Fixation 1 : “Ego-Resentment” / “Over-Perfectionist”

Within the 1 space, there is the domain of sentimentality, the consciousness concerning our sentiments. By sentiment, we mean impressions and feelings – physical sensations, tangible senses and the stimuli that comes from the natural world. Impacts of the material world upon us – all the intrusions, perceived hurts and personal offenses that life sends our way, but also the inclusions, joys, and satisfactions we are invited to receive; those are the sentiments. Temperament here is reactive, it is all about our reactions, how we meet the impact the world delivers. Fixation 1 represents the beginning of our living, what are we feeling in the immediate moment, what are our expectations etc. Here, someone is grounded in their being and reacts viscerally to all sorts of external stimuli. Even a stimulus that causes an emotional response is first felt in the body as a pain, a rush of feeling to the chest or a sudden sensation of heat. These processes are instantaneous, we don’t understand them by logic. Actions situated in our ambient, relationships we have, our ambitions or desires; “stimulation” is what creates our state of mind. One characteristic essence of 1 is “Jealousies”: comparisons. Resentment, frustration and anger is created by making comparisons between ourselves and an ideal of perfect person, comparing reality to what we expected or thought reality was. If we compare ourselves with someone else, and think, “Why that person can do things I can’t? I am prohibited of things that person is not prohibited”, a sentiment of injustice strikes and we feel the urge to make things fair. When a person calls out the mistakes someone else does, makes fun of their errors or has some unreasonable resentment or antipathy towards something (a strange, for example), that person is expressing 1 ’s domain. Things bombards us, therefore we need to be selective about what we attend to. We need to exercise discernment, categorization, rationality. The mechanism at 1 is a reaction to the initial reaction. Suppose someone says something you find hurtful. Rather than express anger, you present a face that is “better”. In reaction to this untruth, you form resentment toward your reaction, toward yourself, or toward anything or anyone that “caused” the reaction. There is hidden intensity and fiery wrath behind our “lies”. And this is probably absurdly unconscious. Our rationality and super-ego is what dictates what we express, not “ourselves”. Impulses and instincts, therefore, can be controlled. Administration and imperfections that needs to be addressed are one essence of the fixation. Nostalgia and attachment to ideals or traditions, criticism and rationalization, beliefs and arrogances, “inertia” plus “dignity”. These are the essences found on Enneatype 1.

Rationalization, when controversial behaviors or feelings are justified and explained in a seemingly rational or logical manner in the absence of a true explanation, and are made consciously tolerable—or even admirable and superior—by plausible means; is one of the multiple core structures that represents the polarity of the domain of sentimentality. This process ranges from fully conscious (e.g. to present an external defense against ridicule from others) to mostly unconscious (e.g. to create a block against internal feelings of guilt or shame). "I didn't get the job that I applied for, but I really didn't want it in the first place.", and the classic “I don’t even care to be honest”, answers we use to avoid sentiments. Isolation, when we recall and think about things without experiencing the emotion associated with them, a process that numbs ourselves and eliminates our “reptilian” behaviours, is another structure. Type 1 paints the world with colors of his dislike or like, and does everything using lens: things are always personal, but never understood as personal. Demonization of the side that opposes us and creation of justifications for our own acts are related to Type 1. Jealousy, “zealous vigilance”, feelings of protectiveness or possessiveness are more clear and expressive when it comes to relations (romance, teamwork, father and son, brother and sister, teacher and student etc), but still, these aspects and multiple forms of 1 are possible manifestations, not necessarily what the type is. For curiosity, a type 2 or 4 can express these manifestations of 1 in more concrete terms. Self-realization of this ego works by recalling oneself in self- observation permanently. The fixation is involved with awareness or intuition of directions and purposes, or “essences”, such as faith. Having a goal or set of rules to act accordingly, leading to the notion of perfection and obssession with it, resulting in compulsive behaviour. Compensation is manifested as addictions and hipocrisy. The polarities of the 1 space describe how we meet the impact of sensation upon us. Both polarities are ways of avoiding our experience. They are represented by two characters: the Heartless (or “thinker”) character at one end, the Enthusiastic (or “feeler”) character at the other. Inspiration is an effect from “over-sensitivity”, phlegmatic temperaments are effects from an attempt to armour ourselves against the external world’s problems. One character is sensitive, he has thin skin, the other, is unsentimental, he has thick skin. One kind of 1 holds himself and lives in silent humour, other kind of 1 frees himself of all chains he imposes on himself and expresses excessive righteousness, control, wrath. One is cute and lets tears come from his eyes, other is too closed and never smiles.

Enthusiasm is being zealous for a cause, for someone or something; not being affected is not letting the world enter your conscience. So, either we let sense-impressions and sense- feelings bounce off us or we push back on them, depending on which pole we have chosen to cling to. The heartless 1 can express self-control, stoicism and adulthood (a positive manifestation) or callousness, behaviour that is unkind, cruel, and without sympathy or feeling for other people (a negative manifestation). The sentimental 1 can express sensitivity and empathy for other people, courage and trust (a positive manifestation) or irritability and touchiness, antipathy, anger and fire (a negative manifestation). Observe that even if you become fixated within one extreme of the domain’s polarity, it is very probable that one moment or another you will switch to the other extreme. There will always be a swing, pretty like mood swings. I think I wrote too much, but, to expand in the addictions and hipocrisy of 1: Some 1 fixed people can have unknown coping mechanisms, such as lack of moderation in gaming, moral contradictions or violence in political movements. The inner motivations and reasons behind actions are always what matters most, but in the fixation of 1, the usual behaviour is that of unconsciousness. Someone with this fixation does not properly give attention to problems and easily resents. Anyway, these are assumptions, all I am doing is interpretation, trying to create explanations and bla bla bla. For curiosity, again, I associate this enneatype with parents. The 1 fixation resembles the idea of father or mother that I have, an archetype of someone that loves their children in two apparently opposite ways: In one manner, your parent loves you by expressing enthusiasm and faith in your self, this parent will be taking care of you and trying to guide you into perfection, into what he believes that is the best for you. In another manner, your parent also needs the rationality, severity and discernment to correct your behaviour, to limit your freedom, to impose rules and discipline into you. This process probably hurts and can create resentment, but it is necessary at times. You can learn to forgive them by comprehension of this. Society tries to make us civilized and normal, people at times can make us lose the right to express ourselves, and in the final distortion of the domain of sentimentality, there lies this sentiment of unfair and fair. What are our rights compared to people’s rights. This is one of the most common reasons that humanity creates social movements and revolutions, these rebellions come from our humanity: our weakness, “emotion”, and I understand emotion as instinct, something of the gut, the body, our being. You can not dominate emotion with reason, you need stronger emotions.