Utopian Visionary meets Nurturer or, Jeff Bezos meets Paula Abdul

Today's letter is U, and we're matching the Utopian Visionary personality Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, with a Nurturer, Paula Abdul.

Utopian Visionaries are entrepreneurs, jetsetters, visionaries who sometimes sacrifice themselves to fulfill their utopian ideals. They’re willing to gamble, even if they lose. They’re inventors, futurists. Ideas spew out of them, and it’s difficult for them to rein it all in. Life is full of endless possibilities for them. Read more about the Utopian Visionary personality. (Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.)

The Nurturer personality is also a Matriarch, a Diva, a Guardian Angel or Fairy Godmother; a Nurse; a Cook; a Sidekick or friend; a Mother; a Stage Mother; a Matchmaker. She’s a lot of things, but what they all have in common is that she takes care of the young, sick, helpless and elderly. Denying her own needs (yes, men can also have this personality type, but most often, nurturers are women), they’re always helping others, but find it hard to ask for help when they need it. Beneath it all, they secretly hope that someone will notice their sacrifices and reward them with Diva treatment. Read more about the Nurturing personality.

So what might a relationship between these two personality types, if not these two people, be like?

This could be a fun match. Surprisingly enough, they can seem as if they’re of the same personality type. Both are outgoing, friendly, spontaneous, often funny, high-energy people. Both love the good things in life and want to have a good time. Both are optimistic, even after a setback.

The Nurturer would admire his chutzpah, and his adventurousness, his vision for life’s endless possibilities. She would even help him realize his plans. His vision is usually the focal point of their emotional life. Both will share the hope of a bright future together.

She’ll focus her life on his potential talents, and be fascinated by his sunny disposition. That he is always dissatisfied, oddly, attracts her. She (mistakenly) interprets his gluttony for experience as a search for emotional depth. She sees his lack of focus and feels compelled to make him more productive and to heal his underlying fears. He’ll respond by being a charming and often romantic playmate.

He’s going to follow his own interests even if she’s not around, so she’d better develop a few of her own. If she gives him enough freedom, he’ll be able to negotiate a commitment to her.

Both are averse to prolonged contact. He’ll feel limited by it. She’ll fear he might discover who she really is, which is frequently someone who lives through others, afraid to fill her own needs, much less know what they are. She may want more attention from him than he’s able to give, and when that happens, he starts seeming pretty shallow to her, whereas she seems like a drag to him.

If he’s wise, he’ll help her to be willing to pamper herself, which she’s not apt to do unless given tacit permission. He does it by reminding her that if she hopes to care for others, including him, she needs to take care of her own health and needs first. She’s very good at helping him feel fulfilled, which is good, because the Utopian Visionary—like the Salesperson and the Bon Vivant, who share related personality types—are the most apt to stray of all 27 personalities. 

The nurturer would bring caring and concern for others into the relationship. The Utopian Visionary would bring his wealth, both material and spiritual, making them a generous couple. As a couple, they are able to succeed at doing what few other couples can: they are warm and generous, loving and inclusive.

   

But this relationship also, frequently, turns sour. Utopian Visionaries are hard to pin down, and Nurturers are emotionally needy. Utopian Visionary personalities will sometimes sacrifice themselves to their ideals, and if they sacrifice themselves, they will surely sacrifice their relationships as well. These are society’s inventors and fururists, full of visionary ideals and willing to gamble their lives on them, even if they lose.

The Nurturer needs lots of couple time, and wants a family. The Utopian Visionary doesn’t want to be pinned down in these ways. They hate having their possibilities limited, including or especially settling down to one woman and having a family. They are true commitment phobes, whereas Nurturers are often ready to settle down at the bat of an eyelash. She’ll get possessive, manipulative and needy, and he’ll feel bored and trapped.

He also needs to be the center of everyone’s attention, including hers. Her needs mean little to him unless she’s able to match his energy and pace. She won’t mind this for a while, but eventually she’ll start to see him as a selfish playboy who is only using her. She might begin to withhold her attention from him, or to have her needs met in other ways such as overeating. Or she could develop health problems as a way of gaining his attention, which in turn will push him ever farther away from her. He is someone who cannot tolerate pain and suffering, his own or anyone else’s.     

Additional Information:

What is the Enneagram, and What are Enneagram Personality Types?  

What are Instinctual Subtypes?  

Traits of the 27 Individual Subtypes  

Sources from which I collected and synthesized information about the matches