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The Power of Fear

The Nightmare, Henry Fuseli. 1781.

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Suzanne Stabile March 25, 2025

I’m mindful that when I gather with my colleagues at an event that includes several keynote speakers, each of whom are speaking from their expertise, that I’m likely to be well received.  While others  talk about topics such as scripture, prayer, theology or perhaps cultural challenges that we face, I am talking to people about their preferred topic: themselves.  We all like to know more about ourselves, to understand why we do the very things we seem to not want to do, and to change ourselves for the better;  we just don’t know how to make the necessary adjustments.

In this series of articles, I’m exploring the emotions of shame, fear and anger as they are related to Enneagram wisdom.  Each of us  experience all three, and so we must have a healthy respect for each and use it for its value, acknowledge how each can be  helpful and harmful.  In addition, we need to be mindful of their power without allowing them unnecessary and unwanted influence in our lives.

Shame or fear or anger are respectively  the default emotions for each personality type.  For Enneagram Fives, Sixes and Sevens - the numbers that make up the Head or Thinking Triad - fear informs how they see themselves, others and the world.  If your Enneagram Number is within this Triad, it will be helpful for you to know what fear looks like and how you can manage the ways it shows up in your life.

I have often found that the stories we tell about ourselves and those we love help us become  more of who we want to be and less of who we struggle to defend.  My husband Joe is a truly gifted pastor, but he is also quite good looking and attracts attention from other women.  I usually handle it well but at one point when I was struggling with some professional choices in my work, I found myself over-focused on one woman’s  behavior and her desire for Joe’s attention.  

We both believe and teach that every person can benefit from having a therapist and a spiritual director and so I took the question as to why I was struggling to my therapist.   I guess I must have gotten a little whipped up because after a while he said, “Are you about finished with your need to talk about her?”  

Annoyed, I replied, “I might be. Why?”   

“Well, I wonder if we might want to explore why you are hanging all of your anxiety on that poor woman’s bones.” 

Anxiety in all nine Enneagram Numbers is transformed into either anger, fear or shame.  In thinking about and learning from fear, it is helpful for all three numbers in the triad to remember this:

A Seven’s fear is usually focused inward.  They are afraid of what they might discover within themselves.  Fives are fearful of the outside world and their ability to navigate safely.  Sixes are fearful of both, moving back and forth between the two.  Regardless of your Enneagram number, we need to be willing to observe our resistance to reality, our attachment to self-image, and our fear.  All three apply to everyone but Fear is especially problematic for Fives, Sixes and Sevens.

Sandra Maitri described the fear of a Five in one sentence, “Fives are afraid of engulfment.”  They maintain a private inner world,  observing rather than actively participating in what goes on around them, perhaps as a means of protection. This is  driven by an inner sense of scarcity and emptiness.  Afraid that nothing will be coming to them from the outside, they “act” like they don’t want anything and don’t care.  They can begin to believe their own performance and thus  limit their expressions of wishes and desires.

Fear causes fives to become observers of life rather than active participants.  They are run from too much engagement and too much involvement.  Part of the reason for this is that they have a limited amount of energy and every encounter of any kind uses the  resource that they fear will be depleted before they get back to the safety of what is usually known and predictable.

Sixes, on the other hand, are coping with anxiety instead of fear, though the two often get conflated.  Anxiety is about possible futures and that is where most of the mental energy of a Six is invested.  They tend to deal with their anxious feelings by finding someone or something to connect with that offers a bedrock of safety.  

This can regrettably cause Sixes to trust neither themselves or anyone else.   Those not trusting themselves are referred to as Phobic Sixes.  They are overly fearful and as a result they often give their allegiance to structures and belief systems.  Those not trusting others are known as Counter-phobic, meaning they are intent on proving they are not afraid by conquering the fears that hold the most power over them.

Sevens manage their fear with a smokescreen of activity.  They are the Number on the Enneagram that can reframe any negative into a positive almost instantly.  To experience anything as other than it should be threatens to bring up buried pain and unresolved grief.  Sevens live in the magical world of their imaginations where all is, or shall be, well.

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“A quiet mind is a place of knowing and guidance that gives us confidence to act in the world.  And when these qualities are unreachable, we feel fear.”

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The Thinking triad is about finding a sense of inner guidance and support.  And it is a very challenging proposition because these personality types have lost touch with what we refer to in the spiritual tradition as the quiet mind.  These are the people who trust what is in their heads over feelings or doing.  When they are in their Personality, the mind is not naturally quiet nor is it naturally “knowing.”  Instead, it is looking for a strategy that will make it feel, at the very least, okay enough to function in the world.

