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What does the Enneagram have to do with money?
Surprisingly, quite a bit…
In this episode, Tori is joined by Sarajane Case, an Enneagram expert and founder of the viral Enneagram and Coffee Instagram account. Sarajane guides us through the different Enneagram types –– what they are, why they interact the way with money the way they do, and how they can build better financial habits for their type.
As a fun bonus, our producer, Kristen gets live-typed on the show –– which means you get a peek behind the curtain on how Sarajane works with individuals who are confused about their type. If you’ve felt unsure how to solve that mystery in your own life, the way she works with our producer might help you uncover your own Enneagram truth.
This fun and foundational episode will help you learn how to better manage your own finances with the power of the Enneagram.
You’ll learn:
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An outline of the Enneagram and each type
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The best (and worst ways) to figure out your type
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Where your Enneagram type might struggle most with money and why
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The questions to ask when you’re trying to discover your type
Meet Sarajane
Sarajane Case is a trained Enneagram teacher, author of The Honest Enneagram and Host of the Enneagram & Coffee Podcast. She is a passionate advocate for your loving relationship to self and author of the upcoming book The Enneagram Letters.
Resources:
Pre-Order The Enneagram Letters
Watch Behind the Scenes and Extended Clips on Youtube
Leave Financial Feminist a Voicemail
Transcript:
Tori (00:00:00):
Hello. Hello, Financial Feminist. Every time I do an intro, I’m like, “How do I make this slightly different? How do I say the same thing but make it slightly different?” Welcome back. We hope you’re having a great start to your week. Things have been heavy lately, as we all know, and we here at Financial Feminist and Her First $100K, we just want to thank you for continuing to join us on the podcast every week. We hope it’s a bright spot for you. We hope that it gives you really good information in order to make changes in your life, to make changes in your world, but also, hopefully, it’s a little fun because we need a little bit of fun right now.
Tori (00:00:37):
So if you’re loving the podcast, please leave us a review. Make sure you’re subscribed. If you haven’t hit that subscribe button, that is the best way to make sure you don’t miss an episode, and share about us on social media. We’re @FinancialFeministPodcast on Instagram and @HerFirst100K, 100K, both on Instagram and TikTok. We love seeing you on your hot girl walks and sharing with your friends and family. It’s the best.
Tori (00:01:01):
We have the most exciting announcement I think of my entire career coming on Thursday. So stay tuned for that. Yes, it’s probably what you’re thinking. Yes, I’m so excited. It’s not only my birthday here in a couple days, it’s also the biggest, biggest, biggest announcement that Her First $100K has ever made. So if you want to stay tuned, make sure you’re subscribed.
Tori (00:01:26):
On today’s episode, we are so excited to welcome Sarajane Case, who you might recognize as Enneagram and Coffee on Instagram. Sarajane is a trained Enneagram teacher, author of The Honest Enneagram and host of the Enneagram and Coffee Podcast. She’s a passionate advocate for your loving relationship to self and author of the upcoming book, The Enneagram Letters.
Tori (00:01:46):
I have been obsessed with the Enneagram as anybody who knows me personally knows. We get into it a little bit, but I am a classic Enneagram two, classic two wing one, although I’m showing a lot of two wing three traits recently. If you don’t know what the Enneagram is, again, we’ll get into it, but this is a powerful conversation about our personalities, our sense of self, how we relate to others.
Tori (00:02:08):
If there’s any tool I can point to, especially for my romantic relationships, as well as our team dynamic, if there’s any tool I can point to that’s like, “That helped so much,” so even if you already know your number or maybe you don’t, you’ll love this episode and how Sarajane ties each number to our money. Plus, Sarajane, actually, in realtime, live typed our podcast producer, Kristen.
Tori (00:02:30):
So if you are the person who’s coming into the show and is like, “I have no idea what my type is,” Kristen has known about the Enneagram for years and has never been able to fully figure out what her exact type is, and Sarajane gets her in five minutes and we love to see it. So without further ado, let’s go ahead and get into it.
Tori (00:03:04):
I’m so excited to chat Enneagram with you. We have chatted before about it. I think we did a live together that was super fun about money and the Enneagram. My team knows I’m obsessed with the Enneagram. Anybody I’ve dated knows I’m obsessed with the Enneagram. It has helped me so much in terms of how I view the world and not only how I view myself, but me trying to figure out my relationship with other people. It’s been the most helpful personality tests that I’ve ever taken by far.
Tori (00:03:32):
For you, what about the Enneagram was so interesting and what was compelling and attractive to you about it when you first learned?
Sarajane (00:03:40):
Yeah. I think I started out of a place of already being curious about humans. I was obsessed with knowing why people did what they did already. I think if you’re naturally inclined to that, the Enneagram becomes a quick obsession because you’re like, “Oh, now we have these deeper levels of understanding.” I had maybe three or four categories that I was working with like, “Some people really want to be successful. Some people really want to be loved.” I think we intrinsically knew that, and then the Enneagram was like, “Well, there’s nine.” All nine types have these subcategories.
Sarajane (00:04:18):
So it’s so intricate and so deep that when you’re curious about people, there’s an endless amount to learn. As a photographer. I learned Photoshop. Photoshop is endless. You’ll never get to the depths of Photoshop, and that’s how the Enneagram fe
els but for people.
Tori (00:04:34):
Yeah. Can you tell us what the Enneagram is? Can you give us an explanation if somebody’s never heard of the Enneagram or maybe heard about it but doesn’t know what it is and why it’s useful, especially examining not only ourselves, but maybe our relationship with money?
Sarajane (00:04:49):
So when it comes to what it is, it’s essentially a personality typing tool or a map of nine distinct personality types. Each type has something it thinks it has to be. So type ones think they have to be perfect. Type twos think they have to be loved and liked. Type threes think they have to be successful. Fours think they have to be original and seen in their uniqueness. Type fives think they have to be informed. Sixes think they have to be loyal. Sevens think they have to be happy and satisfied. Eights think they have to be strong. Nines think they have to be easy to get along with.
Sarajane (00:05:23):
So there are these nine things we think we have to be in the world. So we’ve been taught whether that’s in childhood or through perceived expectations that this is how you earn love and acceptance and okayness in the world. So that impacts everything, right? Who we think we have to be? I will not be okay if I’m not happy and I’m not satisfied or I am not going to be okay if I’m not morally perfect. Everything will fall apart.
Sarajane (00:05:51):
So when we come from that place, that impacts our relationships. First of all, it impacts our relationships because it’s the water we are swimming in. So we think everybody else is doing this, too, right? We’re like, “Oh, everybody needs to be liked and loved,” right? That’s the core motivation of every person, and then you find out, “Oh, actually some people really feel like they have to be informed and they need to have the knowledge and they need to preserve their resources, and sometimes relationships can threaten that.”
Sarajane (00:06:21):
So when we have this expectation of ourselves, we often put that expectation onto the people in our lives. When you think of who you have to be, when we come with money and money is a survival tool, this is how we survive through the world. So our relationship to money is highly going to be impacted by what we’re doing to survive.
Tori (00:06:45):
Yeah. I think that it’s easy when you first hear about a personality test to feel like, “Oh, I’m all of those things,” or somehow none of those things. One of my previous partners was very resistant to the Enneagram because he is like, “I don’t want to be put in a box. I’m a multidimensional person.”
Tori (00:07:00):
I’m like, “You’re a fucking seven. That’s what you are,” and he was. He was a seven and didn’t want to be put in a box. I think, for me, the way I’ve tried to explain Enneagram and it’d be interesting if you agree with this descriptor, it’s almost what we default to. For me, I’m a two. I am a classic two. Twos, their biggest motivation is they need to be loved. A lot of people that might shock them if they don’t know me personally because they’re like, “Don’t you need to be successful?” I 100% want to be successful. “Don’t you need to be easygoing?” Well, I’d like to be easygoing.
Tori (00:07:30):
For me, if I haven’t done work on myself or if I’m in a place of stress or something that is I’m feeling very emotionally heightened, I default to, “I just want you to love me, and I just want to give you love,” and that’s how I’m communicating that this relationship can grow and build, seeing my value and how much I love you. So I think that’s been my easiest way of understanding the Enneagram is it’s like, “What is your default state?”
