Type 3
Tour the types: Type 1 Type 2 Type 3
Type 4 Type 5
Type 6 Type 7
Type 8 Type 9
Registered? Learn how Type 2 differs from all other Enneagram types
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