Of course no literary agent or publisher is going to tell you what to write. Just like how no editor is going to tell you what to change, and no one on your reader team is going to leave you less than a 5-star review and remain on the team for the next book release.
You’re an indie author because you don’t need other people. You’ve learned that time and time again in your life. Things are easier if you do them yourself, your way, and without so-called help from people who only make everything more complicated.
Sure, life feels like a struggle, but what do people expect? No pain, no glory. The world was built unfairly, so either go out and create your own justice or stop complaining.
Yes, publishing books is hard. Yes, marketing them is tough. Yes, you could really use a nap.
No, wait! That’s not what you meant to say! Naps are for the weak! And that’s definitely not you. You didn’t get to where you are by being weak. That’s not how you take from this life what you want.
If you’re pumping your fist and saying, “fuck yeah!” at this point, then you’re probably an Enneagram Type 8, the Challenger. I’ve got some good news and some bad news for you, friend. The bad news is that you’ve probably been making this indie publishing thing harder than it has to be. The good news is that you’re excellently prepared to take on the realistic challenges that do exist. But first, there might be a few mindset shifts you’ll could consider…
Welcome back to this series where we explore what motivates us and how we might build a life that works with our creative impulses rather than against them.
Today, we’re talking all about the Enneagram Eight, “the Challenger.” We’re going to dive deep into what motivates someone with these core fears and desires, and how we can build an empowering author life for ourselves if this is our type.
If this isn’t your type, I strongly suggest you read it anyway. Not only will it help you write strong Challenger characters, but I guarantee you have an Eight in your life, and understanding them will only strengthen the relationship.
At their core, Eights’ desire is to protect themselves. Their fear is to be harmed and controlled by others. The concepts of power and vulnerability are central to the way the Eights relates to the world.
This fear and desire make you Eights natural born leaders, which is good, since you don’t enjoy following anyway. The world needs leaders like you, though, with your keen eye for power structures that are invisible to many others.
You’re not afraid of a fight, which is admirable, so long as there’s a legitimate fight to have. And when that’s not the case, but you don’t usually let that stop you from trying, do you?
If you’re an Eight, you’ve probably been called “difficult” or “stubborn” or “argumentative” a few times in your life (exaggeration of the year). When it comes time to argue for justice or to stand up for the little guy, you’re just the person for the job, but how is the other 90% of your life treating you? Is it the peaceful rest you need? Are you a pro at trusting that, in the words of your fellow Challenger Martin Luther King, Jr., “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice”?
Don’t worry if that’s not the case, because the great news is that you can feel that way eventually! You can learn to trust a higher power (God, the Universe, whoever/whatever) without being harmed for it! It’s waiting for you along the path your type must walk toward health.
This need for justice and your inner call for strength in the face of tyranny is much needed in the literary world, and that’s something you will naturally inspire in your readers. Your stories can’t help but be about standing up for the little guy, showing tremendous power and fight when the odds are stacked against it, and brave leaders inspiring the same kind of drive in those they lead.
When I’m working with a Challenger who’s struggling with motivation (and this is surprisingly rare, thanks to the Eight’s natural aversion to showing weakness and asking for help), it’s usually because they are tired. They’re tired of the grind after doing themselves no favors and making everything more of a struggle than it needs to be. They’re tired of writing the books in solitude. They’re tired of dealing with needy readers. They’re tired of their marketing tactics falling flat every six months. And by the time an Eight is ready to admit they’re tired, you know it’s bad. They’re ready to say “I give up! You’re on your own, assholes!” and take off to be alone.
The key for the Eight is to understand that, yes, indie publishing is one challenge after another, but you’ve undoubtedly been making it twice as difficult for yourself out of a constant need to assert your power over each aspect. Delegating isn’t failure, and you will feel better when you have someone to lead toward a common goal.
For the sake of saving your energy for the important things, try to pick your battles with more discretion. For instance, crappy people are allowed to leave your book 1-star reviews. Is it an injustice that people with no stake in your book who were not the intended audience can leave drive-by 1-star reviews? Totally. But you don’t have to right that wrong. You can’t even if you try. Consider that those in the industry—readers, other authors, coaches—aren’t something to overcome but rather useful human resources that can make your journey easier and, god forbid, maybe a little fun.
Since power is so central to this type, it’s crucial that we discuss a couple of its various forms. In plain terms, an unhealthy Eight seeks power over others, and a healthy Eight aims to empower themselves and those around them. Meanwhile, an average Eight is in the process of losing their grip on their own sense of empowerment and seeking that need for power from external sources rather than reaching internally for it.
