Fritz Riemann was a German psychoanalyst. He wrote several books on psychoanalysis and astrology (of all things…) and one of these books is Grundformen der Angst [German], which translates to the Basic Forms of Fear.

In it, Riemann develops a personality typology based on the notion that there are four conflicting needs in every person and each need goes hand in hand with a fear. On the one side, the need to be an individual (fear of love and commitment) and the need to be part of a group (fear of loneliness and self-actualisation), on the other side the need for constancy (fear of insecurity and change) and the need for change (fear of confinement and constancy). He says that in a healthy human, these four needs – and the fears that come with them – are balanced and everybody experiences all four forms.
But if one of the four types gets out of hands, gets more weight than the others, this causes one of the following four disease patterns: schizoid (fear of commitment), depressive (fear of self-actualisation), compulsive (fear of change) and hysterical (fear of constancy).
The book describes these disease patterns and gives examples from real life.

It’s an interesting and fortunately not too rigid typology. Riemann writes well and its easy to understand the whole book.

But he also can’t deny that he’s an old-school psychoanalyst (not that he wanted to) with all that comes with it – interesting insights but also overly focussed on men, treating women mostly as if they didn’t exist, unless they’re mothers, because everything’s the mother’s fault and in the end it all comes down to sex (basically every of the four typologies makes you homosexual, for example).

The book was first written in the 60s, although it was kept up to date by Riemann until his death, it’s a little outdated. Especially when it comes to questions of gender.

He also has some interesting thoughts on religion and atheism, which I’d definitely dispute. And he was very interested in astrology and that seeps in as well. [I don’t know how he was interested in astrology – whether he believed in horoscopes (which I personally think is crazy) or whether he thought that the description of the zodiac signs is a rather early personality typology which actually has nothing to do with when you were born (with which I could get onboard).]

But there’s definitely a truth to the whole thing and more than once it had me seeing myself (and friends) in the descriptions Riemann gives. Which is of course especially charming because he describes mentally unhealthy people. [In case you wondered, I’m pretty balanced on the compulsive-hysterical axis, but on the schizoid-depressive axis I keep on changing extremes.]

Anyways, as usual, typologies should be taken with a grain of salt, but it was definitely fun to analyse my whole family in the course of the weekend when I read the book. (A hint for anybody who wants to pick this up: Take more time than a weekend to read it because you’ll be going absolutely crazy otherwise. I’m telling you, after finishing the book, all I could think about where these categories and how my mom did and didn’t mess me up and wonder about why I’m not homosexual and and and. Not enough breathing time. It’s okay now.)

Well. If you want to, I could explain the four types in more detail. Just ask. :) Be warned though… I can’t guarantee your sanity afterwards, as little as I can guarantee my own.