3 Ways the Enneagram Can Make Your Book Better

Description: Take your book to the next level with these three applications of the Enneagram to your story. You don’t have to be an Enneagram expert to start putting it to use right now!

Take your book to the next level with these three applications of the Enneagram to your story. You don't have to be an Enneagram expert to start putting it t...

Links: www.ffs.media/free-lesson

Script:

We’re talking Enneagram 101 today, and learning 3 simple ways to apply it to your fiction. I’m Claire Taylor with FFS Media, and without any further ado, let’s get into it. 

Quick primer on the Enneagram. The Enneagram is a personality typing system that breaks people down into one of nine types. That might seem too simple on first blush, but it can get really, seriously complicated the deeper you go. We’re not going that deep today, because we don’t need to. 

Before I go on, just a reminder to hit the subscribe button under this video and ring that bell to make sure you know when I put out new videos. This channel is still pretty fresh, so I really appreciate the follows. 

Okay, what I love about the Enneagram, and the reason I use it for my own writing as well as the story consulting I do for other authors, is that it doesn’t describe behavior, which you can think of as diagnosing symptoms. It describes motivation, which is more like discovering the underlying cause. 

Not just motivations, but core motivations. That’s an important term. It’s the one motivation to rule them all. When a single person’s motivations clash, one will inevitably win out, right? If you find yourself in a situation where you have to choose between doing what you believe is right and avoiding interpersonal conflict, which one will you choose nine times out of ten? That’s determined by your core motivations. 

Each of the types is assigned a number, one through nine, and a name. The Reformer, the Helper, the Achiever, the Individualist, the Investigator, the Loyalist, the Enthusiast, the Challenger, and the Peacemaker.

And each of the types has a particular core motivation. But motivation breaks down into two types: positive and negative. Moving toward and moving away from. Also known as fear and desire. 

Here are the core fears of each type.

And here are the core desires of each type.

We’re not going to walk through each of them, because that will take a lot of time, but you’re welcome to return to this video and hit pause later on, when you’re ready to apply it to your character. 

So, how do we use these tools for fiction? 

Here are three basic but endlessly useful ways:

One. Figure out your protagonist’s type. 

What deep fear are they trying to avoid that sends them down the wrong path? For instance, if your protagonist is a type 5, the Investigator, that fear of being incompetent could send them down a path of endless study to the point where they let life pass them by. On the flip side, that desire for self-sufficiency could lead them to rejecting a romantic partner because they don’t know how to couple and feel like they can stand on their own. 

Once you know the core motivation of your protagonist, you have a pretty good idea of how things might go wrong for them in the story and what lessons they need to learn if they’re going to have a satisfying and happy ending. Whether you have them actually learn those lessons is all up to you, though. 

Two. Figure out your antagonist’s type. 

Just like we did with the protagonist, you can apply the Enneagram to your antagonist to figure out what’s driving them deep down. This is the easiest way to make sure you don’t accidentally create a stock villain for your story. Think about it: aren’t the most memorable antagonists the ones that are also the most sympathetic? 

You create a much more engrossing story when both sides of the argument raise valid points. Your readers feel deeply conflicted when they can sympathize with the antagonist, and that will keep them turning the page! Knowing that core motivation for your antagonist is the easiest way to pinpoint where that sympathy lies to make sure you don’t end up with the Mwahaha! I’m going to ruin the hero for fun! kind of antagonist, which is pretty boring. 

Three. When you know your protagonist’s and antagonist’s Enneagram types, you’ll have a much easier time locating the theme of your story. Where do their core motivations look similar? Where do they clash? What words start to surface from that clash of views? 

For instance, imagine if your protagonist is a type 2, the Helper. This would be a character like Samwise Gamgee. Their core desire is to be helpful or needed. They believe that being helpful is the path to being worthy of love. Now, maybe your antagonist is a type 8, the Challenger. Their core fear is to give up control or let someone else have power over them. 

