Convergenza dei sistemi tipologici/en

The convergence of typological systems is the thesis, developed by the Paret Method School starting from the work of Marco Paret in the texts Le Flux Magnétique et les Savoirs Anciens (2017) and Hypnosis, Polyvagal Theory, and Somatic Liberation (in preparation for Springer), according to which all the great typological systems of tradition and contemporary psychology describe patterns of habitual trances — not fixed identities of the person, but autonomic, attentional, affective, and relational configurations in which the human organism stabilizes for functional economy, each described with the vocabulary and granularity of its own era.

This ethical-clinical thesis is the core of the School's typological reading: character is a set of habitual trances, not the ultimate identity of the person. The four humors of Hippocrates, the eight Logismoi of Evagrius, the Tria Prima of Paracelsus, the seven planetary types of the Hermetic tradition, the three Indian guṇa, Jung's typology and the MBTI, the Big Five, Eysenck's three axes, the contemporary Enneagram and the six states of Stephen Porges's Polyvagal Theory recognize — in their respective languages — the same phenomenon: the recurring tendency of the human organism to fixate on a few stable patterns of functioning.

The School's operational reference map is that of the six alchemical-polyvagal character types (plus a seventh integrated type), based on Paracelsus's Tria Prima systematized by Oswald Wirth and today correlated with polyvagal theory. Read through this map, each of the other typological systems becomes a magnification of a specific aspect of the same phenomenological reality — the eight logismoi on the side of pathological fixation, the enneagram on ego-defensive strategies, the Jungian typology / MBTI on cognitive functions, the Big Five on measurable dimensions, Eysenck on the three fundamental neurophysiological axes — and simultaneously confirms the main base map.

The School's proposal is not eclectic (it is not about summing everything up): it is hierarchical (one operational base-map + systems that specify it) and ethical (classifying to liberate, not to fix). The ultimate goal is the recognition of one's own habitual trance as a passage towards the integrated state that the School cultivates through the Integral Presence protocol.

I. The principle of convergence

Typological systems developed in very different eras and epistemic contexts:

Hippocratic and Galenic medicine (5th century BC - 2nd century AD) articulated the four temperaments (sanguine, choleric, melancholic, phlegmatic) based on humoral theory;
Patristic asceticism of Evagrius Ponticus (4th century) identified the eight logismoi as patterns of behavioral fixation;
Paracelsian alchemy (16th century) codified the Tria Prima (Sulfur, Mercury, Salt) as three principles of the living;
Traditional Hermetic astrology articulated the seven planetary types (Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sun, Venus, Mercury, Moon);
Indian Sāṃkhya thought and the Bhagavadgītā spoke of three guṇa (sattva, rajas, tamas) and their combinations;
Carl Gustav Jung (1921) distinguished two attitudes (introversion, extraversion) and four functions (thinking, feeling, sensation, intuition);
Hans Eysenck (1947, 1967) derived three basic neurophysiological dimensions (extraversion, neuroticism, psychoticism);
The contemporary enneagram (Ichazo, Naranjo, 1970s) articulated nine types organized into three triads (head, heart, gut);
Isabel Briggs Myers and Katharine Cook Briggs (1962) operationalized Jung into the sixteen-type MBTI test;
The Big Five model (Costa, McCrae 1985-1992) consolidated five measurable dimensions (openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism);
The Polyvagal Theory (Porges 1994) provided a physiological grammar with three main autonomic circuits and their combinations.

The principle of convergence upheld by the School is not that all these systems say the same thing — each has its own categories, its own questions, its own verification criteria. The thesis is more precise: each system recognizes and names, from its own vantage point, a tendency of the human organism to organize itself into a few stable patterns of autonomic and relational configuration. The differences between systems are not random: they depend on granularity (3 guṇa, 4 humors, 5 factors, 6 types, 7 planets, 8 logismoi, 9 enneagram types, 16 MBTI types) and on the plane of observation (physiological, behavioral, cognitive, spiritual, statistical).

