March Madness

With both March Madness basketball tourney and the Olympics, all Enneagram students can see style 3 in action.
Two characteristics plague style three: competition and external rewards. Threes will work incredibly hard for trophies, salaries, credits, gold stars, applause, medals or any indication outside themselves that they have done well. Their ability to focus on a task for an extrinsic reward is remarkable. So when a medal or a championship is at stake, they really perform.
But they also do what they do and do it well best when in competition with others. When Tiger Woods was interviewed by Morley Safer on 60 minutes, he said he was competitive in everything. When Safer asked him, "So if we played a game of cards, you would try to beast me." Tiger answered, "No, I'd kick your ass." That's intense competition. And Michael Phelps was asked if he every provoked a competitor he answered with a smile, "I love the competition. It's what feeds me." Both men are style Threes.

We have an Enneagram Three culture so we believe in competition, but Alfie Kohn has a great book, "No Contest," that details all the way competition hurts us. If you are a teacher or a parent, you might check it out -- we need to be aware of cultural pressures.