What a Challenger does in these average levels very much determines if they become a hero or a villain. Because while all types have the potential to get unhealthy, when someone with a natural fixation on power becomes unhealthy, it creates an especially frightening situation for those around them.
Each of the nine types of the Enneagram has nine Levels of Development within it. Three are considered healthy, three are average, and three are unhealthy. We move through these levels at various moments of our lives, but we usually have an anchor point or baseline that’s our default. As we unlock some of the unconscious patterns associated with our type, our anchor point can move slowly upward toward healthier levels.
Below are descriptions of an Eight in the three categories of development (healthy, average, unhealthy):
Healthy: Willing to confront danger for a greater purpose and lasting positive legacy, sees mercy and vulnerability as signs of strength, trusts that the universe “bends toward justice,” exhibits true self-confidence and stands up for themselves without going overboard, a natural leader who focuses on empowering followers for maximum effectiveness.
Average: Functions with extreme self-sufficiency and independence, begins denying own emotional needs, need for power and control shifts from self (empowerment) onto environment (power over), believes their word is law and needs to be boss, becomes forceful and scary to others, not afraid to use intimidation tactics to achieve their aims, projects adversarial relationships onto those who dare to be empowered, looks for obedience from others, and can create a self-fulfilling prophecy by forcing others to band together in opposition.
Unhealthy: Ruthless in any attempt to avoid being controlled, acts like a dictator, starts functioning contrary to laws and morality, willing to resort to violence, fantasies of invincibility, exhibits megalomania with emerging sociopathic tendencies, feels justified in and hungry for destruction of others, murderous.
Yeah, I know. I told you this much raw power could get scary. But if you’re a Challenger, you already know this on some level (don’t worry, random intrusive thoughts are normal for everyone).
If you’re not an Eight, you’re now thinking of someone you know who is. Or maybe even a character. As you can see, Eights can make great heroes or villains in your books, depending on what development level they most often inhabit.
Okay, so how do you use this information to motivate yourself as a writer?
You’ll need to get real with yourself on this one thing: your impulse to exert power over others is a direct result of not feeling empowered in that moment. Reconnect with your inner power, and you’ll find you have less of a desire to exert it over others… and more of a desire to help others find their own inner power.
So, if you’re feeling unmotivated, it may be that you’ve abdicated some of your power to others. You’ve forgotten that you DO always have control of yourself, and the decision to sit down at the computer and push buttons to create story worlds is yours to make.
OR maybe you’re tired. Maybe you’re sad. Maybe there’s some human emotion you genuinely need to deal with and surrender to that you’re not letting yourself, and it’s got you all emotionally constipated. It’s hard to write when you’re in that state.
Emotions make themselves known one way or another, and if you’re ignoring that or trying to express them all as anger, your body, mind, and spirit will eventually hit a wall. It could manifest as physical exhaustion or a serious illness, but that emotion will be heard. So maybe, just maybe, it’s time to rest, listen, and surrender to the fact that you’re a human like the rest of us, and you feel those softer emotions of love, heartbreak, tenderness, grief, fear, and vulnerability. If you think you’re strong now, imagine how unstoppable you’ll be when you can do all the hard stuff while also feeling emotions!
Every type has a wake-up call associated with it to tell us we’re plummeting down the development levels and it’s time to pause, take a deep breath, and reevaluate some of the premises we’re working from. For the Eight, the red flag is forcefulness. This is the first warning sign that we’re losing connection with the power inside us and trying to regain the feeling of control by exerting power over our environment.
In our craft, this might look like trying to force the scene to work the way you outlined it rather than surrendering to your characters’ wills and letting things transpire naturally, then adjusting. Don’t forget that the whole creation—the characters, the events, the themes—are decided by you. It might not be your ego driving the action, but it’s all coming from somewhere inside you. Sometimes you must surrender to the muse. Remember, it doesn’t all have to feel like a struggle. Things can be easy and flow naturally without your willful assistance.
Creative Eights embody this example of surrender. After what we’ve talked about for Challengers, it may surprise you to learn that Toni Morrison was an Eight, as was Paul Newman. It probably won’t surprise you to hear that Ernest Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, and Mae West were Eights as well.
Not everything is a struggle, but some things are. Mae West was fighting against all kinds of body and behavioral expectations for women, and it took every bit of her defiant Challenger attitude to keep it up. But better for the rest of us women that she did.
