Enneagram Type Two

The Love Seeker

We call 2s The Love Seeker because their primary motivation is to seek the warmth and affirmation of loving and caring connection, and to be a source of love for others.

When 2s are connected to Essential Love, they experience the idea that “all is love'' as a living truth. It is as if all things and all people, including themselves, are inseparable from a relational warmth that permeates everything. In this grounded place, Healthy 2s are people-oriented, affectionate, warm, thoughtful, well-boundaried, and humble. 

For 2s, connection with others is what makes life worth living, and of all the Enneagram types, Healthy 2s most clearly embody “unconditional” love. They are gifted nurturers and caretakers, and they enjoy expressing their fondness for others directly. Healthy 2s do not express affection as a means to an end or because someone has “earned” it, but rather for its own sake, simply because it is a joy to do so. Because of this, Healthy 2s are powerful connectors whose radiant heart-forwardness can melt even the toughest exteriors. 

Healthy 2s love supporting others and are highly emotionally attuned, but they are also well-boundaried. Because they appreciate themselves, Healthy 2s attend to their own needs without guilt. They get that self-care is an essential part of life, and they do not overextend themselves to be in others’ lives. Indeed, Healthy 2s are excellent at discerning when it is appropriate to help others and when it is best to give them space to figure things out on their own. Ironically, because Healthy 2s do not grasp for love, the love they receive from others actually reaches them. They delight in the interpersonal sweetness of life. 

When 2s lose touch with Essential Love, it can feel to them as if love itself is drying up, that interpersonal connection is endangered and must be nurtured, lest it fade away altogether. Like Fixated 1s who fear that without them, the world would descend into chaos and evil, Fixated 2s worry that without them, no one would experience the warmth of love and connection — especially themselves.  

Fixated 2s want to feel caring connection with others, but they fear that no one will love them for who they truly are. So they attempt to enhance their lovability by being giving and “selfless.” The unconscious thinking goes, “People won’t want me around unless I’m useful to them.” In this state, Fixated 2s think about how they can help others and take action to do so, yet they begin to expect that others be grateful to them for everything they do—although this is something they may not publicly admit, since they strive to be, and to be seen as, selfless, and such an expectation could come across as selfish. 

Despite striving tirelessly to meet the needs of others, Fixated 2s are insecure that others wouldn’t want them around if they had needs of their own. So, in the name of selflessness, they suppress their own needs. But of course, all humans need love, support, and appreciation, and they attempt to fulfill these needs indirectly. For instance, they may hover and pry into others’ personal lives to amplify closeness. Or, they may flatter, serve, give gifts, or send thoughtful notes to others in the hopes that the recipient will appreciate their attention and affirm their connectedness. Unfortunately for 2s, this may have the opposite effect, since others may detect the 2's attempt to create relational debt and be repelled by 2s’ intrusiveness, neediness, and insincerity.

Prideful thoughts such as, “I do so much for her” and “He would be totally lost without me” buoy Fixated 2s’ self-image and keep them from the depths of love-starved despair. But Fixated 2s can be very sensitive and feel rejected easily. The more attached 2s get to being needed by others, the more sensitive they become to rejection, and the more willfully blind they become to whether people actually need their help as well as resentful towards those who do not appreciate them for all they do.

What 2s really want is to experience the warmth and sweetness of love and connection. While their genuine desire to help others is a gift, the trouble is that by helping others compulsively, 2s abandon themselves, create relational inequalities, and perpetuate the fear of their "true self's" unlovability. Moreover, they deny others the chance of connecting to them by hiding and suppressing the very needs that others could help fulfill. 

As 2s deepen through inner work, they can cultivate enough stillness to recontact Essential Love, which grounds them in the awareness that is not possible to be disconnected from others and that love is always flowing, even when it appears lost. From this place, Healthy 2s drop the need to justify their lovability by being angelically selfless, and they recover their virtue of Humility. This allows them to acknowledge their own needs, to see that others will be fine without them, and to be truly touched by others' love. From this place, they can fully experience the warmth of true connection that have always wanted.