So, we have one character who needs to help people to feel worthy, and another character who needs to feel in charge of themself to feel worthy. These two opposing forces might share the desire to champion others, but the Helper will be doing it for a very different motivation than the Challenger. 

And now imagine this scenario: the Helper offers unsolicited aid or a gift to the Challenger. Those hackles are going to go up for your antagonist, right? Why is this person giving me something I didn’t ask for? I don’t need help. If I accept this, I’ll owe reciprocation, and owing means being indebted, and being indebted to someone is a way of them having power over you.

That’s just one possible point of conflict between a Helper protagonist and a Challenger antagonist. That could even be the inciting incident. The Helper mows the overgrown lawn of her Challenger neighbor, and that sets off the Challenger, who is triggered by the feeling of being indebted to anyone. 

As far as theme goes, what words are starting to emerge from this conflict between the 2 and 8? I see “dependence,” and “power” right off the bat. I could easily pluck out one of those and use it as the central one-word theme of the book, the concept I return back to whenever I need to decide what happens next.

Those three uses of the Enneagram in fiction might seem simple, but they kind of encompass the entire story, don’t they? If you only know three things about your book going into writing it, the core motivations of your two driving forces plus the theme are the things you need to know. 

If you want to go a little deeper into theme, I have a free mini-lesson on it available through the link in the description. I invite you to check that out. 

And if there’s a topic on storytelling you’d like me to cover, drop me the suggestion in the comments!

Happy writing. 

Fix Your Story’s Ending with These Three Questions

Description:

Feel like your book’s climax is missing something? Let’s troubleshoot with these three questions to ask to take your story’s ending from wimpy to WOW.

Feel like your book's climax is missing something? Let's troubleshoot with these three questions to ask to take your story's ending from wimpy to WOW. Link: ...

Link:

Five-Star Power Endings Masterclass: https://www.ffs.media/fivestar-endings

Script:

Ever been reading a book and the ONLY indication you have that you’re nearing the end is that you’re running out of pages?

Ever looked back over your story and felt like the climax was just missing something?

Nobody hates a weak ending more than... my husband. Because then he has to hear about it from me for the next 24 hours.

Today, we’re going to learn how to troubleshoot the ending of our book for those times when it just feels like it’s missing that oomph.

Before we get started, be sure to hit subscribe and that little bell if you want updates when new videos from me go live.

To start off, there are three levels of conflict that need to come to a head for your protagonist in your climax and be resolved in your resolution.

The first level is the physical or external conflict. This consists of actions and physical objects involved. Your protagonist has some sort of physical goal, that is they need to do something, to take some action, to achieve that goal.

The second level down in the emotional conflict. Emotions drive action. Your protagonist should feel emotionally conflicted going into the climax. Maybe their emotions are telling them to take two different actions, and they need to decide which emotion to listen to and which to ignore.

The third level, and the deepest one, is the philosophical conflict. This is all about your protagonist’s values and beliefs about the world. The things we value and our beliefs about what is and is not true and how the world should and shouldn’t work are what inform our emotions. We see this in how people with vastly different beliefs can experience different emotions about the exact same event. But our beliefs can change over time—they can be challenged and strengthened or replaced as a result. Heading into your climax, your protagonist will feel conflicted about one of their beliefs or values.

And then, in the most powerful stories, we have a domino effect of these three levels of conflict. First, your protagonist makes a decision about their beliefs and values, that philosophical conflict. Essentially, they’re passing a verdict on it.

That verdict on the philosophical conflict is going to make them feel one way or another. That’s the emotional conflict. Those feelings don't have to be positive. But your protagonist does have to acknowledge that they are feeling that way and decide whether or not to take the action that aligns with that philosophical verdict or not. If they can acknowledge their emotional conflict and choose wise action, then that resolves the physical conflict. Boom, boom, boom, one domino after the other. The closer you can squeeze the protagonist’s decisions for each of those three levels of conflict, the more satisfying and epic your ending will be.

So, if your action is falling flat, look at the physical conflict first. Ask: Do I have enough physical barriers to my protagonist getting what they want and need?