Our minds have the potential to help us settle down, help us feel supported and safely aware.   A quiet mind is a place of knowing and guidance that gives us confidence to act in the world.  And when these qualities are unreachable, we feel fear.  The three numbers in this Triad each react to fear in different ways.

Fives respond by reducing their personal needs and retreating from life.  They have a sense that they are too frail and insubstantial to safely survive in the world.  It feels to them as if the only safe place is in their minds, so they use their energy to gather and stockpile information.  It’s hard for them to believe they have what is required to meet the daily demands of life, so they move, somewhat seamlessly, between home and the world, and back again, hoping that they will have a new insight or understanding to give them the security to emerge.

Sevens, by contrast, move toward life appearing to be afraid of nothing.  They are outwardly so adventurous and entertaining it can be hard to understand why they are in the Fear Triad.  They are full of fear but not of the outside world, instead  they are afraid of being trapped in emotional pain, grief and especially feelings of anxiety.  Their escape route is to plunge into activity or the anticipation of the next thing they have planned.  It takes a lot of energy to hold at bay the hurts and anxieties of life.  For Sixes, attention and energy are directed both inward and outward in a rhythm that is calming and feels somewhat safe.  When they feel anxious on the inside, they greet the world like a Seven would with action, anticipating a favorable outcome.  However, if their expectations are not met, they begin to fear they will be overwhelmed by demands from others and incapable of performing proficiently.  So, predictably, they jump back inside of themselves like Fives.  Sixes look for an authority figure who is trustworthy, strong and authoritative whom they can follow.  They lose their inner guidance by seeking guidance from others.  While they are looking for enough support to become independent, they find themselves dependent on the very people and systems they were using in their quest to trust themselves and their own ways of seeing the world.

Fives are convinced that support is either not available or it is unreliable.  As a result, they try to figure out everything on their own.  The problem is that “going it alone” means they must reduce their need for anyone.  Independence with no path to interdependence is no solution at all.

Sevens try to break away from fear by pursuing substitutes for the nurturing they think they lack.  They go after whatever they believe will make them feel secure and long for satisfaction. They respond to the lack of guidance by trying everything as if by a process of elimination they could discover the nurturing and care they are looking for. 

Living in a culture where many institutions capitalize on pedaling fear and encouraging anxiety, is very difficult for those who are in the Thinking triad.  Contemplative practices can help calm the fear.  Responding from a quiet mind will always be helpful.  And for these numbers it is essential that you trust yourself.  

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Suzanne Stabile is a speaker, teacher, and internationally recognized Enneagram master teacher who has taught thousands of people over the last thirty years. She is the author of ‘The Path Between Us’, and coauthor, with Ian Morgan Cron, of ‘The Road Back to You’. She is also the creator and host of The Enneagram Journey podcast. Along with her husband, Rev. Joseph Stabile, she is cofounder of Life in the Trinity Ministry, a nonprofit, nondenominational ministry committed to the spiritual growth and formation of adults.

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Iggy Pop Playlist

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Iggy Pop is an American singer, songwriter, musician, record producer, and actor. Since forming The Stooges in 1967, Iggy’s career has spanned decades and genres. Having paved the way for ‘70’s punk and ‘90’s grunge, he is often considered “The Godfather of Punk.”

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The Six of Wands (Tarot Triptych)

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Name:  Victory, the Six of Wands
Number: 6
Astrology: Jupiter in Leo
Qabalah: Tiphereth of Yod

Chris Gabriel March 22, 2025

The Six of Wands is the highpoint of the suit - the fires burn their brightest and ascend, the efforts of the past cards are rewarded here. This is individuality, notability, and power. This is a card of victory.

In Rider, we have a triumphant man dressed in laurels, with another  carried atop his wand. His horse is cloaked in green, and he is cloaked in red. All around him,  figures hold up their wands and hail him as a hero returning from a victorious campaign.

In Thoth, there are six wands, two topped by lotuses, two topped by Set-creatures, and two topped with solar disks. Flames rise from their intersections. The wands are the orange of Leo, and the background is the violet of Jupiter.

In Marseille, the six wands form an X, from which plants and flowers emanate. Qabalistically, this is the Beauty of the King.

This is the end of the republic and the rise of Caesar, when one figure stands out above the rest. As Jupiter in Leo, it is a card of nonconformity and eccentric genius, not for the sake of standing out, but for the sake of gaining power. 

