Enneagram Type Four (the Individualist)
with
Enneagram Type Eight (the Challenger)
What Each Type Brings to the Relationship
This can be one of the most creative relationship couplings, although it is also one of the most inherently volatile. Both Enneagram Fours and Eights are intense and have strong emotional responses; both seek to get a reaction from the other, and both can be dominating of their environments—Eights are socially dominant, Fours are emotionally dominant. Both types bring passion, intensity, energy, and deep (often unconscious) feelings to all aspects of the relationship. They are attracted to each other's storminess, the other's vulnerability, and the other's "hidden" qualities: neither is what they seem to be on the surface. Both types are also highly intuitive—Fours by being self-aware and knowledgeable about how they are feeling, and Eights with their intuition about external phenomena, often with an extremely accurate insight about the potentials and possibilities exhibited by others. Because of their passionate natures, both types can become impulsive and reckless, taking extreme risks for love of thrills or for the sensation of being alive—and this can be tremendously exciting to the other. But there are trade-offs: Fours tend to depend on the Eight's practicality and ability to protect and provide for them, whereas Eights tend to depend on the Four's sensitivity and mysterious sense of challenge—the Four's emotional life and heart may be one world that the Eight cannot easily conquer.
On the other hand, Fours see strength, charisma, and solidity in Eights. Both feel that the other can meet their intensity—that the other will not be boring or non-responsive to them. They make each other feel more alive—something that both want. Intensity, vitality, passion, and immediacy are the emotional hallmarks of this couple, and they relate to each other (and to others in their world) from an unusually high emotional pitch—there is always something happening in their relationship, and they like it this way.
Potential Trouble Spots or Issues
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