If no, then add that in there.

But don’t stop with that question. Ask: Is the action required by my protagonist causing them enough emotional turmoil? An easy way to up the stakes here is to make the “right” decision be the “hard” one to make for whatever reason. Maybe your protagonist has to swallow their pride or risk making a fool of themself or possibly be remembered in an unflattering fashion. Depending on your protagonist, any of these possibilities would leave them feeling conflicted about the action they have to take.

Then, don’t forget to ask: does the action my protagonist take embody a clear verdict on the belief or value that has been hardest challenged by the events of the story? The decision in the climax needs to be one your protagonist could not have made any earlier in the story because their beliefs or values wouldn’t have fully supported it.

And that’s it. Those are the three questions to ask yourself if your ending feels flat:

1. Do I have enough physical barriers keeping my protagonist from getting what they want and need?

2. Is the action required to overcome those physical barriers causing my protagonist enough emotional turmoil?

3. Does the action my protagonist must take to get what they want and need embody a clear verdict on their belief or value that has been the hardest hit by the events of the story?

If you can’t answer yes to all of those, then keep working on that ending. You may need to go back and develop some of those conflicts earlier in the story, but it’s time well spent. A book with a weak ending will likely be the last book of yours a reader buys. A book with a five-star ending is the very best marketing for your next book that you can do.

If you want to go way deeper on how to construct a five-star power ending for your book or series, I do offer a masterclass on it once a quarter. I'll drop a link to it in the description for you.

That’s it for today. I hope your belief about endings has changed so that you feel more confident and will take the necessary action of tweaking your work in progress to give it a glow-up.

Happy writing.

Indie Author Strategy - Type One, The Reformer

Description:

Are you an Enneagram Type One, the Reformer? Are you also a writer hoping to sell some books? Let’s build a purpose-driven career that’s the right fit for you. It starts with knowing what you care about in your fiction, why you chose the indie path, and why you feel compelled to write stories in the first place. Then you can build a meaningful career goal, and from that, we create your Indie Author Strategy for Type One, the Reformer.

Enough wasting energy on the wrong things. Time to align!

Don’t forget to hit Subscribe for more author life videos from Claire.

Are you an Enneagram Type One, the Reformer? Are you also a writer hoping to sell some books? Let's build a purpose-driven career that's the right fit for yo...

Links:

Indie Author Alignment: 5-Day Foundation course: www.ffs.media/foundation.

Discover your type: www.enneagraminstitute.com

Script:

Hi and welcome to the first video of this series on building your indie author strategy with regard to your enneagram type.

I’m Claire Taylor with FFS Media, and I've been an indie author and working with indie authors on their stories full-time since 2015.

Here’s the thing about our business: there are a lot of things you could be doing to write and sell books. And most indies I know do a lot of those things... but without much rhyme or reason.

And it makes sense! Most of us didn’t come from a business or marketing background, so it can be overwhelming. And there are a lot of “experts” trying to tell us you have to learn Facebook Ads or Instagram, or whatever if you want to make it, so be sure to buy their course! Those are all just tactics, though, and you may not need them.

Most indies are just scrapping together a career, building it from scratch, and making it up as we go, and you know what? Y'all are doing a great job. But wouldn’t it be nicer if you had some sort of roadmap so you could waste as little energy as possible? That’s what I’m gonna talk about today.

Before we jump in, be sure to hit Subscribe if you want more videos from me in the future. I know it’s easy to forget to do, so just a friendly reminder.

Okay, real talk: Indies are burning out like crazy lately by living in a reactive state rather than a proactive one, reacting instead of thoughtfully responding, and if you don’t have a strong filter for what new tricks and tactics would genuinely benefit you and which ones you don’t need to mess with at all, you’re going to run out of steam, and you might even forget to write your books.

That’s where a strategy comes in. Your strategy is your filter, and your enneagram type, which addresses your core fears and core desires, what you want and what you want to avoid, is a fantastic foundation upon which to build your strategy. Make your strategy work for who you are.