II. The reference map — six alchemical-polyvagal types

The map that the Paret Method School uses as its primary operational reference is described in detail on the page I sei tipi caratteriali nella mappa polivagale. Summary:

Type	Wirth Principle	Guṇa	Polyvagal	Galenic Humor
Sulfur	Soufre (active-igneous)	rajas	Sympathetic	Choleric
Mercury	Mercure (mediator)	sattva	Ventral vagus	Nervous-sanguine
Salt	Sel (passive-stable)	tamas	Dorsal vagus	Melancholic-phlegmatic
Sulfur + Mercury	Jovial combination	sattva + rajas	V+S (play)	Sanguine jovial
Mercury + Salt	Temperate lunar-saturnine combination	sattva + tamas	V+D (intimate quiet)	Contemplative phlegmatic
Sulfur + Salt (without Mercury)	Blocked martial-saturnine combination	rajas + tamas	S+D (fixation)	Hostile choleric-melancholic
Integrated (seventh)	Philosophical Mercury	balance of the 3 guṇa	Ventral integrated state	higher homeostasis

This map functions as a pivot through which to read and correlate the other systems.

III. Correlation with Eysenck's three axes

The most direct correspondence — which Marco Paret in his teaching materials describes as "almost one-to-one" — is with the three-dimensional model of Hans Eysenck, because Eysenck (unlike models with 4, 5, or 16 dimensions) worked from the outset to derive his dimensions from neurophysiological bases (cortical arousal, limbic activation, testosterone-related activation). The result is a map with three axes that the School recognizes as homologous to the three principles of the Tria Prima:

Tria Prima Axis	Eysenck Axis	Polyvagal Correlate	Paret Map Polarity
Active-Mercury / Receptive-Mercury	Extraversion / Introversion	High-intensity / low-intensity ventral social engagement	Egoist / Altruist
Sulfur-Salt balance / Sulfur-Salt conflict	Neuroticism (stable / unstable)	V+S↔V+D coherence / S+D fixation without V	Achiever / Dreamer
Dominant Sulfur / Dominant Salt	Psychoticism (toughness / conformity)	Threat mobilization / Conservative immobilization	Conqueror / Peaceful

The homology is not metaphorical: Eysenck derived the three axes by seeking the most parsimonious dimensions that explained trait variance, and the School recognizes that he found precisely the three axes that the Paracelsian tradition had already identified as the three principles of the living.

IV. Correlation with Jung's typology and the MBTI

Jung's typology (1921) and its popular operationalization MBTI (Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, 1962) have a more nuanced correspondence with the School's map — not one-to-one like with Eysenck, but readable through the translation principle.

Jung distinguishes two attitudes (introversion / extraversion) and four functions (thinking, feeling, sensation, intuition), generating eight basic combinations that the MBTI doubles to sixteen through the judging / perceiving axis. Read from the School's map:

extraverted thinking (Te) and introverted intuition (Ni) tend to configure the Sulfur-Mercury pole (regulated mobilization, goal-oriented realization);
extraverted feeling (Fe) and extraverted intuition (Ne) tend towards pure Mercury (ventral vagus, social engagement);
introverted sensation (Si) and introverted feeling (Fi) gravitate towards Mercury-Salt (rooted quiet, interoceptive presence);
extraverted sensation (Se) lacking regulated judging functions veers towards pure Sulfur (unstructured mobilization);
introverted thinking (Ti) prolonged in dissociation veers towards pure Salt (conservative immobilization).

In the School's operational notes, Marco Paret notes in particular some MBTI / polyvagal configuration correspondences:

ISTJ — alarmed immobility (dorso-sympathetic) with resistance to uncertainty;
ESFJ — achiever in full ventral mode (V+S with prosodic warmth);
ESTP — achiever in ventral-sympathetic mode (expansive V+S);
INFP — dreamer in dorsal-care mode (immobilized sensitivity but protected by internal prosody).

The reading rule is that the MBTI returns a cognitive identity, while the Paret map returns an autonomic configuration: the two planes converge but do not coincide, because the same MBTI type can traverse different polyvagal configurations depending on the state of the moment.

V. Correlation with the Big Five

The Big Five or OCEAN model (Costa & McCrae) is the most empirically consolidated model in contemporary academic psychology, but it is not derived from neurophysiological bases like Eysenck's: it originates from lexical and factor analysis of traits.