Sarajane (00:07:58):
Yes, and the reality is none of us are just one Enneagram type, right? We’re all whole human beings with complex experiences, and we have all nine types in us, and we’ve told ourselves our whole life that we had to be one. I’ve been saying my whole life, “I have to be a seven. I have to be satisfied. I have to be exciting. I have to chase happiness,” and the Enneagram is actually here to say, “Oh, you actually get access to all of the nine pieces here. You don’t have to just do this one thing. You get to choose to do other things, too.”
Tori (00:08:31):
Yeah. What do you find the best way is to learn your type? Because I’ve taken quizzes that I’ve found have been useful. I’ve taken other quizzes that were not so useful. I personally have a book, I’ll actually link it in the show notes, that I found super incredibly useful. I’m trying to remember the name of it and, of course, I can’t right now, but what for you feels like the way to determine what your Enneagram type is?
Sarajane (00:08:51):
Read the descriptions. If you take a quiz, you are highly likely to mistype. They’re 50% to 80% accurate because it’s motivation based,
and when we are swimming in it, we don’t really know that it’s motivating us, it’s driving us. So when you read the descriptor, you’ll feel so seen and so uncomfortable.
Sarajane (00:09:09):
I remember I said out loud when I read mine, “Someone is following me around and reading my journal and publishing it out here,” because it’s like everything that I’ve ever felt and thought put into words. So if you don’t feel that, keep reading. You’ll find the one that makes you feel the most uncomfortable.
Tori (00:09:27):
Yeah. I think one and three because ones are the perfectionist, threes are the achievers, and that felt very similar to me because I was like, “I like achieving.” I think of a lot of my worth, unfortunately, and my accomplishments, but then when I read two, I was like, “Oh, fuck me.” Literally, my favorite, and this is a joke with my friends and family is in this book that I read about the Enneagram, it gives you like, “If I’m a two, how do you show me love?” Literally, the first one is, “Tell me what you like about me. Be specific.”
Tori (00:10:01):
The amount of times, especially with romantic partners, that I have sat down and they’re like, “I was thinking about you today,” and I was like, “What about? Tell me what were you thinking about,” or they’re like, “You look really pretty,” and you’re like, “Tell me what about me is pretty to you right now and tell me everything,” or “Oh, I was having a conversation with my mom today about you,” and I’m like, “What did she say? What did you say back and what did she say back?” I need to know every single little thing. So that was one where I was like, “Oh, I feel so called out in a way that I had never felt called out before.”
Sarajane (00:10:31):
Yeah. Well, I had a similar experience. I think seven is a fun one to be. Sevens typically like finding their Enneagram type, but then when you keep reading, you get into it and it’s like, “Oh, you use your charm to get through life,” and it’s like, “You call yourself an expert really fast,” and it’s like, “Well, shut up,” but this has been my life’s work at the same time is learning to sit with things and be comfortable with things. This is how we grow.
Tori (00:11:00):
Yeah. I think there are certain parts of the Enneagrams that, yeah, you aren’t going to connect to. There are certain parts of twos that I saw in myself five years ago that I’ve worked through. Twos, their reputation is they don’t ask for help, and I’ve gotten way better at doing that because I’ve made an active decision to not be that person anymore. I think for me, again, that’s why it’s the default that has been really helpful for me of, again, if you didn’t do any work on yourself, if you’re at a place of high stress and you’re not able to manage it, what are you defaulting to?
Sarajane (00:11:31):
I’m so glad you said that because, really, when you’re typing yourself, it’s so helpful to go back to mid 20s, early 20s and to think about, “Who was I then?” because most of us, especially mid to late 30s, we’ve done a lot of work. Especially our generation, we’ve done a lot of work. So it’s hard to type yourself now because we start to look like more types because we’re growing, which is the goal.
Tori (00:11:56):
Can you tell us about you have a primary Enneagram type and then you have what they call the wing Enneagram type? It’s primary and secondary is the way I like to think about it. Can you tell us more about what that is?
Sarajane (00:12:09):
Yeah. So when you look at the Enneagram symbol, it’s a circle. So it has number nine at the top and it works its way up from nine to one all the way back up to nine in a circle. So when you look at your number, you’re looking at the two numbers on either side of your dominant number. So for seven, that’s going to be eight and six, and each of those are your wings.
Sarajane (00:12:30):
So technically, everybody always has both wings available to them. Typically, they possess skills that you need. So for a type seven, the eights are really powerful. They stick with hard things. They don’t mind powering up and dealing with hard things. Sixes, they’re very loyal and steady. They seek security. These are things that we need as sevens. So the goal is really to have balanced wings, but typically, we lean into one or the other pretty heavily. So that other type is you’ll start to see those behaviors in you pretty strongly as well. So it’s almost like a shade of your Enneagram type. So a seven with a wing eight is a certain flavor of seven that has some eight characteristics.
Tori (00:13:15):
… and can help you, I think, figure out more of why you’re making certain decisions or why you’re thinking certain things because for me, I actually took it recently and I was a two wing three, but I’ve always been a two wing one, but I have a pretty even split, I think, between one and three. So again, it’s like I want to be loved with the side of I want to be perfect or I want to be loved with the side of I need to achieve. So yeah, I think it’s a good, helpful thing to give us even more data or more information about ourselves.
Sarajane (00:13:45):
Yeah. If we think about the Enneagram as our coping skills, then as our wings shift and move, it’s like, “What is it that I’m needing from type one right now or what is it that three energy needs to come into me right now?” That’s a weird say way to say it, but-
Tori (00:14:02):
Right, or even, for me, I’m finding in the season of my life right now, not because I don’t want to rest, I very deeply want to rest, but because I feel this need to achieve and building the business and we’ve been doing so many cool projects, the achievement has been the driving force in my life for the past year, two years, probably even more than that. So that makes more sense to me now than maybe the perfectionist did at first where everything has to be perfect.
Tori (00:14:34):
I think when you become an entrepreneur, the perfectionism, it’s just not an option anymore. You’re like, “I have to get shit done.” So I’m not shocked for me that that is reflected in my change, in my Enneagram wing. So why do you think it’s important for us to not just know our own types or to know information about what we got going on, but also know other types or other people’s types?
Sarajane (00:15:01):
So that’s where a lot of the magic happens. When we start to look outside of our little water bowl that we’re swimming in and we start to look and analyze all these other water bowls, we’re able to start picking up on everybody that we’re engaging with, right? We’re interacting with people everywhere.
Sarajane (00:15:19):
One of the major things I like to do is think about the language of the Enneagram instead of the numbers. So if I’m interacting with someone and they’re being really, maybe they’re bragging a lot or they’re showing me that they’re successful and they’re telling me how successful they’ve been, there’s a way of thinking about this where I go, “Oh, wow, they’re being such a three right now,” and then there’s a way of thinking about it where I go, “Whoa, as a child, they felt like they weren’t going to be loved if they weren’t successful. So in this moment, something in them really needs to know that they’re okay and that they’re accepted and that they’re worthy.”
Sarajane (00:15:56):
The amount of compassion we can offer ourselves when we use the language of the Enneagram allows us to see people for the little kids that didn’t get their needs met instead of these big adults who are doing bad things or making us annoyed or frustrating us.
Tori (00:16:15):
Right. I feel like also that compassion for ourselves, right? I think about that a lot, where I joke sometimes, I’m like, “Oh, gosh, that was such a two thing to do,” and then to your point of digging even deeper in that, it was like, “Yeah. I have a fear of abandonment. I want to be loved and I feel like the way I earn your love is by loving you or helping you,” and the realization that, “Okay. If I’m defaulting to that, what’s actually going on?” It’s the realization that, “Oh, I don’t think I’m lovable unless I am contributing to you or helping you in some way.”