So, if you are an Enneagram Type One, the Reformer, this video is for you. If you don’t know your type, I have a link to the Enneagram Institute’s website where you can read more about the types and even take a test, if you so choose.

Let’s talk about what motivates an Enneagram Type One and how to build a comprehensive and compatible author strategy around it.

I, myself, am a Type One, so I know a thing or two from personal experience about what will and won’t work for our type.

The core motivations of the Reformer are all about goodness and conducting yourself in a way that’s beyond moral reproach. If you’re a One, your top priority will be to hold yourself to high standards of integrity, and the one thing you absolutely want to avoid is being perceived as corrupt or making a move that compromises your integrity or opens you up to criticism that you believe is legit. That “you believe” is important, because that’s all that matters to a One.

When you make decisions for your business, you must incorporate your values into the process. That goes for all types. But in my experience, Ones tend to be the clearest about what their values are.

Let’s talk about some things a Reformer might care about within their indie author career:

• Producing high-quality work

• Telling stories that can inspire change and show how to make the world better

• Being perceived as honest and moral by both readers and fellow authors

• Not sacrificing your integrity to make a buck - EVER

For a One, looking at this list might feel like, “Yeah, duh. Of course I care about those things. Doesn’t everyone?”

Not at all.

Now, why on Earth would a Type One want to travel the indie path to begin with? It’s important to know our reason for this before we can build a strategy. Here are some reasons I’ve heard from Ones.

• “I was born to write, and I have to live out my purpose.”

• “I have a message for the world I need to get out there.”

• “My words can create change.”

• “I know exactly the kinds of stories I want to tell, and I don’t want someone pressuring me to make changes I don’t agree with.”

There will be other reasons, but since most indies I know have more than one reason why they’re in the business, I’m sure at least one of these will resonate with you if you’re a Reformer.

Next, think about what you want to accomplish with your books. What’s your purpose for telling stories?

Maybe your purpose is to make the world a better place with your writing. Because Ones care about goodness and integrity, the lack of it in the world can drive us a batty, and we’re desperate to inspire others toward the same standards we hold ourselves to.

Maybe your purpose is to help people heal from shame, victimization, or guilt when they read your stories. Okay, Ones, consider yourself seen. When we make a mistake, we know it immediately, and no one beats us up for it more than we do, right? Our inner critics are unrivaled in their ability to paralyze us completely. But as we grow and learn to free ourselves from that sense that there’s something corrupted deep inside us, we may want to take some more people with us on this healing journey. I see that a lot in the writing of Reformers. They want their readers to learn that they, too, are already perfect in their imperfection. When we free ourselves, we want to turn around and free others. Writers are liberators.

Another evolved purpose for a Reformer would be to show people the gray areas of life. Type Ones are notorious for being black-and-white thinkers, but that’s only in the unhealthy and average levels of the type. Once we move a little higher in our self-awareness, we actually enjoy playing in the gray, especially in fiction, because it’s a safe place for us to do it.

Okay, once you know what you care about or value in your writing, why you chose to go indie, and your purpose for telling stories, we can start talking goals. Because you need to know what you’re going after before you can build a strategy for it.

Let’s say you got into this business because you wanted to tell stories that make people laugh and accept their imperfections rather than feeling ashamed of them.

And the things you care about are publishing well-edited books, writing imperfect characters that inspire, making people laugh, and not compromising your integrity for money, no matter how much is up for grabs.

Before I move on, let me not mince words: if you don’t know these things about yourself, you’re going to set a stupid and irrelevant goal. You’re going to set a goal disconnected from reality and probably based on a goal you saw someone of a different type set for themself. So you have to take some time to write out what you care about and why you write, and THEN you set goals that relate to money in any way, shape, or form.

Now, let’s talk about what a goal for those criteria might look like:

I want to earn enough money to continue my pursuit of finding my specific tribe of women and inspiring them to feel less ashamed about things they have no business feeling ashamed about.