Many cards in  the suit of Wands concern the difficult amassing and keeping of power. This, however, is the desired state of the suit; the Ace sparked the fire, but it burns warmest and brightest at six, and only gets more difficult from here.

The same is true of victory, it is always short lived - a temporary reward in an endless power struggle. But this period produces immense change and revaluation can occur. What was slow and tiresome before now becomes easy, the victorious powers are able to move freely.

Rider shows us that  the victorious one is a “head above the rest”, able to see past the crowds and chaos. A line from Guilliame Apollinaire’s Victoire puts it perfectly:

Victory will be above all
To see truly into the distance
To see everything
Up close
So that everything can have a new name

The “New” motif of the Three of Wands comes to fruition here as the “Make it New” is now able to occur. This is God allowing Adam to name all the animals, according to his uppermost role. This is the renaming of months after Julius and Augustus, the Revolutionary government of France creating Thermidor, a new month, for a new calendar, and far more. Ancient Christians sought to change the pagan names of the planets and zodiac. To reshape the world in one’s own image is the will of God, and those that would be as Gods. These sweeping actions are only possible at the highest point of power.

When we pull this card, we can expect to achieve our desires, enjoy the rewards of our work,and  stand out in what we do. Be sure to make good use of this time and move things forward toward your long term goals. Do not rest on your laurels.

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Chris Gabriel is a twenty four year old wizard and poet who runs the YouTube channel MemeAnalysis.

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Malcolm Gladwell

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The Principles of the Nature Cure System, A Fragment

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One of the founding fathers of so called ‘Alternative Medicine’, Benedict Lust established a principle of Naturopathy which promoted non invasive self healing, using the medicine of the world around us rather than chemical or developed drugs. Though many of the practices Lust called for have since been widely and rightly discredited, many have become accepted into the mainstream, and scientifically endorsed. His criticisms of the pharmaceutical industry, from the turn of the 20th century up until his death in 1945, remain relevant and potent today. This piece is a fragment from the introduction to his ‘Universal Naturopathic Encyclopedia’, a guide to drugless therapy that combined and utilised folk practices, vitalism, and other alternative cures, published in 1918.

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Benedict Lust, March 18, 2025

Since the earliest ages, Medical Science has been of all sciences the most unscientific. Its professors, with few exceptions, have sought to cure disease by the magic of pills and potions and poisons that attacked the ailment with the idea of suppressing the symptoms instead of attacking the real cause of the ailment.

Medical science has always believed in the superstition that the use of chemical substances which are harmful and destructive to human life will prove an efficient substitute for the violation of laws, and in this way encourages the belief that a man may go the limit in self indulgence that weaken and destroy his physical system, and then hope to be absolved from his physical ailments by swallowing a few pills, or submitting to an injection of a serum, that are supposed to act as vicarious redeemers of the physical organism and counteract life-long practices that are poisonous and wholly destructive to the patient's well-being.

From the earliest ages to the present time, the priests of medicine have discovered that it is ten times easier to obtain ten dollars from a man by acting upon his superstition, than it is to extract one dollar from him, by appealing to reason and common sense. Having this key to a gold mine within their grasp, we find official medicine indulging at all times in the most blatant, outrageous, freakish and unscientific methods of curing disease, because the methods were in harmony with the medical prestige of the physician.

Away back in pre-historic times, disease was regarded as a demon to be exorcised from its victim, and the medicine man of his tribe belabored the body of his patient with a bag in which rattled bones and feathers, and no doubt in extreme cases the tremendous faith in this process of cure that was engendered in the mind of the patient really cured some ailments for which mental science, not the bag of bones and feathers, should be given credit.

Coming down to the middle ages, the Witches' Broth — one ingredient of which was the blood of a child murderer drawn in the dark of the moon — was sworn to, by official medicine, as a remedy for every disease.

In a later period, the docteur a la mode, between his taking pinches of snuff from a gold snuff box, would order the patient bled as a remedy for what he denominated spirits, vapors, megrims, or miasms.

Following this pseudo-scientific diagnosis and method of cure, came the drugging phase in which symptoms of disease were unmercifully attacked by all kinds of drugs, alkalis, acids and poisons which were supposed, that by suffocating the symptoms of disease, by smothering their destructive energy, to thus enhance the vitality of the individual. All these cures have had their inception, their period of extensive application, and their certain desuetude. The contemporary fashion of healing disease is that of serums and pills, which, instead of being an improvement on the fake medicines of former ages are of no value in the cure of disease, but on the contrary introduce lesions into the human body of the most distressing and deadly import.