Sarajane (00:16:52):
Yeah, which when we use the language instead of the numbers, then from there we’re able to go, “Well, what’s the next step? What’s the next question? There’s actually something to build on.” Whereas I think when we use the numbers, it closes us down. It’s like, “Oh, I’m being such a seven,” end of sentence, end of thought. Whereas, “Oh, what need am I trying to get met here? What need are they trying to get met here? How can I love them better and love myself better?”
Tori (00:17:20):
Yeah, and thinking about if you are a certain type interacting with somebody who has their own type, what meshing is happening between your own need versus their own need, and is that currently working with each other? Are you doing that in a positive way? Is that helpful for both of you or is it actually maybe stirring up potential conflict or something like that?
Sarajane (00:17:45):
Yeah, because we’re coming to the table with very specific expectations of how a person is supposed to be based off of who we think we have to be. So when people aren’t being what we think we have to be, it’s very easy to feel frustrated by that or to feel confused by that or to take it personally. When in reality, it’s just they’re showing up how they think they have to be and we’re showing up the way we think we have to be and that has a fun little soup that it makes.
Tori (00:18:11):
Yeah. I thought one of the fun things we could do is go briefly through each type and talk about where they might have some money success and where they might also struggle with money. I think it’d be helpful to go through each type, name the type, and then talk about, yeah, how are they able to show up and maybe be good with money or what strategies or personality traits do the
y exemplify that are great with money and then maybe not so much. So let’s start with number one.
Sarajane (00:18:42):
So type ones are the perfectionist. This can be traditional perfectionism, but I think of it as more moral perfectionism like, “It’s incredibly important that I be a good person and I do the right thing.” So ones tend to have this internal compass that is really an inner critic that’s telling them, “Bad. Wrong. You messed up right there.” I’ve heard type ones say their whole life they thought that was the voice of God, that is who God is. It’s this critical internal compass that’s saying, “Bad. Wrong. You’re failing,” right? So that’s really intense.
Sarajane (00:19:21):
So when it comes to money, I would imagine they’re going to struggle with feeling bad about spending money. They’re probably going to feel like they … There’s a lot of what I call perfectionist procrastination, where they put things off until they can get them perfect.
Tori (00:19:38):
Right, “I’m not going to start investing until I know everything there is to know about the stock market.”
Sarajane (00:19:44):
Yes. Yes, and to know how morally good the stock market is, “Is it good to be rich? What if it’s bad to be rich? What if making money is morally horrible?” These are the things they’re up against. Then also, “If I can’t balance my budget perfectly, if I don’t make enough money to feel like I can really do it, then I’m just going to wait.”
Tori (00:20:07):
Right or, “If I can’t pay off $10,000 of credit card debt in a week, then I just shouldn’t do it at all.”
Sarajane (00:20:15):
They’re also, strength-wise, they make a rule and they follow through, right? So they tend to be right with routines. So if they were able to push through that procrastination and say, “Okay. I’m going to pay a certain amount on this thing, then I’ll do it.” They tend to restrict pleasure. So they may go, “Okay. I’m going to push through and I’m going to pay off all of this debt,” but they may forget to really celebrate that or enjoy the process of doing that.
Tori (00:20:43):
Finding the balance of, yeah, enjoying your now also financial goals. Yeah. That’s great analysis. Let’s talk about twos. I’m about to get called out really hard. Let’s go.
Sarajane (00:20:56):
You’re going to tell us. Okay. So type twos are the helper. They feel as though they must be loved and liked and they earn that love and that like through flattery, through being helpful to others, being of use to others. They may struggle to trust that they are worthy or lovable just because they exist just as they are.
Tori (00:21:18):
As my mentor tells me all the time, “You are a human being, not a human doing, Tori Dunlap.”
Sarajane (00:21:24):
I see it. When it comes to money, you can tell me, but I would imagine one of the struggles is not spending your money on other people, not wanting to earn love by buying fancy dinners for people or taking people out or paying for people to go on trips with you because you want them to share this bonding experience with you. Sometimes a lot of two get caught up in financially supporting their families. There are several types that do that and, yeah, using money as a tool to receive love, which sounds harsh.
Tori (00:21:58):
Yeah. I think for me it manifests because I’m not a great gift giver. I know this about myself. This is the one biggest difference between Leslie Knope and I is I am real-life Leslie Knope, but I’m not a very good gift giver, but instead, I am big words of affirmation person. I am big on that. That’s how I love to receive love and that’s how I love to give love. I think for me the way it shows up with money is I am now in a financial place where I can spend money on the people I love and I like to do that, but I think, especially in the early days, it was a lot of, “Let me go work really hard so then I can show up and give my time.” So it was more like, “Let me earn money, let me become financially stable and take care of myself, hopefully, because I want to take care of others.”
Sarajane (00:22:53):
This might sound counterintuitive because knowing you, I know that you’re great at self-care, right? Maybe this has been gross.
Tori (00:23:01):
Am I, dude?
Sarajane (00:23:02):
Well, from my observation.
Tori (00:23:07):
I don’t know if I am. I don’t know if I am. It’s getting harder and harder. It’s getting harder and harder. I try to be, but it’s getting harder and harder. Yeah.
Sarajane (00:23:14):
That’s fair. Well, you seem good at self-care, and I think that’s a big … So yeah, but that’s another area. Twos struggle to spend money on themselves, so they may struggle to give themselves what they need while being comfortable giving other people what they need.
Tori (00:23:32):
Yeah, and I think that is something that I’ve worked on being better at, but I think, actually, what ends up happening for me, actually, this is a great example because I’m living this right now is this is, literally, this is a perfect time to have this conversation because I’ve been pretty burned out. Literally, manuscript for the book is due tomorrow and I’m tired and we just launched the show and all of these things are happening.
Tori (00:23:55):
So what I find myself doing is just shutting down because I’ve given so much of myself and then I’m like, “I just don’t want to do it.” So I end up just throwing money at things. So I’m just like, “Okay. I need a massage,” and I don’t care if there’s a massage open tomorrow and it’s super expensive. That’s what I’m going to do. So I feel like it’s the weird response to not potentially taking care of myself as a lifestyle and instead trying to fix things quickly because I’m tired and burned out.
Sarajane (00:24:23):
Yeah. That is so fascinating. It’s almost like not having integrated self-care leads to bigger displays of self-care.
Tori (00:24:32):
Binging self-care, yeah, or just trying to solve things because now there’s an issue. What do you feel like twos might be good at around money?
Sarajane (00:24:42):
Yeah. Well, I think you touched on it with what you said was a struggle, which is working really hard so that they can show up for people. I think that being really hard workers and being willing to do the hard work and being willing to show up. Twos also tend to thrive in the workplace in general because they know how to read people really well and they can pick up on, “Okay. What does my boss want from me?” and give that to them even if it’s maybe not natural or doesn’t come easy. They can do it. So they may be more prime to promotions and just earning potential.
Sarajane (00:25:18):
That being said, I think the other element probably would be just, yeah, I mean, I’m going to stick with earning potential, just highly motivated to earn more money because the more they can give, the more they can do.
Tori (00:25:33):
Yeah, totally. Okay. Let’s talk about threes.
Sarajane (00:25:37):
Okay. Type threes are the achiever. The story there is that, “I am worthless and I have to earn my worth through doing and succeeding and achieving.” So that’s pretty strongly tied to money, right?
Tori (00:25:51):
Yeah. I was waiting for this one because this one I feel like is the most natural integration. It feels very, yeah, very tied.
Sarajane (00:26:03):
Our average level threes tend to get caught up in debt. They tend to get caught up in keeping up with the Joneses kind of energy like, “I want to look successful even if I’m not, I don’t feel successful,” which feels terrible for that three because it seems like, “I want to earn this success or I want to be perceived as successful and recognized for my achievements,” and oftentimes, they spend money on the path to being recognized instead of doing the under the ground dirty work of getting those achievements more difficultly. Yeah. So that really lends to debt and living above your means, spending money on things that look good instead of feel good.
Sarajane (00:26:49):
Then strength-wise, again, they’re highly motivated, highly goal-oriented. If they set their mind to bein
g debt-free or doing things that feel good to them, they’re going to do it. They’re going to follow through with those intentions because they’re highly motivated to do so and they tend to do the things they say they’re going to do.