So, yes, this goal does mention money. But only in the context of how it can serve the purpose I’ve set out to accomplish. Because it might be that if you’re going to have the energy you need to reach this goal, you need to make writing your full-time job, and you can’t do that if you can’t pay the bills with the money it brings in.

Ones can usually be pretty level-headed about money, but the trap we fall into is equating earnings with moral superiority. That is, if we make six-figures, we are somehow more perfect and worthy than someone doing the same and living below the poverty level. Yikes. Don’t do that. You don’t want to be that megachurch preacher with a private jet who claims it as proof that Jesus loves him best. That’s a very unhealthy version of a Type One. If you catch yourself thinking you have moral superiority because you make more money than someone else, knock that off right away. That’s the trap for the One, so avoid it at all costs. Maybe go have a healthy meal or get a good night’s sleep. Whatever it takes to avoid that nonsense.

Now that you know your purpose-driven goal that aligns with your Enneagram type, we can talk strategy! Yay!

Here’s an example that is in no way my exact one that I live and die by:

I will position myself as an example of a shameless female who is imperfect, rough around the edges, and still good at heart. I will build my brand around that, and direct the audience through my books, videos, blogs, and paid advertising back to me as a central figure of the brand. I will build a track-record of quality stories with my audience so when I have a new book out, they will one-click buy it, I can keep paying bills, and they get to enjoy more of the healing messages I’m pushing into the world.

That is a unique vision, no doubt. It’s broad, doesn’t include specific tactics, and has a real vibe. Yours will be something different. And this kind of strategy is not one you would stumble on without doing the legwork to discover and build it out first.

So, if you want to construct your strategy for your Enneagram type, be sure to start small, with the things you care about (integrity, goodness, right/wrong) and don’t let the big, flashy marketing gurus (who are almost all Threes, by the way) throw you off your course. Yes, making a ton of money is nice, but for Ones, that won’t be enough. Not even close. Accept it, embrace it, and strategize for it.

And if you want more specific steps for building out your Indie Author Strategy, I do have a totally free 5-day course you can sign up for to start asking and workshopping your fiction strategy from the top down. Hundreds of authors have taken it and set out on a path of a truly fulfilling career. You can find the link to it in the description.

Something I encourage indies to do is try to find other authors who are your same Enneagram type, and talk strategy with them. They share the same core motivations with you, so you’ll finally feel like someone is talking your language. If you know another Reformer, why not share this video with them to get the conversation started?

Okay, Reformers, that’s it for now. Keep on being the industry’s conscience, and we’ll chat more soon.

Supercharge Character Dialogue with Enneagram Talk Styles

Description:

Learn a quick way to bring your characters’ dialogue to life and give it authenticity by using their Enneagram talk styles! In this video, Claire Taylor of FFS Media explains each of the nine Enneagram Types’ talk styles and provides an example of how that style would show through while initiating a break-up. 

Don’t forget to hit Subscribe for more story tip videos from Claire.

Want to go deeper into using the Enneagram to build your ideal author career? Check out the totally free Indie Author Alignment: 5-Day Foundation course: www.ffs.media/foundation.

Learn a quick way to bring your characters' dialogue to life and give it authenticity by using their Enneagram talk styles! In this video, Claire Taylor of F...

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Script:

Hey there. It's Claire Taylor with FFS Media, and for today's video I wanted to dive into how character Enneagram types might affect how you write their dialogue.

Each type has its own unique way of communicating verbally. These are often called “talk styles.” So I want to run through what each type of talk style looks and sounds like, and give you an example of how that type of character might initiate a breakup. That way, you can kind of see each type in action. 

Now, obviously breakups are going to go different ways depending on the many variables of a relationship, so take these examples with a grain of salt. Also if you have a very socially perceptive and empathetic character doing the breaking up, they may subconsciously adjust their talk style to match that of the person they are breaking up with, and that is more or less likely depending on the type we're dealing with.

Let's jump into it. 

