There’s the syndrome that one out of every nine people, myself included, suffers from. It’s called Fuck It, I’ll Do It Myself, or FIIDIM. There’s a lesser version of it called Screw it, I’ll Do It Myself (SIIDIM), but the people I’ve met who suffer from it usually experience the more severe form.
Symptoms of FIIDIM include an overactive sense of personal obligation, perfectionism, acute judgement of self and others, headaches, resentment, and exhaustion.
This is not a real syndrome, obviously, but if you’re an Enneagram One, the Reformer, then you might have read all that with wide eyes as you realized someone had finally diagnosed you properly.
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. To read the previous entries, go here: www.ffs.media/story-tips/category/Motivation+series
Today, we’re talking all about the Enneagram Ones, “the Reformers.” We’re going to dive deep into what motivates someone with these core fears and desires, and how we can build a nice little 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 Reformer characters, but I guarantee you have a One close to you in your life and understanding them will only strengthen the relationship.
At their core, Ones’ desire is to be good and moral and balanced. Their fear is that they’ll be bad or corrupt or imbalanced. Fairness is also important to this type, which connects back to the need for balance and righteousness and extends to a deep dedication to justice of all types.
I’ve noticed that when people first identify their type, they usually feel like it’s the worst one to have, but after doing some of the inner work on it, they begin to feel like it’s the best one to have as they realize what gifts they bring to the world. (Not to be a killjoy, but all types are equally important for a healthy world.)
Ones are frequently stereotyped as neat freaks, but I can say from personal experiencing of being a One that this is not necessarily true. I like when everything is organized, but my need to maintain order and improve things is focused on bigger issues than my desk or how the dishwasher is loaded. So, sometimes messier Ones are mistyped.
If you’re a One, it’s important to attach everything you do to a deeper motivation of making the world around you a better place. That’s what we do. It’s why we’re called the Reformers. Our ability to find the flaws and injustices of the world is our strength (even if it makes us feel like we’re taking crazy pills from time to time), and our ability to envision ways forward toward something more just, equitable, and good is the gift we can share with the world.
That is, of course, when we’re at our best.
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.
Most people, when beginning their Enneagram work, start at a low-average level of development (Level 5 or 6, where 1 is healthy and 9 is destructively unhealthy). We’ll occasionally dip into the unhealthy levels, and that’s usually ugly for everyone involved. We’ll also experience healthy moments of our type now and again, but more out of luck of circumstances than any conscious effort.
Below are descriptions of a One in the three categories of development (healthy, average, unhealthy):
Healthy: Possesses deep wisdom, conducts oneself with integrity, works toward building a better world, stands up for what they believe in despite the personal cost, inspires others to be more merciful and less judgmental, treats self with mercy and acceptance.
Average: Striving hard worker, self-controlled but often rigid, critical and judgmental of self and others, functions on basis of personal obligation.
Unhealthy: Self-righteous and condemning, obsessive, hypocritical with incoherent moral beliefs, a sense of entitlement to punish others, downright merciless.
If you’re not a One, you’re now thinking of someone you know who is. Or maybe even a character. As you can see, Ones 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?
The trick is simple: You need to be writing books that you believe will make the world a better place by existing and attracting readers. Writing to trend in some genre you don’t care about with stock characters that go through the motions will not be enough to get you out of your warm bed in the morning.
Write stories that activate those healthy parts of yourself. Write stories that require characters to stand up for what they believe in. Show your readers, through the art of fiction, how we can fix the things that are broken in the world, in others, and in ourselves. Inspire others to love themselves, imperfections and all. You are a fixer and healer by nature. Use it for good, not evil.
When you start to feel less motivated, it’s usually because you’ve lost sight of the purpose and importance of the work you’re creating. You might start thinking, Nothing in the world would change if I never published another book, so why bother?
Exactly! Nothing will change, and the way things are isn’t working. But your voice, your stories, can push the world toward something better. You can’t do it all on your own, but you can do a part of it. That’s all you need to do because 1/9th of the population is a Reformer like you, so you’re not in this alone.
I have a sticky note on my computer that says, “What the fuck else are you going to do with your LIFE?!” In typical One fashion, I approach myself with a little tough love and pitch-black humor, but the message reminds me of my sense of purpose, and that’s why it’s there where I see it every day.
As a Reformer, I write stories to change hearts and minds. Life is short, and I want to make a positive impact, and this is the best way I’ve found to do it using my talents. The positive emails from readers only confirm that I’m on the right track. But speaking unpopular truths and criticizing the status quo isn’t without its punishments (and one-star reviews), and when those happen, I need the reminder: What the fuck else would you do with your life, Claire? I can’t come up with a more worthy way to spend my years, and so I get back to work.