Tori (00:27:08):
Yeah. Okay. Fours.
Sarajane (00:27:10):
Type fours are the individualist or I like the title romantic. The message for them is that they have to be seen in the fullness of who they are. They also feel as though they need to be significant or special in some way and/or original. So these types when it comes to money, they’re highly likely to spend a lot of money on very nice things so that they can live up to their aesthetic standards.
Sarajane (00:27:41):
Type fours tend to have very specific aesthetic desires for themselves and have very specific ways they want to be perceived by other people. So they might spend a lot of money on a few quality items, whether that’s for their home or for the way that they choose to dress. Now, with that being said, they can also get caught up in purchasing things for who they think they’re going to be because they’re looking for a title, right?
Sarajane (00:28:09):
So fours are looking for, “I’m an artist,” “I’m a skier,” “I’m a mathematician.” They’re looking for a title, and if they buy all the supplies for that title, then that makes them feel as though they might be able to have that title, and then they’re very afraid of mediocrity. So they’d rather be a doomed failure than a moderate success. So if they feel as though they can’t reach that high level of success, then they’re not going to settle for average. So they’re like, “Okay. This hobby is not for me. I’m on. I’ve already bought all the supplies. I’ve spent thousands of dollars on these supplies, but you know what? The first time I tried it, I wasn’t very good, and so out onto the next.”
Tori (00:28:55):
… or even you could do that with money, right. It’s realizing, “Oh, I tried to get a budget together and I blew it and so I’m never going to budget again,” because it’s easier to just say cut your losses than it is to realize that most things were not good at for a long time and that’s okay.
Sarajane (00:29:12):
Yes, and budgeting’s not very romantic. You have to make it romantic. Yeah. I think that’s where the strength of our fours lies is their ability to romance the mundane. When they’re in their healthier levels, they can make these ordinary activities feel so beautiful, and can I say sexy, just so good. My husband, he describes washing the dishes like, “Oh, I just love the warm on my hands and the soapy-“
Tori (00:29:43):
“… and my Scrub Daddy.” Yeah.
Sarajane (00:29:45):
Yes. We do have a Scrub Daddy.
Tori (00:29:47):
There you go. This is not sponsored. I don’t know. I went to the Duolingo office yesterday and they did a Scrub Daddy collab. So I have a Duolingo owl-shaped Scrub Daddy on my sink and I can’t wait to use it.
Sarajane (00:30:00):
I’m into it.
Tori (00:30:01):
Yup.
Sarajane (00:30:01):
I’m really into it.
Tori (00:30:02):
No, but I love that of literally romanticizing your life, right? It’s the main character energy.
Sarajane (00:30:08):
Yes. They are the masters of romanticizing your life. We all have a lot to learn from them. So yeah, when it comes to budgeting, if they can get into that energy, they’re going to kill it because they’ll find a way to love it.
Tori (00:30:22):
Yeah, and savor it, savor the things that they’re purchasing or what they’re spending their money on. Cool. Okay. Fives.
Sarajane (00:30:28):
Okay. Oh, our fives, they have a pretty strong money story. So our fives are the investigators. They are motivated by being informed, having all the knowledge. They fear depletion. So they tend to hoard their resources, which has an obvious money context. Fives tend to be great savers. They struggle with spending money. They may not want to spend any money ever on anything.
Tori (00:30:53):
It’s that scarcity mindset of, “When is it coming back?” Yeah.
Sarajane (00:30:57):
Yeah, and they tend to do that with all of their resources, their energy levels, how much time they give to people, how much money they give to people, how much affirmation they give to people. They tend to keep it close at hand. So their work is really going to be in allowing themselves to be a little frivolous and have a little fun and trust that it’s all going to be okay, and that they can make … They tend to limit the amount that they ask for because they think they can do without. So they’re really not likely to ask for a raise. They’re not likely to ask for support. They’re going to just find a way to not need the things that they need so that they don’t have to ask for more.
Tori (00:31:37):
Right. What do we feel like their potential like benefits are to being a five with money?
Sarajane (00:31:42):
Oh, they’re incredible at saving money. They’re going to just keep it all and not spend any of it, and they may all be millionaires, I don’t know, but they’re saving it.
Tori (00:31:54):
I was going to say if you’re a five and you’re listening to this, add us, tell us what you’re doing. Tell us how much money you have. No, I love it.
Sarajane (00:32:00):
Yeah. Tell us your secrets.
Tori (00:32:01):
Tell is all your secrets, although, yeah, it is. We don’t preach deprivation on the podcast or at Her First $100K. So yeah, finding that balance I think is going to be tricky for them. Let’s move on. Sixes, what do we got going on?
Sarajane (00:32:14):
Yes. Our sixes are the loyalists. They value safety and security and they are seeking certainty. They want answers. Now, with our sixes, they tend to be very loyal to jobs, to family, to friends, and that gets them into a lot of trouble when it comes to money because two things happen. One, they don’t want to be in charge. I had a six say to me one time, “I don’t want to be the boss, but I would like to hire the boss,” because they don’t trust authority. So they’re constantly testing authority, but they don’t want to be the authority. So that can limit your income potential, of course, because you avoid promotion.
Sarajane (00:32:54):
Now, the other side of this, too, is that they can stay in jobs that aren’t promoting them or maybe have toxic environments. They may struggle to spend money on the things they really want to do or to use their savings to live a free and happy life because they want that stability, they want that security. Now, the obvious pros to this are they’re probably, and they may struggle to invest, right? The risk of, “Well, I don’t want my money up in the air. I want to have guaranteed security, certainty that this is going to be okay,” which is another limitation thing.
Tori (00:33:29):
Mattress cash as opposed to a banker, yeah, a Roth IRA. Yeah.
Sarajane (00:33:36):
Now, they are likely to have a stable job for years and years and years. They’re likely to buy and pay off their home as soon as possible. So these strongholds of just, “I’m going to have stable certainty,” but again, that stability may limit your access to joy, access to freedom, access to more abundance.
Tori (00:33:59):
I think about in my own life the decision to quit my job, right? I remember calling my parents. I think my mom is also a two. I’ve never had her take the Enneagram, but I wouldn’t be surprised if my dad is a six because those stable options. Yeah. I called my parents and they were like, “You cannot quit your job. You need health insurance. You can’t do that.” Of course, I quit and way better off for it, but yeah, I think it could limit your ability to take either a perceived or an actual risk when it comes to making financial decisions. All right. Sevens, your type, let’s chat.
Sarajane (00:34:34):
We also have a very strong money story. So sevens are the enthusiast. We like to be satisfied. We fear being trapped in emotional pain. We are adventurous. We love new experiences. We hate being limited. We want to keep our options open.
Tori (00:34:53):
Commitment is rough. Yeah.
Sarajane (00:34:55):
Rough.
Tori (00:34:55):
I dated a seven in case that wasn’t clear. I know a lot of seven.
Sarajane (00:35:01):
We’re easy to like and hard to keep liking, I think. I think that’s an easy way to say it.
Tori (00:35:09):
You call yourself out.
Sarajane (00:35:11):
I don’t mind.
Tori (00:35:12):
We’re easy to like and hard to love, yeah.
Sarajane (00:35:16):
That’s actually a problem, really, that’s it. That’s the sentence. When it comes to money, as you can imagine, people who are scared of feeling pain look for lots of escapes, lots of ways out of that pain. Some of my favorites are Targe, buying plane tickets out of nowhere. Here’s the thing. We are very good at convincing ourselves that everything is possible and there will not be any negative consequences to our behavior.
Sarajane (00:35:45):
So the problem here is that I will unconsciously fudge the numbers to myself, right? So I’m like, “Okay. I’m going to buy this plane ticket. It’s only going to cost me $50 because of my points on my miles,” and then I wait three weeks to buy the plane ticket and the plane ticket’s $1,200 now, I still buy it and I’m like, “That was $50.” So we are able to convince ourselves that anything is possible, anything is real.