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Type One: The Reformer

Talk Style: Preaching

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The talk style of the Enneagram type 1, the Reformer, is that of preaching or sermonizing. I know that doesn't sound too flattering, and of course, as with every type, as the level of health increases the harsh qualities of that type will tend to lessen and become much more tolerable to everyone else. 

When Enneagram Ones speak, they are precise, direct, and honest. You also hear a whole lot of “shoulds” in there. It's not necessarily that the Reformer always thinks they have everything figured out and that they are the final judge of what is right and wrong, this is just their speech pattern.

So, if a One was going to initiate a breakup, it might sound like this: “I don't think two people should be together if it's not going to work long-term. I don't see this lasting, so the right thing to do is for us to break up.” Direct, honest, and with some sort of concrete worldview mixed in. And did you hear the word “should”? It was definitely in there, too.

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Type Two: The Helper

Talk Style: Advising

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The talk style of the Enneagram type 2, the Helper, is advising or supporting. Twos are very other-focused, but they also have this belief that they shouldn’t need help… but they would really love it if others anticipated when they needed it and just did it without needing to be asked. They tend to give the kind of help they wish they had. And sometimes their misguided desire to help can override their common sense when it comes to knowing when someone just wants to vent and when someone actually needs help. So while they are very friendly and their speech and placate others, they can sometimes be a little pushy with offering help and advice, to the point where the person you're talking to might just want them to stop offering advice for three seconds and listen to the emotions.

A Two is going to have a hard time initiating a breakup. They need to be needed, and pushing people away is just not in their nature for that reason. So, if one of your characters is a Helper and they're initiating a break up, it might not even be entirely clear that that is what’s going on. 

It's going to be very other-focused, and their desire to be needed is going to be fighting back against their desire to be separate. So it might sound something like this: “You are so amazing and you deserve all the happiness in the world. But I just feel like I can't give you enough, so maybe you should see other people.” If someone said that to you, would you even be sure that they were breaking up with you? You would probably have to ask. That could just as well be an invitation for you to have an open relationship as it is a breakup. Ending relationships is just not a natural strength of Twos, and it could make for a good bit of comedy in your story to see this character incompetently attempt to break up with a partner who is very confused about what is happening.

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Type Three: The Achiever

Talk Style: Persuading

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The talk style of the Enneagram type 3, the Achiever, is persuading or selling. They're always trying to convince someone of something. Oftentimes, what they're trying to sell is themself. Persuasion comes naturally to these types, and they often find themselves in careers that benefit from their ability to sell things to people. 

When a Three is speaking, they speak confidently and directly and their words tend to be focused on the topic at hand. They know exactly why they are talking, what they're trying to accomplish. They don't have time to not accomplish things; after all, they are the Achievers.

So, if your character who is a Three is going to break up with their partner, it might sound something like this: “I don't see this relationship going anywhere, and I don't think we should waste each other's time anymore. I think we should break up so that we don't spend our best years on a relationship that's failing.” If they don't see a relationship “going somewhere,” (after all, existence is a verb to Threes) or positioning them closer to their goals, it's got to go. Also, anything that smells even faintly of failure has got to go for an Achiever.

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Type Four: The Individualist

Talk Style: Lamenting

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The talk style of the Enneagram type 4, the Individualist, is lamenting or expressing. Since the Four likes to live in the darker moments of humanity and feels comfortable there, you're going to hear a lot of lamenting language and occasionally some melodramatic and flowery metaphors. It's going to be very emotional based. They may not appear to be outwardly emotional, but their language will show the depth of their emotion. Fours’ talk style also tends to be intense and self-focused. Fours can be a little too attached to their emotions, which keeps them self-focused like that. But they're also highly creative, so their dramatic metaphors and imagery will be reflective of that imagination. 

So, if your Four character is going to initiate a breakup, it might sound a little something like this: “I just don't know that you're ready to plumb the depths of reality with me. I'm starting to find this relationship really stifling, and I don't know that we’re the twin flames that I thought we were. I need to be on my own to really explore my true nature without feeling like I have to be someone else for you.” Very melodramatic, lots of visual elements, but ultimately all about the speaker and their emotional needs.

