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The Situation
So you are trying to connect with someone who is hard to get a hold of…you’ve emailed and called…left funny or challenging messages and used all the charm of your personality to no avail. If you’re a seven on the enneagram, this is personal; nothing drives a seven more nuts than unresponsiveness…it is something that can neither be understood nor accepted by this personality type because for them, responsiveness is a need.
Reacting to an Unmet Need
Unresponsiveness triggers an inborn fear that materializes as an anxious internal disruption that most sevens try hard to escape. The emotional roller coaster ride that follows usually starts off small and unassuming; a sort of petulant brooding over the situation which soon turns upbeat because of the seven’s innate sense of optimism which is largely motivated by an…of course it has nothing to do with me…line of thinking. What few people realize (most sevens included) is that the real fear revolves around the feeling that it has everything to do with them and that they have somehow misstepped and will now be punished for the infraction. Punishment for the seven includes missing out, not being able to get enough and being stuck.
Hiding the Fear
In an attempt to make the feelings of insecurity subside most sevens will go into overdrive and will literally beg to be noticed through a flood of correspondence, that can range from once a week to many times a day…just in case the unresponsive individual has forgotten or is perhaps unaware of the needed contact
. While this persistence encourages most people to figure out it is far less troubling to talk to a seven and get it over with the real drive behind it is to give the seven an opportunity to fix the situation thereby abating the basic fear. If this behavior does not yield results however, then it doesn’t make the seven feel any better. In fact, it then becomes annoying because it causes a self-consciousness to rise within the seven. They become acutely aware of the mania and the driving need for attention that is a critical part of most everything they do.
Denial
They then move on to convincing themselves that they are not being avoided, they haven’t made a mistake…the unresponsive person is just really busy…and yes…maybe also a bit rude. Sulkily they begin to think about how rarely they are ignored and are now fondly recalling how many of their friends dutifully check in with them every week.
Avoiding Pain
Although it is difficult and it saddens them to think about it…they consider writing this endeavor off entirely because they just can’t stand the current discomfort and pain they experiencing while engaging in this situation (sevens will of course develop a case of selective memory when the above mentioned unresponsive person finally does call and of course they will have forgotten all about the whole severing the ties idea
).
If what I’ve just described to you sounds absolutely crazy then you probably don’t need to read any further but if this sounds familiar (as in you yourself have been through this or it sounds like someone you know then read on).
What to do?
The above scenario describes a typical seven response to the trigger of their basic fear. Sevens characteristically react by doing…often manic doing. Doing something is far better than paying attention to the way they feel so they attempt to outrun their feelings by ‘fixing’ the situation so that it feeds their needs and they no longer have to experience the fear. This however, does not encourage their growth…only their dependence on doing is strengthened.
The Wake-Up Call
For a seven a good wake up call in the above scenario would be take a moment to think about all the people who ARE in regular contact with them and DO want to talk… and then to start noticing how little of their attention is actually going toward these people (THE PEOPLE WHO WANT THE CONTACT). Following the trail of attention, take a serious look at the enormous amounts of energy being sent out toward the one person who is unresponsive.
The Farmer Parable
Question yourself about the logic of this, if a farmer had two fields one in which everything he planted grew effortlessly and one which he had to toil for even the smallest results where would he spend most of his time? If the farmer is the seven in the above scenario he is working in the wrong field.
Using the Law of Attraction
The law of attraction states that you get what you think about you. The farmer working in the barren field is always only thinking about the fact that there isn’t enough…when he has another field within easy reach that he could spend his time in and in that field there is plenty.
If you are focused on a need from a place of lack…you are sending the message of not enough to the universe and so your fears come to pass because you are focused on what you don’t want and you are feeling what you don’t want. The very behavior a seven exhibits in reaction to a fear is the manic behavior that could actually damage the relationship and allow the fear to manifest into the seven’s reality. If the seven can relax, allow the feelings to sink in…and let go of trying to make a relationship happen something amazing will occur.
I’m Still O.K.
When a seven sticks it out through their feelings and allows themselves to be present and fully experience their fears…they begin to realize that though it was uncomfortable…nothing really terrible happened and they are of course, still here and o.k. The thing they thought they needed to experience or have in order to be o.k. (their people, opportunities, experiences or acquisitions) did not come through for them yet…the sky did not fall and life has not changed all that much. Through these sorts of experiences a seven gains the insight that their basic fears are really just mental phantoms…although it takes some practice to step out of the knee-jerk reaction to fear they have developed over the course of their lives, they begin to become more aware of themselves and heed the wake-up calls that alert them to an opportunity to change the patterns that have ruled them for so long.
Ironically sevens desire to be happy, content and fulfilled…most of what they do is an attempt to gain these things yet they get lost in the doing. When they are able to regain being, the natural fulfillment of that state touches them and the simple pleasures of existing arise into their experience creating a happiness like no other.