Tori (00:36:15):
Which is beautiful and exciting and also very dangerous, right?
Sarajane (00:36:18):
Exactly. Yes. It’s very inspiring. If your struggle is self-care, then being around a seven is very inspiring and motivating. It is also the reason that oftentimes sevens have to work their tails off constantly just to maintain the bougie lifestyle that we enjoy because we might spend a bunch of money then have to earn all of that money back really fast or-
Tori (00:36:47):
… or that commitment isn’t there. You’re hopping from one thing to another, to another, to another.
Sarajane (00:36:50):
Yes. That’s the other thing is we tend to spread ourselves really thin and struggle to follow through. So a lot of the work that we have to do is in how do we sit with this being uncomfortable and just get to the other side of that feeling.
Tori (00:37:04):
Yeah. My partner who’s a seven, one of the beautiful things about him is he would text me and be like, “Hi. I’m doing this,” and then five minutes later would be like, “I’m doing this,” and it was so exciting, especially he was trying to grow a business and so it was like, “I want to do this and I don’t want to do this.” For me, both as a business owner and a coach, but also as a two, I was reeling him in. I was like, “I love the energy. However, pick one thing and do that for a while before you go on to the next thing.”
Sarajane (00:37:30):
I will say I’m speaking really personally here and I’m being kind of harsh with myself just because I think that’s fun, but there are sevens who save money and who do great. I save money at this point in my life. We learn and we grow and that’s for every type. As we get healthier, these habits shift and change. I think in terms of strengths for us, we spend money on the things we love. W
e’re not afraid to treat ourselves or to do things that feel fun. We’re not as risk averse. We might take those financial risks that help us to have earning potential.
Tori (00:38:03):
Right. The YOLO energy is both good and bad with sevens. Yeah.
Sarajane (00:38:07):
100%.
Tori (00:38:09):
All right. I have so many friends who are eights. We have a couple eights on our team. I love a good type eight. Let’s talk about eights.
Sarajane (00:38:18):
I love eights, too.
Tori (00:38:19):
They are the Scorpios of the Enneagram. They do not put with your shit. I feel like I have a lot of eight tendencies, especially publicly. My public persona is very much eight. It’s just like, “Fuck you. If you cross me, go away.” I will defend who I need to defend, what I need to defend. Eights have really, yeah, passionate, justice-fueled energy.
Sarajane (00:38:49):
100%. Yeah. So our eights here are the challengers. They are motivated by, I mean, the message they received is that the world is a doggy dog place and only the strong survive, “So I need to become strong so that I don’t get taken.” They fear betrayal. They fear weakness. So they tend to power up when things get hard. Now, financial struggles, eights, more than any other Enneagram type, support their family members. So they tend to be really protective of their family members.
Tori (00:39:25):
You just said that. I have, again, two friends who are actually ex-clients of mine. So I know both their personal lives and their finances, and the two I’m thinking of, wow, yeah, really, really have gone above and beyond to make sure that their families are okay financially. Yeah.
Sarajane (00:39:41):
I have a type eight brother. We grew up really, really poor and he bought all of my clothes. He was 25 at the time. He worked his tail off, paid a lot of our bills, and bought me clothes so that I could not look poor at school. He would spend his 25-year-old money. He was a 25-year-old kid buying me things that I needed for school. That’s the eight energy. I think eights get a lot of bad press, but that’s the eight magic is they’re willing to do the hard things for the people they care about, and they don’t always get the credit for that either, which is intense. Yeah. So I think they tend to work really, really hard to take care of other people.
Sarajane (00:40:27):
The other element here for our eights is they don’t really know when to stop. So they’re very prone to burnout, burnout to the degree of physical illness. I’ve had eights say to me, “I didn’t know that I was working too hard until I had to go to the hospital.” More than one eight, lots of eights have told me that. So that’s the major thing I think of when I think of money and their relationship to money.
Sarajane (00:40:51):
When it comes to strengths with money, I mean, they’re not afraid to do hard things. That’s not intimidating to them. Things tend to feel really simple to them like, “Okay. I’m going to …” Well, you just do it. You’re supposed to do it, so you do it and you don’t complain about it.
Sarajane (00:41:08):
Now, they are also pretty bougie. Eights tend to do things to the extreme. So anything they like, they like it a lot. So sevens and eights are similar in the sense that we both like things a lot. Sevens like a lot of things, eights like things to have something to the maximum. So I like whiskey. I’m going to get the most whiskey. Sevens, “I like whiskey. I’m going to try every whiskey there is in the world.” So they can go to the extreme in either direction, in deprivation or in pleasure.
Tori (00:41:41):
Yeah. All right. Our final type, our little peacekeepers, our nines.
Sarajane (00:41:46):
Yeah. So our nines are the peacekeepers. Their message is that they need to be easy to get along with. They fear separation from the people that they care about, and the struggles that they tend to have have to do with numbness to self and numbness to life. They don’t like to feel too much, too intense, and they unconsciously just numb out whether that’s through their phones or through TV or whatever they choose to do. They also may struggle with prioritization knowing what’s most important and where to go next, and beca
use of that, that can cause them to be pretty intense procrastinators, struggling to get started.
Sarajane (00:42:22):
So I imagine the struggles that they would have with money come from, “I don’t even know where to start. The idea of this is so overwhelming. I can’t even look at it.” So they probably ignore their bank accounts. They probably have struggled to start a retirement account. Unless it’s being done for them by someone who’s either a little bit more assertive or their career, they’re not very likely to go out and proactively create these systems for themselves.
Sarajane (00:42:50):
Strengths-wise, they don’t need a lot. They tend to be pretty chill people. They’re not like the seven. When we escape our pain, we’re spending a ton of money. They’re more likely to just quiet, stay in, stay at home, maybe go out in nature. They’re probably not big spenders in the same sense that other types might be.
Tori (00:43:10):
Yeah. That was so helpful. Thank you. I’m spontaneously deciding to go somewhere different in this interview. We always joke at Her First $100K. We’ve all taken the Enneagram as a team because we’ve found it’s been really helpful, both for understanding more about ourselves and also understanding how we work together. Kristen, our lovely podcast producer, has not been able to figure out her type but not for lack of trying. This woman knows so much about the Enneagram.
Tori (00:43:35):
So Kristen, I’m putting you on the spot, and I want to see if we can figure out your type live on the show or at least give a better insight. So Kristen, if you had to guess maybe top two, top three, what are the ones you oscillate between?
Kristen (00:43:51):
Oh, honestly, it’s been a journey. When I first took the Enneagram as test, I typed as a seven and there were pieces. I think what’s hard is that I very much resonate with pieces of multiple types. I would say I feel like I lean toward a six at moments, but I think, yeah, I don’t know. I partially think I went through a lot in my late teens and I’m fine talking about it. I went through some traumaticky emotional stuff and I really genuinely feel like there are some things that I reacted to out of that that just hung with me through my 20s. So when you say go back to your early 20s, I honestly don’t remember a ton. I don’t have a good vision of myself at the time.
Kristen (00:44:45):
So I think that it makes it an interesting conversation. So I try to look at myself now and there are moments … My spouse is a four, no doubt. Cackling when you were talking about the four, cackling in this room. I’m not kidding. It was hysterical because I was like, “Yeah.” We literally had a conversation last night because he was like, “I’m just really into men’s fashion right now and I want to go to this boutique here in town and they have these really great … Look at this suede bomber.” He’s like, “I really want to have my garden party look ready for the summer.”
Tori (00:45:25):
Oh, my God!
Sarajane (00:45:26):
We married the same person.
Kristen (00:45:28):
It’s amazing because it’s so true and it’s so honest. It’s genuine, 100% because what you said about trying to determine, basically predetermining who you are going to be, that’s very much what he would do. So he finds this thing that he wants to be and he goes, “Okay. How do I piece this together?” but like you said, he wants to buy nicer pieces and he’ll buy a little a time. I mean, he is also a musician. So same thing here, but yeah, that cracked me up. I would say that more lately I would say I lean toward a six, but also, a lot of people thought I was a three.