Pay attention to where your mind goes when you’re writing. Are you having trouble getting to the next scene because you’ve slipped into harsh self-judgment? Are you working on projects because you feel like you should or because you’re passionate about them?
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 One, the red flag is personal obligation. This is that FIIDIM syndrome I mentioned, and the reason we need to watch out for it is because personal obligation invalidates our desire for boundaries around our energy. And when boundaries are ignored or infringed upon, resentment seeps in. Over time, it becomes the water we swim in.
Resentment is something Ones really need to watch out for. It’s our trap. It sends us plummeting into those unhealthy levels at breakneck speed if we’re not careful, and once you’re there, you’re not going to be able to write anything your healthy self would be proud of, if you can even get yourself to put down words at all.
Combating this starts with not agreeing to things that don’t move you deeply and engage your higher self just because you think they need to get done. There is so much good you could do in every corner of the world and in every relationship you have. Don’t be afraid to narrow it down and put your energy toward the things that matter to you most.
There’s really nothing like watching a One who’s developed their gifts of wisdom and discretion and mercy pick up a cause and champion it. Nelson Mandela is an example of this. So is Elizabeth Warren. As far as fictional characters go, you have Bruce Wayne and Hermione Granger. Batman fights corruption (especially this new version, which Ones should definitely check out), and Hermione fights for house elf rights (and constantly follows her conscience in tricky matters of the wizarding world).
You might think that Ones aren’t a lot of fun to be around or that they’re necessarily overly serious killjoys, but that’s not the case. When we’re around our close friends, we tend to resemble the fun-loving Seven, and there are plenty of famous comedians who are Reformers, like Jerry Seinfeld, Tina Fey, and Bo Burnham. We just do fun and comedy our own way. But everyone can rest assured that when a One is having fun, it’s harmless fun, because they’ve already put it through extensive moral vetting.
Laughter is also an essential part of a healthy One. You’ll never stop noticing the flaws in yourself and others, sorry. It just ain’t in the cards for you. But if you learn to laugh at your own flaws and the foibles of mankind, you’ll do yourself (and your nervous system) a huge favor.
I figure I’ll end each of these emails with some subconscious scripts that might trip up people of this type and sap our motivation if left unchecked and unquestioned. If you’re struggling to put the words down or market your book, see if any of these are running on loop in your head:
“Nobody cares if I publish this or not.”
“Why am I writing made-up stories when there are so many problems in the world that need fixing?”
“This book is garbage and I’m just going to embarrass myself.”
“I can believe I agreed to this project. How dare someone ask this much of me.”
“I can’t move onto the next scene until this one is fixed/perfect.”
“Nothing I do is going to make any difference in this screwed up world anyway.”
All of these statements are false. You may not believe me, but try entertaining the idea for a while and see how your life would feel if you stopped thinking these things. (Spoiler: much lighter and more joyful.)
Your inner critic is trying to protect you from your worst nightmare of being bad or corrupt, but it’s going about it in the least helpful way possible. Try summoning these negative thoughts to the forefront and saying, “Thank you for trying to protect me, but I don’t need that belief anymore.”
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 when we’re Reformers. Out with the critical, in with the purpose-driven.
So, if you’re a One who’s struggling with motivation:
Remember what your purpose for writing is and what you want to change for the better in this world.
Get your karate hands up when you realize you’re functioning with a sense of personal obligation rather than passion, and either drop that project like it’s hot or find a way it can support your goals of making the world a better place.
Watch out when you become overly critical of others. It causes you to be equally critical of yourself, and that is detrimental to creative work.
Learn to laugh at yourself. The hardest belly laughs I ever experience are at my own expense.
If you find yourself telling lots of stories that paint you as the hero, it might mean that you’re feeling more like a villain and need to stop and reassess. Great insight can be found in those moments that you can stitch into your current book.
Build relationships with other people who share your passion for causes so you remember you don’t have to do it all on your own.
Schedule frequent time for rest. You’re an intense person and when you commit yourself to something, you go hard. You can’t do that forever. Rest is an essential part of your work if you want it to continue long term.
Next week, we’ll discuss how to find you writing motivation if you’re a Type 2, the Helper. This is the type of Dolly Parton, Bishop Desmond Tutu, Samwise Gamgee, and Molly Weasley.
I would absolutely love to hear your thoughts on this type. Maybe you just realized this describes you and you feel slightly attacked but equally seen. Maybe your spouse or parent or sibling is a One and suddenly everything makes sense. I live for these insights, so send them my way. And if you have remaining questions, I’ll take those, too.