Its five dimensions — openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism — are recomposed in the School's map by intersecting 2-3 dimensions at a time:

high openness + high conscientiousness configures the Mercury-Sulfur-achiever pole;
high agreeableness + high extraversion configures the pure ventral Mercury pole;
high neuroticism + low conscientiousness configures the unintegrated Sulfur pole or, in depressive mode, Salt + Sulfur deficiency;
low neuroticism + high conscientiousness + low openness configures a stable Salt pole (rooted without being hypoergic).

The metric precision of the Big Five is a valuable modern acquisition, but its 5-dimension granularity is inferior to that of the six mixed-type map, which the School considers more operational because it is directly readable from non-verbal signs (posture, gaze, prosody, rhythm).

VI. Correlation with the enneagram

The contemporary Enneagram (Ichazo, Naranjo, Riso-Hudson) organizes nine character types into three triads (head: 5-6-7; heart: 2-3-4; gut: 8-9-1) which in Claudio Naranjo's readings correspond to configurations of three centers (head, heart, gut) and three dominant passions (fear, shame, anger).

The correspondence with the School's six types and Evagrius's eight logismoi is organic because the three enneagrammatic triads correspond to the three principles of the Tria Prima:

Enneagram Triad	Center	Dominant Passion	Tria Prima Principle
5-6-7	Head	Fear	Sulfur blocked by inhibition → mental defensive mobilization
2-3-4	Heart	Shame	Mercury compromised → altered social engagement
8-9-1	Gut	Anger / Indolence	Salt compromised → altered grounding (towards blind action or inertia)

The nine enneagram types add wings, instinctual variants (self-preservation, social, sexual) and directions of stress / integration that provide a finer map than the six-type one. The School recognizes in this granularity a useful magnification of ego-defensive patterns, but maintains that enneagrammatic integration (the growth points) converges on the same configuration that the Paret map calls the integrated state and which operates through the Integral Presence™ protocol.

VII. Correlation with the logismoi and classical temperaments

For detailed correspondences with Evagrius Ponticus's eight Logismoi and the Hippocratic-Galenic four temperaments, please refer to the dedicated pages. Schematic summary:

Orgè (wrath) ↔ pure Sulfur type / choleric / enneagram 8;
Acedia / Lupé (sadness-indolence) ↔ fixed Salt type / melancholic / enneagram 4-9;
Gastrimargia / Philarguria / Porneia (greed in its forms) ↔ compensatory Salt or unintegrated Sulfur / enneagram 5-7;
Kenodoxìa (vainglory) ↔ solar Sulfur / sanguine / enneagram 3;
Uperéphanìa (pride) ↔ blocked Sulfur-Salt / paranoia / enneagram 1-8 in rigidity.

The four classical temperaments doubled by the hot-cold / wet-dry pair and the binary planetary influence yield seven to eight sub-types that Marco Paret documents in Flux Magnétique (section VII «L'analyse des différents tempéraments»).

VIII. What the School's map adds

The added value of the alchemical-polyvagal map compared to other systems is the combination of three properties:

Explicit neurophysiological basis. Unlike the enneagram (descriptive), the Big Five (empirical but a-physiological), and the MBTI (cognitive), the School's map has a precise physiological grammar in polyvagal theory: ventral vagus, sympathetic, dorsal vagus, and their three combinations. This grammar allows for non-verbal diagnosis (posture, gaze, prosody, rhythm, segmental muscle tone) and coherent somatic interventions.
Explicit historical continuity. The map is anchored to a tradition of twenty-seven centuries — Hippocrates, Galen, Paracelsus, Wirth — and shows how the new does not replace the old but recognizes it: polyvagal theory is the contemporary vocabulary for what the Desert Fathers called logismoi and Paracelsus called principles.
Operational orientation. The map is linked to techniques — magnetic fascination, mesmeric crisis, Integral Presence, work with the six types — that allow one to operate on patterns, not just describe them. It is a map that originates in the clinic and for the clinic, whereas the MBTI and Big Five were born for assessment and research, and the enneagram for self-knowledge.