Tori (00:46:10):
I don’t think you’re a three. If I had to guess, I don’t think you’re a three and the reason I wanted to bring you on, not just I want to figure out your type because I want you to figure out your type, but also I think if you’re listening and you’re the person … I so clearly am a two. I identify as that so hard. I think it’s very, very easy to take any test and be like, “Yeah. I don’t know, though. What am I actually?” Sarajane, what questions do you typically ask or can we get to the bottom of it?
Sarajane (00:46:36):
Yeah. I’m ready to go.
Tori (00:46:39):
I love it.
Sarajane (00:46:40):
When you think about maybe fitting in with a group or the repeated patterns of things that just kept catching you up.
Kristen (00:46:49):
I would say that, really, when people met me, I would come off as … A lot of people thought I was a bitch. That’s the nicest way to say it when people first met me, especially in high school. I did not feel like that. I very much felt very open, very easy to talk to. I was a little shy at times, which is so funny because, Tori, you know me a little bit, and my friends called me the wallflower in high school.
Tori (00:47:19):
God, no.
Kristen (00:47:20):
I know. I know, and I’m like, “I’m a very. I’m not a wallflower.” I’m a theater person, right? I’m an actor, which not that other actors are not wallflowers because I know plenty, but yeah, my friend used to call me her wallflower. I would go into new situations and I would be very. I would be like, “How do I figure out? How do I relate?” You what I mean? It would take me a long time and I think that’s why I’d come off.
Tori (00:47:43):
Right. Well, immediately, I want to psychoanalyze you and say maybe your response to wallflower was, “I’m not going to be that,” so you went so far in the other direction.
Kristen (00:47:53):
Oh, and I absolutely would at times. There would be times where when people really got to know me I was like, “Let me be the most bombastic person you’ve ever met in your life.” I also have a tendency to say the thing that nobody else wants to say in the room, sometimes very off the cuff. I’ve definitely gotten in trouble for it because I think things and then they come out of my mouth.
Sarajane (00:48:12):
Can I ask you another question? Do you tend to, when you meet a new person, are you sizing them up as to whether or not you can trust them? Are you like-
Kristen (00:48:21):
Yes.
Sarajane (00:48:21):
… looking for … Okay.
Kristen (00:48:23):
I do that very energetically. That’s the only way I can explain it is I can very quickly, yeah, I can very quickly tell I always know if there’s something a little bit off about a person.
Sarajane (00:48:34):
Do you feel like when a room is really, really happy and energetic that you unconsciously want to bring it down, and if it’s really down that you want to bring it up?
Kristen (00:48:44):
Yes. Yeah.
Sarajane (00:48:47):
Okay. So what part of six does not resonate for you?
Kristen (00:48:52):
Very selfishly, I know that six is very common, and there’s a part of me that’s like, “I don’t want to be common.”
Tori (00:49:00):
You little four.
Sarajane (00:49:01):
I understand that.
Kristen (00:49:04):
Yeah. I know it. Yeah. There are moments where I think people … I’ve resonated with … My husband’s name is Austin. I’ve resonated with him on that because he would say the same thing, right? He’s like, “I don’t want to be mediocre.”
Tori (00:49:17):
Kristen, that’s so funny. You’re like, “The only reason,” you’re like, “I can’t be a six is because I don’t want to …” You’re like, “I don’t want to be in Slytherin so I must be a Gryffindor.”
Sarajane (00:49:27):
Well, my other question is when you experience fear, do you tend to run toward it like, “Okay. I’m going to prove that I can handle this,” or do you tend to say, “I’m going to back off of this. I’m going to run away”?
Kristen (00:49:42):
I would tend to avoid. I definitely am leave before I get hurt type of … I mean, there are definitely situations where that’s different. I do find that I’ll oscillate, but I am definitely someone who’s more I will step back.
Sarajane (00:49:57):
Well, I think you might be a six.
Tori (00:50:00):
I feel like we’re giving a diagnosis.
Sarajane (00:50:04):
I also think it’s helpful to say that those stats are not based in reality, right? The idea that sixes are the majority is a made up statistic that I think isn’t necessary for us to hold onto because it doesn’t really serve a purpose.
Kristen (00:50:21):
Yeah. I can think of a lot of situations where when I feel, and this might be a five wing because that’s another number that we’ve thought of too is because I definitely am like an information person and I definitely need to understand all of the facts first, but with other sixes, I’ve noticed when I’ve had friendships with them, if I feel like they need me too much, I start to go, “No, no, no, no, no.” You know what I mean? I start to pull back. I think that’s maybe because I probably also … You know what I mean? When it’s not opposites attract, but same Zs repel. Is that a thing? Yeah.
Sarajane (00:50:59):
Well, let’s play with five a little bit if you’re okay with that.
Kristen (00:51:02):
Sure.
Sarajane (00:51:03):
Okay. I don’t want to … because I met you four minutes ago.
Kristen (00:51:07):
Yeah. Absolutely.
Sarajane (00:51:07):
So I don’t want to push you into a six, for sure. So when it comes to five elements, are there things that resonate and don’t resonate for you?
Kristen (00:51:17):
The grouping of friendships, these people get to know this information, these people get to know this information, and then a very private class of people gets to know this information. That was an interesting thing when I found out about that, but again, I know that that could be part of the safety thing as well with sixes. So yeah, and I mean, I really genuinely have just come to six more recently because I would say that I’ve floated everywhere around it.
Kristen (00:51:47):
So I think I’m looking at the sides and going, “Why did I maybe think I was a five or a seven or even a three?” which makes sense because you got wings and then you also have heart and stress. So yeah, but I identify with that with the five, and then I do also identify with the information, just needing a lot of information to understand things and to feel good.
Kristen (00:52:13):
I will say in this conversation, listening to how you talked about money, I think it actually pushed me more towards six because you talked about, especially with investing, this fear that if I put it in, what happens if I can’t get it back? I literally said that sentence to my husband the other night. I’m like, “I know that I should be investing. I know that we have an emergency fund. I know that we have extra money saved, but when I put money in the Roth IRA, it is never coming back.”
Tori (00:52:40):
I was going to say as your resident financial educator, it will come back and it will come back with
a lot more money. So please invest in your Roth IRA.
Kristen (00:52:48):
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, and I am and I did. Yup, and I did. I put the monthly amount that I have predetermined.
Tori (00:52:57):
Totally valid fear. Yeah.
Kristen (00:52:58):
Yeah. I would say that in my early 20s, again, as a response to some handling of trauma, I was just a much more erratic person and I think that’s why it was hard for me to look back at my 20s and go, “Oh, yeah, that’s how I acted at times,” because I think if I was acting like a three in my early 20s, it’s because I was not healthy.
Sarajane (00:53:24):
Okay. I have one more question for you. When you’re in conflict, do you tend, let’s say you get into a fight with your sibling or a parent, do you move toward them in order to please and make things right or do you pull away and isolate?
Kristen (00:53:40):
I pull away and isolate usually and I usually just shut down completely. It’s literally like the emotions inside me dry up temporarily in a very … It’s a numbing thing. It’s 100% a numbing thing. That makes me-
Sarajane (00:53:57):
Okay. I have more question.
Kristen (00:53:59):
You can see. Honestly, it makes me feel better because I feel like I’ve been going … Literally, I learned about the Enneagram in 2015. I’ve known about it for seven years. I still just spent this entire time circling and not ever feeling completely understood in it, which is frustrating.
Sarajane (00:54:19):
So the reason this happens a lot of the time is because we are a counter type. So every Enneagram type has three subtypes, social, sexual, and self-preservation. Each Enneagram type has one of those subtypes that is a counter type, meaning in behavior, you act differently than your motivation. So I’m curious if you might be a counter type of one of the numbers that you resonate with where you resonate with the motivation, but maybe your behaviors look different or they’re in conflict.
Sarajane (00:54:46):
So one of the pieces here for five is there’s the sexual five, which can look sometimes like a four. They’re more into one-to-one relationships. They’re very curious about people, but I don’t know if that’s where you’re at. I don’t know if five’s your dominant type, but do you have one of the core motivations where who you think you have to be that you’re like, “I definitely think I have to be this thing, but my behavior doesn’t look like that Enneagram type.”