The policy of expediency is at the basis of medical drug healing. It is along the lines of self-indulgence, indifference, ignorance and lack of self-control that drug medicine lives, moves and has its being. The sleeping swineries of mankind are wholly exploited by a system of medical treatment, founded on poisonous and revolting products, whose chemical composition and whose mode of attacking disease, are equally unknown to their originators, and this is called "scientific medicine."

Like the alchemist of old who circulated the false belief that he could transmute the baser metals into gold, in like manner the vivisector claims that he can coin the agony of animals into cures for human disease. He insists on cursing animals that he may bless mankind with such curses.

The natural system for curing disease is based on a return to nature in regulating the diet, breathing, exercising, bathing and the employment of various forces to eliminate the poisonous products in the system, and so raise the vitality of the patient to a proper standard of health.

The prime object of natural healing is to give the principle of life the line of least resistance, that it may enable man to possess the most abundant health.

What is life? The finite mind of man fails to comprehend the nature of this mysterious principle. The philosopher says "Life is the sum of the forces that resist detail," but that definition only increases its obscurity. Life is a most precious endowment of protoplasm, of the various combinations of oxygen, hydrogen, carbon and nitrogen, and other purely mineral substances in forming organic tissues. As Othello says, referring to Desdemona's life, which he compares to the light of a candle —

"If I quench thee thou flaming minister, 
I can thy former light restore 
Should I repent me; but once put out thy light, 
I know not whence is that Promethean heat 
That can thy light relume."

The spark of life flickers in the sockets of millions and is about to go out. What system of medicine will most surely restore that flickering spark to a steady, burning flame?

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Benedict Lust (1872 – 1945) was a German-American doctor who was one of the founders of naturopathic medicine. He helped introduce ideas of psychotherapy, Yoga, and Ayurveda therapy to an American audience.

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Larry Levan Playlist

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Larry Levan was an influential American DJ who defined what modern dance clubs are today. He is most widely renowned for his long-time residency at Paradise Garage, also known as “Gay-Rage”, a former nightclub at 84 King Street in Manhattan, NY.

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Hannah Peel Playlist

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Mercury Prize, Ivor Novello and Emmy-nominated, RTS and Music Producers Guild winning composer, with a flow of solo albums and collaborative releases, Hannah Peel joins the dots between science, nature and the creative arts, through her explorative approach to electronic, classical and traditional music.

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The Four of Wands (Tarot Triptych)

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Name:  Completion, the Four of Wands
Number: 4
Astrology: Venus in Aries
Qabalah: Chesed of Yod

Chris Gabriel March 15, 2025

In the four of wands we see both the quick fulfilment of desires and the ability to regularly achieve them. The daily virtue taught by the three of wands pays off here, with an effective and pleasurable routine.

In Rider, we see two robed figures holding up small boughs. Immediately in the foreground are four wands, with a bough of fruits and ribbons atop them. Behind the two figures is  a castle and a group of revellers.

In Thoth, we are shown an astrological image - four wands tipped by the ram of Aries and the dove of Venus. They oppose one another, and form a circle. There is fire in the center, and the earthy green of Venus decorates the background.

In Marseille, there are four wands, out of which two plants and two flowers emerge. Qabalistically, this is the Mercy of the King.

Astrologically, Venus in Aries is a detrimental position, but as this card shows, that doesn’t mean it can’t be fun. This is a ‘shotgun wedding’ rather than an extravagant and beautiful ball. It is a passionate relationship, but not necessarily one with a future.

The four of cups is a good mood, with the comfort of home, but it already bears the seeds of its undoing. Venus in Aries is much like “Beauty and the Beast”, which may work out in fairy tales, but usually proves unstable in our lives. Aries seeks immediate satisfactions while Venus enjoys the dance. Venus takes its time  to converse with a partner. Aries wants just one thing, and it wants it now. They are naturally opposed, but can be exciting when the chemistry is right.

Both Jodorowsky and Crowley emphasise this card's relation to routine. Our natural drives and whims form a circuit, and while this can work well for a time, routine can wear down creativity. This is the relationship that sexually satisfies both parties, but fails to reach higher resonance.

In its most dignified form, it represents a passionate bout of work, a relationship, or a period of partying that leads to greater satisfaction and ability. So long as it is not permanent, all is well.

When pulling this card, we can expect a good time. We may find inspiration in  a new flame, or find a good rhythm to our life. The key is passion; as soon as things get boring, this card is out of play.

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Chris Gabriel is a twenty four year old wizard and poet who runs the YouTube channel MemeAnalysis.

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