What Human Design Taught Me That 20+ Years of Studying Astrology Couldn’t

Warning: There are a lot of nautical metaphors in this post…

Before you lay into me about astrology, please allow me to clarify this blog title:

I LOVE ASTROLOGY. I’ve studied it since I was a teen. I’m am not saying astrology is bad.

Astrology is a tool, and just like any tool, it is extremely powerful when it is used in a way that is perfect for what it is: a system for understanding the celestial influences on our lives and the collective through psychological archetypes.

And our birth charts show us that, as well: a beautiful skymap of the celestial influences at the time we were born, and how that energetic imprint will affect us throughout our lives.

However. . .

If you want to understand your own modes of moving through the world, I believe a better system to get a good understanding of ourselves is Human Design.

If you’ve never heard of Human Design before, it is a system that incorporates and melds together several other systems - iChing, Astrology, Chakras, and Kabbalah - into a unified framework for understanding the individual.

It breaks down our own energetic blueprint into several different categories, each more granular, to get a deep understanding of ourselves and how we operate in the world.

The reason for this, in my opinion, is precisely BECAUSE it incorporates multiple systems into one. When studied individually, the iChing, astrology, and Kabbalah are all informative, but still provide a limited viewpoint. However, when you layer all of these together over the chakra system, mapping your own individual energy signature and how these influences move through YOUR body, consciously and subconsciously, your own inner landscape opens up to you in a reveletory vista unlike anything you’ve ever seen before.

For transparency, I AM NOT A HUMAN DESIGN EXPERT AND I DON’T PRETEND TO BE ONE ON THE INTERNET. I’m not going to ask you for your credit card information and make any empty promises, here.

There are brilliant Human Design practitioners out there that I highly recommend: Christie Inge, the Jovian Archive (which was founded by the founder himself), Katie Irvine . . . none of these are affiliate links, by the way; I’ve just learned so much through them and am happy to provide a plug. Go give them some of your money. But first, read the rest of this article.

What I learned that changed everything

If you’ve read some of my story, it’s pretty obvious that I was one of those people who was constantly searching for The Answer™ in any direction that either A. I was told was correct for me, or B. felt kinda like duh, I should have seen it sooner.

Notice what’s wrong with both of those: neither of them come from true desire, interest, or passion.

Now, that’s not to say that I didn’t deviate from that narrative sometimes, or find desire, interest, or passion along the way: I certainly couldn’t say that photography was something I pursued because of anyone else. I deeply love my photography work and I’ll probably always seek to document the beauty of life. It also aligns with my Human Design: my Conscious Sun is Gate 61, and one of it’s energetic signatures is reveling in the beautiful mystery of life - aligning perfectly with capturing the gorgeous, meaning-saturated moments of our lives.

What I have struggled with, though, is handing over control of my rudder (or refusing to use it myself) and allowing the tides of life to pull me in all sorts of crazy directions.

That lack of self-leadership and constant trying to accomplish everyone else’s projections of me led me straight burnout and a ton of self-judgment, self-hatred, frustration, desperation, really stupid acts of rebellion, and ultimately, depression and thoughts of self-harm.

Understanding my Human Design showed me something that released me from the self-hatred of never being able to accomplish anything:

Even with picking my astrological birth chart apart over two decades, even with seeing some of the patterns (North Node at 29° of Leo), I did not understand, in ways that translated to practical behavioral shifts, that I was meant to learn how to become Captain of my own ship and guard my rudder carefully, while also practicing empathy towards those who think they know better than me what I’m supposed to be doing.

In practice, I thought I was being empathetic by listening to others and making changes to my own life paths based on their opinions. Whomp, whomp.

My Human Design showed me that I was here to revel in the glorious mysteries of life, make intellectual connections about the esoteric, emotional, and mystical, discern through experimentation how to put those ideas into tangible projects that turn me absolutely incandescent with excitement, and then bring them all the way to fruition for the greater good.

It showed me how I was doing Life right…and how I was going about the right things in the wrong ways.

What it showed me, that astrology did not, was the HOW: HOW TO EMBRACE MY GIFTS, and how to let go of the things that weren’t mine to embody.

Both systems showed me what the Gifts and Challenges of my life were meant to be, by birthright, generational hand-me-down, or destiny. Both are a blueprint, a map, and all other similar terms so commonly tossed out about these kinds of personality-archetyping playgrounds. But Human Design, when explored all the way: your type, strategy, and authority; your active gates; your Incarnation Cross and the quadrant it falls in, these all combine to really tell a beautiful picture of your strengths and gifts.

And the “empty”, or open/undefined parts of your chart are areas where life can teach you, where your experience of life can be richer and fuller than just your own individuality.

Understanding all of this finally allowed me to stop the chasing the question, “who am I and what am I meant to do, why am I here???”, it allowed the constant churning, sucking whirlpool of seeking the right life, of never feeling quite fulfilled in anything I took on, to finally settle and release.

And when that black hole that kept sucking my ship into it, leaving life phase after life phase bashed into pieces on the depths of the ocean floor, finally dissolved and dissipated, I realized THAT WAS WHAT I NEEDED FREEDOM FROM ALL ALONG.

From building new ships that someone else designed and sailing them off in search of an uncharted Life I never could have found, because they were never mine to sail and never mine to find in the first place.

What Human Design gave me was the key to a map that led me EXACTLY where I needed to go:

Home to Myself.

If any of this resonates with you, I highly recommend checking out the resources mentioned above to get your Human Design profile.

And if you’re looking for other ways to go Home to Yourself - because once you get there, you’re going to have to meet and become friends with the folks that already inhibit the Island of You, your inner pantheon of personalities - check out the Courses and join my newsletter.

I send you so much love and wish you endless blessings (and valuable lessons) on your journey home. Because nobody makes it out alive, so you might as well LIVE as fully and authentically as possible!