Enneagram Type Three

The Value Seeker

We call 3s The Value Seeker because their primary motivation is to feel valuable, outstanding, and worthy of admiration.

When 3s are connected to Essential Value, they are blown away by the magnificence of all things, including themselves. It is as if their hearts know and celebrate the innate glory of all things and all people. In this grounded place, Healthy 3s are confident,  charming, admiring, adaptable, gracious, and authentic. 

Healthy 3s live comfortably in the paradox of self-acceptance and self-development. They work hard to be the best they can be, and they delight in challenging themselves to manifest their potential. To Healthy 3s, life is a playground where they get to develop the full range of their competencies, and it is a joy to become excellent at what they love to do. However, even as they develop themselves with ardor and dedication, Healthy 3s also fully accept themselves “warts and all.” They are honest about their talents and limitations, and they present themselves congruently with their personhood. 

That Healthy 3s are both authentic and adaptable deserves some exploration. As we will see, in order to succeed in any situation, Fixated 3s may “forget” themselves, act deceptively, or do whatever it takes to win. But Healthy 3s work hard and adapt intelligently to situations without abandoning who they are. This may seem like splitting hairs, but not so — the former is a frantic bid for validation, while the latter is an attuned calibration to one’s environment based in a know-your-audience sensibility. For instance, a Fixated 3 at a job interview might reference a book he hasn’t read it if he thinks it will impress his interviewer. By contrast, a Healthy 3 would not engage in such conversational sleight of hand, but would still comport himself in a way that the other person is likely to receive well.

Because Healthy 3s value themselves, they do what they love whether or not it will earn them praise, and they shine with a radiant charm that inspires others without conscious effort. By example, they inspire others not just to develop their skills, but to live in greater congruence with their hearts. Valuing themselves also makes it possible for Healthy 3s to delight in seeing others succeed. They admire others genuinely and without competitiveness, and they naturally inspire others to see their inherent worth and live up to their potential. 

When 3s lose touch with Essential Value, it can feel to them as if there is no such thing as inherent worth. Everyone's worth must be proven, measured, and evaluated by comparison to others. This distorted outlook applies most of all to themselves, and Fixated 3s begin to feel that it is not enough simply to be who they are. They must be, and be perceived as, outstanding or else be doomed to the oblivion of worthless mediocrity.

Because Fixated 3s feel that their worth depends on their success, they become ambitious, compulsive self-developers determined to “be somebody.” Fixated 3s notice what is valued in their environments, and based on this, they form a notion of success and set themselves single-mindedly towards achieving it. Accolades, prestige, and symbols of status loom large in their inner worlds, and constant striving becomes a way of life. Something is only worth doing if it helps them get “further ahead,” and values like efficiency and high performance rule their worlds.

Because Fixated 3s evaluate themselves relative to others, they are highly competitive. But because they are image conscious, some 3s conceal their competitiveness lest others think of them as obnoxious or try-hard. Either way, all Fixated 3s want to be perceived as extraordinary, so they will usually flaunt their successes or present themselves favorably, and they may sometimes “adjust” the truth or curate their self-presentation to paint themselves in a better light. 

The more scared 3s are of their own worthlessness, the more they turn into presentational workaholics who strive relentlessly to be, and be perceived as, successful, admirable, and worthwhile. On the outside, others may perceive Fixated 3s as confident, driven, competent, and perhaps strangely glossy or perfect, since they are in fact attempting to be perceived that way. But on the inside, Fixated 3s often feel empty, sensitive, and fearful of judgment. Although they would not readily admit it, they do not want others to see through their polished demeanor, impressive resume, and honed skills to the scared, imperfect person they “really are.”  

What 3s really want is to know that they are valuable. The trouble for Fixated 3s is that they try to prove their worth by achieving a notion of success that is not their own and will not ultimately fulfill them. Their constant striving to prove themselves is a symptom of their underlying lack of self-love, not a viable solution to it. Instead of working to become more valuable, 3s must instead learn how to love themselves as they are right now.

As 3s deepen through inner work, they can cultivate enough stillness to recontact Essential Value, which grounds them in the truth that they (and others) are already valuable as they are. From this place, 3s drop the need to prove their value by becoming more successful, and instead delight in developing their skills because they love themselves. They also recover their virtue of Authenticity. Healthy 3s are exactly as they seem because they do not need to be, or to be perceived as, “better” than who they really are. From this place, 3s truly shine and become the admirable people they have always strived to be.