IX. They are all habitual trances — the ethical hallmark of the School

The cardinal thesis — already addressed on the page about the six types, taken up in the Logismoi and developed in its full scope on the page Ordinary Trances — is that typological systems describe habitual trances, not identities. Character is a stabilized ordinary trance that the person experiences as "their normality" while being, on a phenomenological level, a restriction of the field of available autonomic and attentional possibilities. Logismoi, enneatypes, MBTI profiles, Big Five configurations — all describe the same mechanism seen from different angles: a few recurrent patterns of fixation, each with its own avoidance mechanism for a core wound, each with its own autonomic signature.

This reading has a decisive ethical-clinical consequence, which distinguishes the therapeutic-initiatic use of typology in the Paret Method School from the predominantly commercial and identity-based use that many contemporary applications make of the same systems.

The MBTI in its popular version has become a social network label ("I'm an INFJ"); the enneagram in its popularized versions tends to fix identity on the dominant type ("I'm a 4"); the Big Five circulates as a personnel selection tool. The Paret Method School does not condemn these uses — it recognizes that every map can be used well or poorly — but clearly distinguishes itself: no type is an identity. The recognition of the habitual trance serves to traverse it, not to confirm it. For this reason, the School insists on the notion of Enneaphase (see page Enneagram, section VI): not which type the person is, but in which phase the person finds themselves now.

The continuity with the alchemical tradition is literal here: the Magnum Opus of Paracelsus and his successors is the work of separation and recomposition of the three principles, where the goal is not one of the three but the Quintessence that integrates them — what the polyvagal map calls the integrated state and which the School cultivates through Integral Presence.

X. Phenomenological convergence, not reduction

The recognition of convergences between typological systems does not reduce one system to another: the enneagram is not the polyvagal map, and the logismoi are not the MBTI types. They are different maps of a shared terrain, each with its own internal coherence, its own access route, its own verification criterion.

The School's proposal is that knowing how they translate allows the clinician to read the same phenomenon with different tools depending on the context and the client: with a client who speaks the language of the enneagram, one can work in their vocabulary without betraying it; with a client trained in MBTI, one can start from there to lead the cognitive reading back to the underlying autonomic configuration. The Polyvagal Theory provides the physiological bridge that allows all these vocabularies to be recognized as precise observations of the same human body at different levels of analysis.

The traditions continue to speak each in their own language, and they certify each other in recognizing the same topos of experience.

Sources

School Publications

Marco Paret, Le Flux Magnétique et les Savoirs Anciens (2017), section VII «L'analyse des différents tempéraments» and section on the Trois Principes Paracelsiens.
Marco Paret, Hypnosis, Polyvagal Theory, and Somatic Liberation — A Non-Verbal Approach to Healing (Springer chapter, in preparation), particularly the notes on the "six mixed types" and the MBTI/Eysenck correspondences.
Marco Paret, Metodo Paret™ — Presenza Integrale™. Proposta di riconoscimento, Federmindfulness, 2026.

Historical Typological Tradition

Hippocrates, De natura hominis (5th century BC).
Galen, De temperamentis (2nd century AD).
Evagrius Ponticus, Praktikos (4th century).
Paracelsus, Opus Paramirum (16th century).
Oswald Wirth, Le Symbolisme hermétique dans ses rapports avec l'alchimie et la franc-maçonnerie, Dervy, 1909/2009.

20th Century Typological Psychology

C. G. Jung, Psychological Types (1921).
H. J. Eysenck, Dimensions of Personality (1947); The Biological Basis of Personality (1967).
Isabel Briggs Myers, The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, Consulting Psychologists Press, 1962.
P. T. Costa, R. R. McCrae, NEO PI-R Professional Manual, Psychological Assessment Resources, 1992.

Enneagram

Claudio Naranjo, Character and Neurosis, Gateways/IDHHB, 1994.
Don Richard Riso, Russ Hudson, The Wisdom of the Enneagram, Bantam, 1999.

Polyvagal Theory and Typological Neuroscience

Stephen W. Porges, The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-Regulation, Norton, 2011.
M. B. Sullivan, M. Erb, L. Schmalzl, S. Moonaz, J. Noggle Taylor, S. W. Porges, «Yoga Therapy and Polyvagal Theory: The Convergence of Traditional Wisdom and Contemporary Neuroscience for Self-Regulation and Resilience», Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 12:67, 2018.