Working with Type Three in Therapy

Enneagram Type Three, also known as “The Achiever” or “The Performer” struggles with an overidentification with success, performance, and external validation as well as ambivalence about showing Best Self vs. True Self. While they can be adaptive, efficient, self-confident, admirable, and ambitious, they can begin to believe that they are failures and have no real identity in a state of unhealth.

Their patterns include staying overly focused on tasks and goals, ignoring their feelings, avoiding reflection, fearing failure or incapacitation, taking charge or overriding others, and adopting widely-admired features. How they are perceived by others is what feels most true to them at any given time. This holds them hostage to identifying primarily with their status, performance, or achievements.

The goals of therapy should include helping Threes take time to slow down, diversify their focus beyond work or getting things done, and pay attention to their true desires and feelings. Growth is indicated when Threes realize that love comes because of who they are, not their successful image, what they do, or their accomplishments. 

Core Messaging & Key Characteristics

Lost Childhood Message: “You are loved for yourself.”

Wounding Message: “It’s not okay to have my own identity or feelings.”

Wounding Message Development: To get approval and acceptance, I can give people what they want to see and what will impress them. I can strive easily and make achievement my focus.

Grounding Message: “I am accepted for who I am and not what I do.”

Wants/Needs: A hope-filled world where all things work well but will settle for looking good

Basic Fear: Of being worthless
Basic Desire: To feel valuable and worthwhile
Basic Need: To succeed, avoid failure, and eschew valuelessness

Values: Successful Image, Recognition, Performance, Achievement, Efficiency, Attractiveness

Motivations: To aspire, to be affirmed, to distinguish themselves from others, to have attention, to be admired and recognized, and impress others

At Their Best:  Self-accepting, authentic, inner-directed, truly admirable, inspiring to others

Strengths:  Enthusiastic, encouraging, action-orientated, getting things done, efficient, hard-working, competent, adaptable, energetic, successful, and high-achieving

Challenges: Impatient, inattentive to feelings, competitive, over-worked, rushed, self-promoting, driven, over-extended, and vanity

Mental Habit:  Attention goes to tasks and goals in order to be recognized as successful

Emotional Habit: Distress at not being recognized as successful

Emotional Survival Strategy: I produce, work hard, achieve, and become what others want.

Patterns of Behavior

Patterns listed below are based on average to below average levels of functioning within the Type, which is typical for clients entering therapy. Behaviors may vary from client to client, so it’s appropriate not to assume every client displays all of these behaviors.

• Stay overly-focused on work, career, tasks, projects, and/or goals
• Tend to avoid or repress feelings since they get in the way of getting things done
• Over-emphasize doing over being and acting over feeling
• Resist introspection and quiet reflection that could bring up uncomfortable feelings or truths
• Demonstrate an exaggerated fear of failure or incapacitation
• May take charge by overriding others oftentimes prioritizing results over relationships
• Adopting widely-admired features, qualities, and attributes
• Prioritize status, prestige, recognition, appearance, attractiveness, or being the best
• Drive to accomplish things such that career/performance/job becomes their first priority
• Struggle to slow down, be present, and savor “wins”
• May show unhealthy competitiveness (ex. doing whatever it takes to win)
• Highly competent, effective, and efficient
• Overly focused on keeping up with appearances and maintaining a successful image
• Compare themselves with others as a gauge for enoughness
• May cut corners to achieve their goals since the priority is to get it done
• Play to win; it’s the only reason to play
• Seek recognition and feel frustrated when it’s not forthcoming
• Adapt their identity to others based on what they believe the other wants
• Self-motivated and almost always chasing a desired goal or outcome

• Tend to prioritize career/job/performance/work over their significant relationships
• Typically choose partners who would be a “trophy” and boost their worth or image
• May find it difficult to make sense of or understand their own or others’ emotions
• Resist slowing down and being present with themselves and others, which can prevent genuine connection, compromise trust, and reduce workability in relationships
• Tend to perform for their partners as a way to impress them, rather than connect with them
• Knowingly or unknowingly be someone they are not, which interferes with real relationships
• Forget that healthy relationships require an investment of time, nurturance, and presence
• May turn off potential partners by overly highlighting their status, success, or achievements
• Make it difficult for others to know who they are beyond their image or accomplishments
• Drawn to partners who are either willing to adopt the support role so they can focus on their work or pursue partners who are equally successful and can manage mostly on their own
• Over-work themselves such that close, meaningful relationships become unlikely