How to Practice Self-Forgiveness, Based on Your Enneagram Type
By Rev. Nhien Vuong
Posted on May 17, 2025
-“Love cannot abide where it is not welcomed.” Enneagram mentor Rev. Nhien Vuong teaches each Enneagram type how to practice self-forgiveness.
Forgiving ourselves for things we’ve done wrong is not about refusing to take responsibility for our actions. In fact, it is vital to take whatever steps we can to make amends and rectify past harms towards others.
Self-forgiveness as an inner act, too, is an essential part of the spiritual journey. No matter how hard we might wish or pray for it, we cannot access Divine Love if we are the very ones punishing ourselves. Love cannot abide where it is not welcomed.
Indeed, taking personal responsibility does not mean we need to lock up our souls in a self-made purgatory or exile our hearts from Divine Grace and human belonging. The following practices are about embracing the irrevocable truth that your essence is whole and good; that every fiber of your being is worthy of love and forgiveness. Resolve in this moment to set yourself free to live and love openheartedly so you can more fully experience and express Divine Love throughout the remainder of your precious and sacred lifetime.
Self-Forgiveness Practices by Enneagram Type
Don’t know your Enneagram type? Try this quiz here.
Type One
No one gets everything right. No one does everything perfectly. Do not punish yourself for being human. Send more love and compassion to yourself when you discover that you’ve erred, not less! Be a place of peace for yourself, not an enabler of inner violence.
Type Two
It is not your job to make everyone happy. It is not reasonable to expect everyone to like you. Yet when important relationships aren’t as strong or as positive as you would like them to be, you take on more than your share of blame and responsibility. Do your best to let this go.
Type Three
Until you forgive yourself, you’ll spend the rest of your days—and nights—overcompensating where you feel you have failed. As you push yourself harder and harder, you may end up further and further away from your true path. Forgive yourself so you can welcome the full worthiness of who you are today and don’t have to keep looking for it in the future.
Type Four
What you most need to forgive in yourself isn’t one thing or another that you did; rather, it’s who you are (or think you are). Let go of condemnation and shame and give yourself a new start. Forgive yourself for who you thought you should be or might have been. Find your voice and power in fully embracing all your traits, as well as the essence of who you are in this moment today.
Type Five
You tend to harbor resentment toward anyone you believe has rejected you. By rejecting them in response, you spare yourself from having to accept how you were critiqued. If you make them smaller or more inferior by condemning them, then they have no authority to judge you. Notice, though, what you have not yet forgiven in yourself. Likely it has to do with an area in which you feel fearful or incompetent. If someone else has triggered you, chances are that before you can forgive them, you need to release this high expectation of your own capabilities.
Type Six
No amount of vigilance can possibly keep everyone you love, including you, safe. Yet when harm occurs, you often judge yourself harshly. Letting the Ghost of Mistakes Past haunt and torment you is inhumane. Moreover, it only fuels more anxiety and second-guessing, which prevents you from making wise and compassionate decisions both in the present and the future. Set yourself free from the shackles of the past.
Type Seven
If you are on a path of self-awareness, you may be starting to realize all the dreams you’ve sabotaged, the bridges you’ve burned, and the love you’ve been too afraid to lean into. The belief that it is darkest before dawn feels especially relevant. Your willingness to stay with the darkness—to feel your own fears, anger, resentment, or grief deep in your heart and bones—and not hastily move on allows you to experience the dawning of a truly new and transformed life.
Type Eight
Do not confuse moving on with letting go. Forgive yourself the big dreams that never fully materialized, the people you couldn’t help, and the important situations you couldn’t control. Your vision and appetite for bigness is a gift, but it is also a heavy burden. There is power you can claim in the present when you get real about what happened in the past. Bring compassionate strength to all that you have not yet grieved so you can finally let go.
Type Nine
When you finally wake up to parts of yourself that went to sleep—whether for weeks, months, or years—it’s easy to be hard on yourself. Do not judge yourself for what you weren’t ready to see or know or act on until now. Weep if you need to for your old self and life, but don’t condemn yourself. This will only make you want to go back into hiding. Resist your tendency toward inertia. Coax yourself out further with self-forgiveness and loving-kindness.
Reflection
After trying the practice aligned with your Enneagram type, did you find that you could forgive yourself? If not, then consider what is truly in the way of your self-forgiveness. Ask yourself: How does my unforgiveness serve me? What does it help me to do? What does it protect me from? What do I fear will happen if I forgive myself? Self-forgiveness becomes easier once we realize that compassion can help us respond more effectively to life than unforgiveness can.
