How to Use the Enneagram to Create Characters

As a fiction author, one of the key elements in writing is keeping characters’ personalities both distinct and consistent. Authors create and develop characters in various ways, but the way I do it is simple and easy. Want to know my secret?

I use the Enneagram to create characters.

My main and secondary characters all get Enneagram numbers, and I develop their personality based on that number.

If you’re not familiar with the Enneagram, I won’t explain it in detail here, as you can find that information in a host of places around the Internet, like here and here. You can also read this book if you want to dive deep. In a few words, the Enneagram is a system of nine interconnected distinct personality types.

Hear this: While it’s important to understand how the Enneagram works and how it’s structured, you don’t need to intimately understand or memorize each Enneagram type in order to use the Enneagram for character development.

What you do need is a good reference at hand while you develop your characters. You could use a book or a website, which I do as needed. But the most succinct resource I’ve found is THIS HANDY CHART that contains an excellent overview of all nine types on one page. If you want, go check it out in a different tab, bookmark it and/or print it, and then come back here.

Using the Enneagram to Create Characters

Using the Enneagram takes the complication out of personality creation and development, if you do some basic work up front.

When I first dream up a character in my mind, I form an idea of their core personality—introvert/extrovert, driven/laid-back, thinker/feeler, etc. Then I go to my chart and find the Enneagram type that best fits what I have in mind. From there, I flesh out the character’s personality details and determine their basic traits, including their strengths and weaknesses. But it doesn’t stop there, especially when writing character-driven plots.

The foundational elements for characters are their desires, struggles, motivations, and fears. These elements are at the center of both their inner and outer conflicts. If they’re not determined up front, the characters will flounder and their arcs will be more of a jagged line.

Once I determine all the details of a character’s personality, I put the information into a spreadsheet, along with other character details such as birthdate, physical characteristics, background, likes, etc., which I’ll cover in another post.

Flexibility Is Important When Developing Character Personalities

Once I start writing, personality details often change as the characters come alive on the page. I’m a “pantser,” not a “plotter,” meaning I fly by the seat of my pants as I write. My characters often think, do, and say things I didn’t plan and that might be outside their personality type.

When that happens, I have to determine whether I’ll change what I wrote, whether I’ll change the character’s personality traits or even their Enneagram type to fit what I wrote, or whether I’ll just leave it all as-is. I’ve done all of those things at times.

Here’s the reality. It’s OK to have a character do something outside their personality. In fact, I’m going to argue that it should happen from time to time. While each person has a personality type, we also stray from it at times. We’re each unique and do things outside our usual personality on occasion or even on a regular basis. That doesn’t mean we’ve changed our personality. It simply means we’re human.

In a way, I think it’s helpful that I don’t have an in-depth catalog of each Enneagram type living in my brain. That helps me keep my characters more fluid and not always living strictly within their Enneagram type. When someone does act notably out of character, though, I often explain it via that character’s thoughts or another character’s words.

Consistency Is Key in Character Arcs

At the same time, it’s important to keep your characters’ overarching personality types in mind throughout the writing process. You don’t want them to completely morph from one personality type to another from the beginning to the end of the book or the series.

A character’s development and their character arc will be based around their core desires, struggles, motivations, and fears. If any of these elements change, your story will quickly go off the rails, and your readers will be left in confusion. Nobody wants that!

There’s much more that could be said about using the Enneagram for character development, but I’ll leave that for a potential future post. For now, I’d love to hear if you’ve used the Enneagram in your writing or if you’d like to create characters using the Enneagram. Let me know in a comment below!

If you’d like to read some of the books I’ve written using characters with Enneagram types, check out my Totally 80s Mysteries and Throwback RomComs.