People who see the world interpersonally and define themselves through service to others.May be selfless, loving and giving or dependent, prideful and hostile. 

In the Enneagram’s organization, Twos, Threes and Fours form an emotional trio, in that they share general tendencies and undercurrents. People within this trio of styles can experience a kind of ongoing confusion about their identities, confusing who they are with the roles that they play and images of who they seem to be.

All personality styles do this somewhat, but Twos, Threes and Fours are most deeply prone to confuse seeming with being. They share a general propensity for losing track of how they actually feel in favor of how they imagine they feel within the roles they are playing. People with these styles are prone to conflicts in relationships and matters of the heart. 

Two is the most purely interpersonal of all the Enneagram styles. Twos are most apt to conceive of life as a fundamental give-and-take between people, regarding all human beings as members of one vast family. Within this point of view, giving love becomes the most important thing a Two can do.

People with this style have a well-developed capacity to identify emotionally with the needs of others. They have a strong unconscious habit of sending themselves over to other people and intuitively divining what another person might be feeling or needing. Healthy Twos practice this habit voluntarily; they willingly identify with another before returning to their own point of view. They are able to care for the needs of others, yet value their own emotional truth, and effectively attend to their own needs. The phrase "lend yourself to others but give yourself to yourself" describes what Twos do when healthy.

At their best, Twos are capable of truly selfless love and have exceptional ministerial skills. The biographies of some saints portray Twos dedicated to relieving material and spiritual suffering. Whether or not it has succeeded, the classical intention of Christianity is fundamentally Twoish.

When Twos are less healthy, they still send their attention over to others, but now they forget to return to their own position. They begin to repress their own needs and funnel their energies toward taking care of others whether others need it or not. Now they over-identify with others, losing their sense of themselves and compulsively giving in hopes of being recognized, appreciated and loved. Through the medium of other people, Twos try to give to themselves, to satisfy needs that they have rejected in themselves and relocated in others. Twos at this stage can also begin to fear being abandoned and alone.

Unhealthy Twos use flattery, manipulation and seduction to get others to respond to and define them. The Two’s need to give is so strong that it becomes selfish and what is given comes with an invisible price tag. It is often a high price as Twos, to compensate for having lost their real self, begin to inflate and exaggerate the importance of what they give to others. This exaggerated self-importance is otherwise known as pride, and when Twos are very unhealthy, pridefulness becomes their most striking feature.

Not surprisingly, Twos can struggle in relationships since it’s important to know your own true feelings and motives in order to relate honestly to others. When Twos are deeply unhealthy, they are typically quite deluded about their motives. They replace their real feelings of selfish desperation and aggression with the image of an altruistic martyr who is owed big sums for their wonderful efforts. What maddens and confuses others about unhealthy Twos is the way they package what feels like hostility as love.

The saintly high side of this style is very high indeed while the lowest expression can be drastically destructive. The motif of stalking an objectified loved one goes with the unhealthy side of this style as does the metaphor of the vampire, who lives on the blood of others.
 

About the Contributor:

Thomas Condon has worked with the Enneagram since 1980. He has taught classes at schools like Antioch University, and the University of California, Berkeley, as well as hundreds of workshops in the U.S., Asia, and Europe. He is the author of 50 audiotapes, 19 videotapes and two books, soon to be more. You can find more information like this, his books, and his tapes at his wesite here.