Kristen (00:55:20):
I’m really trying to think. That’s good. Who I have to be? Yeah. It’s a hard question for me to access. I also feel like I change a lot. I’m a very mercurial person in some ways. I would say that I’m rock steady in a lot of ways, right? I definitely have my pillars, but a lot of things around me will change frequently. My passions, the way that I vacillate between friend groups, what I believe. I can be very mercurial in that way. So sometimes when I have to ask that question of, “What do I feel like I need to be?” it’s very hard for me to answer.
Tori (00:55:56):
I will say, Kristen, though, knowing you, fours are the one where they need an identity, right? I feel like, especially with your relationship with theater, is it was like, “I am an actor. I need that identity even though I might not be acting anymore.” In our conversations privately, we can cut this, but our conversations privately about your career and what you wanted to do, it was trying to figure out, “Am I a marketer? Am I a this? Am I a that?” So I see a little bit of four energy, at least in your career where it was like, “I need to have … This needs to make sense to me and be motivated by what I want.”
Kristen (00:56:33):
Yeah. I think some of that, too, is, to go a little deeper, is that I think social media tells you have to be one thing, too. So I definitely think I struggle … I do struggle with that like, “Am I just a multi-hyphenate? Well, that feels really broad and I don’t really like …” You know what I mean? Who I have to be in this world? Well, we’re-
Tori (00:56:55):
What I would argue, Kristen, is probably part of the reason why finding your Enneagram type has been so difficult is you’re lik
e, “You can’t nail me down. I don’t want to be nailed down. I’m a bunch of different things, but also I don’t want to be a bunch of different things. So how do I find one?”
Kristen (00:57:09):
Yes. I would absolutely say that that is very much true. I get very uncomfortable in one skin for too long. I just get a little …
Sarajane (00:57:20):
Yeah. Can I ask? Do you tend to be quick to take action, slow to take action or take the action that you’re told you should take?
Kristen (00:57:28):
Gosh, it depends on the scenario. I do definitely go to people who I trust for advice. Absolutely. I’m very much like a … A lot of times I will.
Tori (00:57:38):
Kristen, you went to Sophia being like, “Should I be a podcast manager?” Right?
Kristen (00:57:43):
Yup. Yeah. I will, a lot of times, wait for someone else’s validation of what I am already feeling. I would say that as a struggle in my life. If we were to look back at, and that I think is another tenet of the six is the inability to trust your own self, not the inability to because you can learn to, but the natural tendency to not want to trust yourself. Yeah. I would definitely say that feels right. Probably some religious upbringing there, too, that I think that not to shit on all religious upbringing, though as I say shit, but I think that there are certain tenets. I think there’s a lot of teachings that I maybe was privy to that said you can’t trust your thoughts, you can’t trust anything but a deity or someone who is the voice for that deity, and that can be very harmful.
Kristen (00:58:36):
I do think it is. Yeah. I think that has been something that I do struggle with. So I do tend to, unless it’s something I’m very sure of, I will ask my husband 15 times, “Do you think this is the right decision? Should I? Maybe I’m just going to sit on it for another five minutes. No, maybe another day, maybe another three days, maybe another two months,” and then two months later, I won’t have talked about it all and be like, “Hey Austin, do you remember that thing that I brought up that one time?” It’s literally like buying a gumball. It’s-
Sarajane (00:59:08):
So I think you’re a six boom.
Kristen (00:59:10):
Boom! Boom, baby.
Tori (00:59:12):
We love it. If you had to get, you’re probably a six swing thought, right?
Kristen (00:59:16):
Oh, my gosh!
Tori (00:59:18):
It sounds like we’ve got some five tendencies. Yeah, and I don’t really see seven in you.
Sarajane (00:59:23):
I would guess that maybe you’re a social subtype, which is the dutiful one who’s looking for, “What’s the right thing to do? I will make sure that I’m doing the right thing.” So sometimes there’s a little bit of one energy there, but it’s really coming from a place of seeking certainty.
Kristen (00:59:40):
Yeah. Like I said, you talking through the money stuff, that was honestly more clarity than almost anything I’ve read just because, well, yeah, because I’m like, “That’s a very tangible thing that I know exactly how I am,” and it was very easy for me to hear, “Oh.” So I think that that helped right before Tori was like, “Let me pull you on,” and I’m like, “Well, I think maybe I figured it out, but sure. Let’s play an experiment. Let’s play a game.
Sarajane (01:00:08):
I love it.
Tori (01:00:08):
Well, we got one person typed, baby. Literally, it’s been like a saga. Every time we have a team retreat, nobody’s like, “Share your Enneagram type,” and Kristen‘s like, “I don’t know mine.”
Kristen (01:00:19):
I can give you my entire astrology chart. I am a Scorpio sun and moon with a Pisces rising.
Tori (01:00:23):
It’s amazing. Kristen, thanks for your vulnerability. Thanks for just popping on. Sarajane, that was beautiful. That was masterful. That was great.
Kristen (01:00:30):
Oh, my God! Yeah. How fun.
Sarajane (01:00:34):
Thank you for doing that. That was so fun.
Tori (01:00:36):
Yeah. That’s perfect. Amazing. That was a fun game show. Who’s that Enneagram? What’s your type? There it is.
Sarajane (01:00:44):
Yeah. That’s so fun.
Tori (01:00:46):
Oh, that was fun. Okay. We also have another game. We’re doing a lightning round Enneagram typing but very stereotyping about money. Are you ready?
Sarajane (01:00:58):
Cannot wait. Okay.
Tori (01:00:59):
Okay. Which type is most likely to have books as one of the things that they value spending their money on?
Sarajane (01:01:07):
Oh, type five. Yeah.
Tori (01:01:09):
Nice. Why?
Sarajane (01:01:12):
That’s the joy of their life is knowledge and reading. One time I described five’s mind as a cozy library, and I’ve never been thanked more for anything I’ve ever said. It’s like, “That is what my mind is like. Thank you.”
Tori (01:01:28):
Which type is most likely to buy a last minute flight deal?
Sarajane (01:01:33):
Oh, sevens.
Tori (01:01:33):
Definitely.
Sarajane (01:01:34):
Yeah. I think it’s hard for us not to buy the last minute flight deal.
Tori (01:01:39):
It’s so cheap, though. I have to do it. I don’t care where we go. Let’s go.
Sarajane (01:01:43):
Yeah. I have an app that pings me, and every time I’m like, “Oh, I’m not-“
Tori (01:01:47):
Scott’s Cheap Fights? Is it Scott’s Cheap Flights?
Sarajane (01:01:50):
It’s Fare Drop, but-
Tori (01:01:52):
We’ll link both. Both of them are …
I have a link. I’ll link you. It’s so good. It literally emails me from whatever airport I choose. So it’s like, “From Seattle.” Literally, I got one today. It was like, “Seattle to Vegas. It’s less than 200,” and I was like, “I hate Vegas, but do I go?”
Sarajane (01:02:09):
I know. Actually, I’ve literally set myself up for my specific brand of torture by downloading this app and I can’t stop.
Tori (01:02:17):
You’re wanting for punishment, baby. Let’s go. All right. The type most likely to overspend on clothing.
Sarajane (01:02:25):
I would say fours.
Tori (01:02:26):
Okay. Yeah. That makes sense.
Sarajane (01:02:27):
I want to say threes, but I think it’s fours.
Tori (01:02:29):
We talked about this briefly. Type that is most likely to be an oversaver.
Sarajane (01:02:33):
Fives and sixes. Yeah.
Tori (01:02:37):
Yeah. The type most likely to have a Roth IRA, a 401(k) and a brokerage account before they turn 25.
Sarajane (01:02:46):
Well, I want to say threes, but also maybe twos because I mean you’re out here doing it.
Tori (01:02:51):
We are, but I have a lot of three tendencies. Yeah. Cool. Likely to spend money on front row seats for their favorite band.
Sarajane (01:03:03):
Fours, and threes, too.
