yearning to be an individualist or an investigator, born (or made) a challenger

Stay until the end if you want a Project Headless update. Not to blackmail anyone.

I took my first Enneagram tests when I was 14: I had a therapist who found them useful and a teacher who liked to have us take layperson's versions for fun. Both times, I tested as an Eight, and both times, I wanted to be a Four or a Five.

Archetypically, Eights are called "the challenger," with their subtypes usually being termed "the maverick" or "the bear." Think a cowboy. An assassin. (Or a dictator, sadly.)

Fours are collectively "individualists," and Fives are generally known as "investigators." For the prior, think of the amazing outsider-artist. The latter, Sherlock Holmes. (However, and here's my harmless hot take for the day, I believe Holmes is an Eight with some Four tendencies.)

To be brutally honest, I was tired of being resilient by the time I was 14. (Nor was I good at being told what to do, though.)

Never fear, if you don't know much about the Enneagram, you probably weren't on Tumblr in the 2010s or under the dubious care of a Christian therapist at some point in your life. At risk of being too simplistic, but in service of making my point, Eights are often described as outsiders. They don't like to be controlled and they seek autonomy. They're afraid of betrayal, etc. As a consequence, they may place themselves at the edges of things, especially if under stress.

Friends, that's where I am (the edges) and I don't mind it. I keep talking to my spouse about some deep existential matters at the end of each day, and we're both remarkably thankful that we haven't chosen the usual paths. We do want more money and say in our days, and in the past, we've fallen into the trap of thinking, If only we'd done normal things with our lives. But we also know we're not wired for normalcy, so if nothing else, this present chapter of caregiving has brought our priorities and needs into useful focus.

I'm not struggling with knowing myself, rather... I don't know how to find my flow state in this new paradigm. I don't have issues with ideas or thinking concepts through to completion, but I'm vigilant at almost all times, which makes it difficult for me to create.

It's weirdly made me feel like an outsider as an author because I don't know what to talk or post about, even though there is a lot to talk about, and my problem isn't feeling insignificant or unworthy. I don't fall into the comparison trap very often... I think my postgrad years sort of beat it out of me.

Actually, I'm struggling with the concept of rest and reserving my energy for creation instead of promotion. There just isn't enough in me to do both, and I would rather be creating; if that goes, what even is there to promote? Even keeping this in mind, Project Headless is going well, although it may not be finished with an actual ePub/eBook form in time for the proper Halloween season! I may publish versions of it here (yes, blog posts and websites are protected under copyright law in most of the world, although concepts are not), but haven't considered that thoroughly enough yet. Let me know your thoughts?

Here's a treat if you've made it this far: Project Headless' title is More Merciful Monsters x