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Type Five: The Investigator

Talk Style: Lecturing

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The talk style of the Enneagram type 5, the Investigator, is lecturing or presentational. Fives know a lot about their areas of expertise and they want you to know about it, too. But more importantly, they just really want to talk about it to better process the information. They like talking about facts. The talk style tends to be highly analytical, lacking small talk entirely and with a certain detachment from the topic they're speaking about. If you want to talk about emotions with a five, prepare to talk about it in terms of psychology, not metaphors. 

Frankly, the most likely way that a Five would break up with someone is just to ghost them or cut them off so much emotionally that one day the partner wakes up and goes, “Oh, I guess I’ll just show myself out.” They might even realize that the Investigator partner has, in their own mind, left a relationship a long time ago. But, if your Five character we're going to initiate a breakup, it could very well be over a short text, or something factual like this: “I'm moving to Boston to get my masters, and I would prefer you didn’t come with me. I will need time to myself without distractions. I wish you the best of luck.”

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Type Six: The Loyalist

Talk Style: Cautioning

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The talk style of the Enneagram type 6, the Loyalist, is cautionary or contrary. They are always looking for what could go wrong. So you're going to hear a lot of questioning of other people's plans, and they may sound a little bit pessimistic. Their reason for speaking is often to test the other person, or the other person's plans or motivations. For very obvious reasons, this can get annoying after a little bit. It's important to note a specific difference between the One and the Six when it comes to pointing out flaws: Sixes are in the future triad, so their eye for flaws is future-focused on what could go wrong, whereas Ones are in the present triad, so they are focused on what is wrong. 

So, a Loyalist character would initiate a break up something like this: “I think you're really great, and this is not a reflection on you, but I'm just worried that this relationship is going to end badly if we keep trying to make it work like we are, even though we know that it's not good for both of us. We might as well end it now rather than wait it out and have things go down even worse later.”  The Six will be cautious of the other person, especially if they don't know how the partner is going to react. They're going to assume the other person will react as badly as possible, which is why they would start off with a reassurance to try to cushion the blow and deactivate the bomb before it starts ticking. And then they would focus on the future and how things would be worse later, so they might as well end it now to save themselves risk. “Bad but not as bad” tends to be as much as a Six dares hope for.

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Type Seven: The Enthusiast

Talk Style: Hyping

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The talk style of the type 7, the Enthusiast, is that storytelling or hyping. They tend to gush about things, focusing on the positive qualities. Everything is the best. Everything that they love, you have to try. Even a trip to the store can be fodder for an off-the-wall tale by a Seven. Enthusiasts like to feel good, and they like to make other people feel good, while also being the center of attention. What better way to do that than to tell hilarious stories about their life? 

Of course, when it comes to the uncomfortable moments, Sevens do not necessarily excel. Like the Five, the Seven  might just ghost instead of initiating a break-up. Or they might go to great lengths to create a no-one’s-fault reason to break up. It wouldn't be too outrageous to have your Seven character move their entire life to another country as an excuse to end a relationship. Unlike the Five who might move across the country to pursue an interest and forget they ever had a relationship, the Seven would plan a cross-country move for the sole purpose of having an excuse to leave their partner. It doesn’t hurt that it would also be a great adventure, so that is a huge perk for an Enthusiast.

Because your Seven character is the king or queen of freedom and avoiding unnecessary responsibility, the mention of that will probably be somewhere within the break-up scenario. You could write something like this: “I feel like we have so much to experience in this world and we should go do that on our own rather than holding each other back. Maybe someday we'll get back together once we go and live our lives to the fullest, but right now, I feel like I need to focus on me and I don't want to hold you back while you focus on you.”

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Type Eight: The Challenger

Talk Style: Commanding

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The talk style of the Enneagram type 8, the Challenger, is commanding and authoritative. They are often viewed as confrontational or overly assertive. Their talk style is just to say how things are and who should be doing what. 