Tori (01:03:06):
Yeah. Cool. Most likely to spend the most at Christmas on presents. We already know who this is.
Sarajane (01:03:12):
Oh, that’s twos. That’s our twos.
Tori (01:03:14):
… or maybe an eight. We could see eight, too, if you’re giving to your family, 100%. We could see that in eights as well.
Sarajane (01:03:20):
Especially if your family is poor and you have some money, then the eights are challenged.
Tori (01:03:27):
Eights are doing the giving a goat, where you can donate a goat for … You’re like, “Oh, the person who doesn’t need anything I will donate a goat in your name to a family who needs it in an African country,” right? That kind of shit or, “I’ll make a donation in your name to a charity.”
Sarajane (01:03:45):
… or, “I physically flew there and built a well with my bare hands.”
Tori (01:03:49):
It’s very much an eight, “Look at the hands.” Yeah. That’s totally eights. Most likely to avoid looking at their bank account.
Sarajane (01:03:57):
Ooh, sevens and nines.
Tori (01:04:01):
Those are nines. The type that has the best budgeting spreadsheet you’ve ever seen.
Sarajane (01:04:06):
Ooh, I’m going to go fives and threes.
Tori (01:04:10):
Cool. I was surprised you didn’t say one. That was what I thought you were going to say.
Sarajane (01:04:16):
Oh, yeah. They might. Yeah. I’m sorry, ones. I think ones do win on that one.
Tori (01:04:18):
Yeah, budgeting the perfect budgeting spreadsheet, yeah, or even threes maybe, too. I could see the threes trying to get their budget together. Okay. Finally, the type that has the most robust emergency fund, the biggest emergency fund you’ve ever seen to prep for any natural disaster.
Sarajane (01:04:35):
Oh, those are our sweet sixes. Oh. They’ve got it.
Tori (01:04:38):
Prepping for any natural disaster. Kristen‘s got that big ass emergency fund.
Kristen (01:04:44):
Let me just tell you. I literally just had the conversation where I was like, “Hey, Austin. I think we should just, to be safe, double armor.”
Sarajane (01:04:55):
We typed her right, folks. We got her-
Tori (01:04:56):
Kristen, I remind you, you wrote these questions. So if you didn’t want to get called out, you shouldn’t wrote the questions.
Kristen (01:05:06):
Listen, listen, listen. I love the call out. I literally just texted Austin and I was like, “I just called you out so hard on this podcast. Everybody’s going to know about your garden party look.”
Tori (01:05:15):
Oh, he just wants the garden party.
Kristen (01:05:19):
It’s his dream. It’s his dream to be at a dapper garden. You know what I mean? To just walk in, grab a … He drinks beer, not cocktails, to be fair. I was going to say, I feel like the cocktail goes more with the garden party theme, but it’s fine, it’s okay. We let him like what he likes, but yes, but he does like eccentric beers. He likes Hefeweizen and-
Tori (01:05:41):
Boujee, the Boujee beer. Yeah. Beautiful.
Kristen (01:05:43):
It’s not your Bud Lights. Oh, yeah, and it’s the ones from Germany, too, except for, except for, and if you didn’t know this, Trader Joe’s has a Hefeweizen-
Tori (01:05:52):
Kristen‘s dropping all sorts of knowledge.
Kristen (01:05:56):
… called Josef Hofbauer, called Josef Hofbauer. I want you to just think about that. I just want you to let that permeate your brain for a second, Josef Hofbauer.
Tori (01:06:01):
This is now Kristen‘s podcast. We’re just living in it. I’m here for it.
Kristen (01:06:06):
I’ll go away again. I’m sorry, but you-
Tori (01:06:10):
We typed her folks. It’s great. They got that robust emergency fund.
Kristen (01:06:14):
Yeah.
Tori (01:06:14):
Sarajane, anything else to add about Enneagrams and money or if you are trying to figure out either your type or how to get better at money and use your type to your advantage, what advice would you give?
Sarajane (01:06:28):
Yes. So I think it’s similar. So when you think about typing yourself, it’s really thinking about who you think you have to be in the world, the standard you’re holding yourself to, and an expectation. Now, with that being said, when it comes to growing with the Enneagram, it’s so helpful to remember that these are our coping skills. So sometimes we need them to cope, right? Sometimes there’s correct times that they are going to show up and they’re going to get us through a really hard time and that’s okay. The real work here is recognizing, “When am I using this at the wrong time, with the wrong people in the wrong way to where it’s causing harm to myself or to others and what behavior can I choose instead?”
Sarajane (01:07:10):
We don’t have to be so hard on ourselves. I think we can get caught up in, “I’m failing at the Enneagram,” or “I’m doing it right,” or “I’m doing it wrong.” Sometimes you need it and sometimes you don’t, and when we use it when we don’t need it, sometimes that causes harm.
Tori (01:07:22):
Totally. Thank you so much for coming on the show. Where can people find you?
Sarajane (01:07:25):
Yeah. Find me @SarajaneCase on Instagram, @Enneagramandcoffee, the podcast. I have a new book coming out in the fall called The Enneagram Letters, which you can pre-order now. So you can go ahead and check it out.
Tori (01:07:39):
Yay. We’ll drop everything in the show notes. Thanks for being here.
Sarajane (01:07:40):
Yeah. Thanks for having me.
Tori (01:07:45):
Thank you again to Sarajane for joining us for this episode. We just had so much fun. I think there was a gas leak in the studio. We just had a great time. She was so lovely to talk to and is such a wealth of knowledge about the Enneagram and how to make it relevant to your own life. Find her new book, The Enneagram Letters. Out now, and make sure to follow Sarajane on social. We have all of her links in the show notes.
Tori (01:08:07):
As always, please make sure if you’re enjoying Financial Feminist to subscribe and leave us a review on your preferred podcasting platform. We release a ton of content on our Financial Feminist podcast. Instagram that explores more content of the episode, connects you to the guests. So if you’re not already following us over there, please feel free to do so.
Tori (01:08:26):
If you are joining us and this is something you’re new to, our money personality quiz is absolutely free and it is the best way to get started with our resources. If you are financially struggling, you’re wondering where to start, you’re like, “Where do I go?” we have compiled all of those resources very specifically by personality, by what your goals are. So feel free to take that quiz. It is always linked in our show notes.
Tori (01:08:50):
Thank you for your support. As always, have a good week. Hang in their, Financial Feminist, and I’ll catch you later.
Tori (01:08:58):
Thank you for listening to Financial Feminist, a Her First $100K podcast. Financial Feminist is hosted by me, Tori Dunlap, produced by Kristen Fields, marketing and administration by Karina Patel, Olivia Coning, Cherise Wade, Elena Helzer, Helena Isaac, Sophia Cohen, Valerie Oresko, Jack Coning, and Ana Alexandria, research by Ariel Johnson, audio engineering by Austin Fields, promotional graphics by Mary Straton, photography by Sarah Wolfe, and theme music by Jonah Cohen
Sound.
Tori (01:09:28):
A huge thanks to the entire Her First $100K team and community for supporting the show. For more information about Financial Feminist, Her First $100K, our guests, and episode show notes, visit financialfeministpodcast.com.
Tori Dunlap
Tori Dunlap is an internationally-recognized money and career expert. After saving $100,000 at age 25, Tori quit her corporate job in marketing and founded Her First $100K to fight financial inequality by giving women actionable resources to better their money. She has helped over one million women negotiate salary, pay off debt, build savings, and invest.
Tori’s work has been featured on Good Morning America, the New York Times, BBC, TIME, PEOPLE, CNN, New York Magazine, Forbes, CNBC, BuzzFeed, and more.
With a dedicated following of almost 250,000 on Instagram and more than 1.6 million on TikTok —and multiple instances of her story going viral—Tori’s unique take on financial advice has made her the go-to voice for ambitious millennial women. CNBC called Tori “the voice of financial confidence for women.”
An honors graduate of the University of Portland, Tori currently lives in Seattle, where she enjoys eating fried chicken, going to barre classes, and attempting to naturally work John Mulaney bits into conversation.