Oskar Schindler, another Eight, embodies the benevolent strength of the Eight when it comes time to defend those who need it. And Serena Williams shows us how a Challenger can soar to greatness despite, or perhaps because of, the immense opposition in her chosen arena. Her creativity is undeniable on the tennis court, as is her passion and power. And by doing what she’s done and in the unapologetic way she has, she’s inspired a whole generation of girls, especially black girls, to try out a sport that was, until recently, the domain of white men. Talk about challenging power structures!
So, if you’re struggling to put the words down, see if any of these are running on loop in your head:
“This is too easy.”
“I can’t get the story to do what I want it to.”
“I don’t need help with this.”
“My readers aren’t ready for this kind of a story.”
“I shouldn’t be tired yet.”
“I’ll write after I tell this person off.”
“I can’t write because my 9-5 boss is such a prick and won’t stop bugging me.”
“If my editor is going to question me like this, I should just find another editor.”
“I’ve dug deep before, so if that isn’t working this time, it’s because I’m not trying hard enough.”
“No pain, no gain. Work is supposed to hurt.”
Each of these thoughts rejects the signals your emotions are trying to send you and concocts external challenges where there aren’t any, pulling your focus away from what you can control and toward what you can’t control but will try to anyway.
This doesn’t have to be a struggle. You don’t have to fight against your environment all the time. You can take breaks (and must) without being “weak.” I’m telling you right now, a story where none of the main characters show basic emotions without being painted as weak will be a hard one to read and enjoy. You need to let the vast range of human emotions (yes, even the softer ones) flow through you to your characters, or else you could exhaust your readers.
One of the most challenging emotions for an Eight to show is kindness, but when you do tap into that well, it’s a display of the purest form of power—the strength to be kind when one could easily be otherwise.
So run an experiment, I dare ya: show an act of kindness to yourself and see if you can survive it.
Drawing conscious thought to our subconscious scripts is like drawing blood to an injury to help it heal. And that’s how we begin to break these cycles that hold us prisoner so we can move to healthier development levels of our type.
It’s also how we keep ourselves motivated and connected to the work when we’re Challengers.
So, if you’re an Eight who’s struggling with motivation:
Use your writing to practice the art of surrender. Let your characters be who they are and stop trying to control them so closely. If the scene doesn’t want to bend to your will, see where it leads you, trusting that you’re still the one in control, because you are.
When something feels like a struggle, ask yourself if it needs to be. It’s not weak to make the process of self-publishing easier on you, just like it’s not valiant or brave to make it harder than it has to be.
Remind yourself of who your work will inspire simply because it came from someone as empowered as you. Empowerment is not a zero-sum game. There is an unlimited amount of it to go around, and you help it multiply just by showing up in your creative work as an empowered person.
If your writing feels dull, maybe you’re not examining invisible power structures enough in it. Maybe you’re relying too heavily on tired examples of power and need to dig deeper and take a more nuanced approach. You know better than anyone that explicit power and implicit power are not always the same.
You don’t have to be on guard all the time. Use your writing to challenge injustices, and then give yourself a break about it when you’re not writing. Rest can be an act of rebellion. Trust that there are other Eights out there taking shifts defending those who need it. Story changes more hearts and minds than force anyway.
Create an emotions practice. What I mean is some special time and space where you check in with yourself and ask what you’re feeling. And then, you need to feel it, even though doing so might make you feel out of control. Your type is firmly planted in the Anger triad, which puts you in jeopardy of every emotion feeling like anger. But you need to unpack that and sort out the individual emotions to keep moving forward.
People will try to exert power over you. If you’re always reacting to this, they’ve won. But if you begin to recognize your body’s sensations whenever this happens, you’ll learn to pause and remind yourself that you are the only one who can give your power away. This exercise will empower you and keep you focused on your story rather than throwing hands at every critic who comes your way.
Build a network of authors you like, and don’t feel like you always need to lead. If you find yourself only networking with authors you believe are behind you in their career, it’s time to reel in your need to be in the power-up position. Network with people you believe know more than you do and who don’t need you to lead them. Then, you know, learn from them. There will come a time when they need your gifts in return, and you can provide them then. No need to force it.
Next week, we’ll discuss how to find you writing motivation if you’re a Type 9, the Peacemaker. This is the type of storytellers like Walt Disney, and George Lucas, as well as beloved characters like Harry Potter and Winnie the Pooh.