Another feature of the Eight’s talk style is that they tend to talk loudly. They have something to say, they know it, and they don't care who hears. They’re the one at the restaurant who says inappropriate or inflammatory things so loudly that they get looks from the next table over. When they speak, there is a finality to it. The interesting thing about the Challenger’s talk style is that it's so commanding that it almost invites challenge. It's almost like they're daring anyone to call BS. And if you do, you’re just as likely to earn their respect as you are to earn a loud tongue lashing.

If your Eight character is going to initiate a breakup, it's going to have that same finality to it. Challengers don't want their partner to try to convince them not to break up. They've made up their mind. This is how it’s going to be. And by the nature of the Eight, there will not be a lot of room for the partner’s vulnerability in there. Your Eight character might initiate a breakup like this: “I don't want to be in this relationship anymore. We're over.” No mention of “I think” or “I feel” or “maybe.” Just that they don't want it, so it's done. And as far as setting goes for this conversation, it could kind of be anywhere. Public, private, wedding, funeral. Whatever it is, it won’t be done in a whisper.

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Type Nine: The Peacemaker

Talk Style: Meandering

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The talk style of the Enneagram type 9, the Peacemaker, is the epic saga or meandering. Nines like to take their time. They are not urgent people, on the whole, and they like to see the big picture. They're talented at seeing all of the elements.This is how they become the social mastermind of the groups they’re in. 

If people hate confrontation as much as a Nine does, they learn how to read between the lines. Peacemakers get very good at picking up on details, and when they talk, it can be mostly details. I’m married to a Nine, and as a One, our talk styles frequently clash when it comes to matters of precision. I love his stories, but I have an extreme sense of urgency like a ticking clock inside me, and it requires a lot of restraint for me not to interrupt him on one of his tangents to say “Can we get back to what you were talking about before?” Or “What's your point?” 

The talk style of the Nine is other-focused because their attention is other-focused. They can also be indecisive in their speech, arguing both sides. That's because they never don't see all sides of every argument, and they have a hard time deciding which side they are on. Because taking a side inevitably leads to confrontation.

If you are writing a Nine character initiating a breakup, first of all, good luck. Peacemakers would rather self-erase than create a confrontation, it takes a LOT before they would be willing to confront the person they’re closest to and push them away. A lot of negative feelings have to build up first, and the cost of that is that Nines can be very passive-aggressive. And in the heat of a breakup, it's likely that passive aggression will come out. 

So a type 9 character might initiate a break up like this: They would make themselves very useless. A nine would have to either be in a very healthy level or be able to lean in hard to their Eight or One wing to get the job done. 

But so that I don't leave you high and dry on the dialogue for this type, let's come up with a different scenario for the type 9. How about a Peacemaker offering feedback. Let’s say your character has just read another character’s manuscript and they HATED it. Now it's time for the Nine to tell their friend what they thought about the book. It might go like this: “I am just so impressed that you have the discipline to sit and write an entire book from start to finish. I could hear so much of you in those pages, and it was really nice to spend that much time in your world.” So, not the most constructive feedback, but entirely non-confrontational. 

Okay that's it. I hope you started to think about how to integrate your characters’ talk styles into your fiction. It really gives it veracity. If you want more writing tips be sure to subscribe by hitting the Subscribe button below this video. And I always like to hear what you have to say, so let me know how one of your characters would or already has initiated a breakup in your books, what Enneagram type they are, and if it matched up with the talk style descriptions I've given you. 

Even if you hadn't considered talk styles in your writing before, these are all pretty intuitive, and I see authors get it right more often than get it wrong. And when they do get it wrong, it tends to be that they're overlaying their own type’s talk style onto their characters. Always something you want to keep an eye on. 

Talk styles are one of the easiest ways to make your characters sound different in dialogue and help set them apart and your reader's mind. You don't even have to overdo it, but even if you do, you will still sound pretty natural.

That's all for now. Happy writing. 

AMA Replay - 9/10/2020

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