I have realized, in my many attempts to get a satisfactory answer to what I fall under in the Enneagram types and justify my behavioral preferences in Emergenetics, that I am much more opinionated than I may seem to be.  Answering the questions they pose has gotten me deeply introspective about my person.  According to my profile, I should be more assertive than I feel I am and far more ready to express my opinions.  Yet, I find that I hold my tongue a lot and keep my thoughts to myself, save for some ranting to Panda (poor guy) and occasional references to it in my writing.  As I started to reflect more on what kind of a person I am and how I interact with and fit into the world, I began to see that yes, I am rather assertive and gregarious about how I feel.  It’s just that few things seem important enough for me to actually express my thoughts on it, so I usually opt to keep it in rather than allow any brashness to come out and hurt others.

This is where I keep my spontaneity in check, to ensure the peace is not disturbed unless I just can’t contain it anymore or determine that the benefits of doing so outweigh the costs.  I’m a very analytical person, so I prefer to sit around thinking about my options, weighing them in turn.  I tend to see many points of view, so it takes me time to process them all and evaluate the best course of action.  Internally I may be fuming, but externally I am quiet and withdrawn as I retreat to my thoughts to digest what is going on.  I like to fantasize and get lost in my imagination to escape what bothers me in this world and dream up scenarios in which problems could be aired out.  Yet because of this, I tend to miss the boat and if and when I decide it’s time to react, the time has passed and it would be inappropriate for me to bring up and address the issue again.  I don’t like to be confrontational, so I often try to express my feelings by saying things that can suggest how I really think about things.  Because of this, I often feel suppressed and, in a sense, shackled.

So, it’s not that I don’t stand up for what I believe in; I’m actually quite stubborn and adamant about the things I’m truly vested in, mentally and emotionally.  Once I do get going, I don’t like to back down and I can get very passionate in promoting my thoughts.  I’m also the type to notice a lot of details and can get primed to notice ones that annoy me more and more, which then starts to wear away at my patience.  Sometimes what it takes to get me to cross the threshold into openly expressing my opinion is just that process of getting weary of putting up with something.  At some point, I reach a level that then pushes me to release my ideas to the world.  Usually this stuff is not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, so I have learned to filter everything through a screening process to allow myself time and force myself to reason to see what doesn’t really matter in the end.  I guess giving myself the opportunity to mull things over is my own way of counting to ten.

It’s an interesting observation about myself that I always knew, but haven’t really explored (at least not lately).  Most of my frustrations stem from this tendency and I’m trying to find a way of handling it that doesn’t shortchange me and my reactions.  I hate stepping on toes though, so I tend to just get walked all over.  I’ve thought about setting a designated time to bring up these issues so I can get it out there without being in the heat of the moment, but I can’t bring myself to even get that going.  By the time I want to, I’ve convinced myself that it’s really not that big a deal and I don’t want to be petty.  Yet, time and time again it just comes back to haunt me and grate away at my nerves.  Am I undervaluing myself?  Or am I just being too observant, too anal?  I need to find more peace in my life.  A deeper sense of calm and contentment.  To an extent, I wish I was as easy-going and relaxed as Zen always appears to be.