Our Human Design Authority is our way of saying yes to those things that are most optimal for us.
In human design our minds are considered powerful tools for comprehension, analysis, and as sources of wisdom for other people. They are not however, considered a good place to make decisions from. Using our minds to navigate life served humanity well for a very long time but since we evolved from 7 centered to 9 centered beings in the 1700s we have a more powerful way of choosing those things that are best for us, and that is our authority.
Your Human Design Strategy and your Human Design Authority work hand in hand with one-another. Think of your strategy as the way you know what opportunities to even consider for yourself, and then think of your authority as the way you actually choose which ones to say yes to and which ones to allow to pass you by. Your Human Design Strategy is the high level filter that when followed allows you to easily and quickly ignore much of what’s irrelevant in our busy noisy world. Your human design authority is then the finer filter, allowing you to figure out — without the interference of your mind – which of those selected opportunities to take any further.
The problem with making decisions from your mind is that your mind has taken on a lot of information about who you should and shouldn’t be, how you should and shouldn’t behave, and when we make choices from the mind, we’re at the mercy of deep deep societal conditioning.
When we make decisions from our authority, we choose what is truly best for us and the collective, without the pressure of our conditioning getting in the way.
There are seven different kinds of authority and it’s easy to look at your chart and figure out which one you have. Mybodygraph.com will actually tell you which one you have, (off to the right hand side under Chart Details), but you can also read this directly from the bodygraph itself.
How?
Each center of the bodygraph falls under a hierarchy of authority. Basically you just need to figure out which of your defined centers falls highest in the hierarchy of authority and that’s your authority.
The flowchart below helps you to navigate this process:
Human Design Inner Authority – The Details
Human Design Emotional Solar Plexus Authority
Human Design Emotional Solar Plexus Authority (Also known as Human Design Emotional authority) is the authority at the top of the hierarchy of authorities. If your human design solar plexus is defined, no matter what else is defined in your chart, you have emotional authority. As someone with emotional solar plexus authority you live your life on emotional waves. You’re always somewhere on an emotional wave. If you’re up the top of a wave you might feel amazing, if you’re down the bottom you might feel awful and if you’re just in the middle you’ll feel fairly neutral.
You are not designed to make decisions spontaneously in the moment because wherever you are at that point in time on your emotional wave will strongly influence your decision in that moment. If you’re prsented with an opportunity and you’re feeling amazing and optimistic, you might say “Yes! Definitely let’s do it!” only to come down to a more neutral place and realise you have far too much on your plate already. Likewise, if you’re feeling really low and you’re presented with an opportunity, you may decline it, only to rise up on your wave a little while later and regret having turned that opportunity down.
Rather than making decisions at low or high points on the wave, it is best to wait and give yourself time to process and reach clarity. By waiting, you can consider the decision or opportunity at multiple points along the way and come to a more well-rounded decision on what is ultimately best for you.
Human Design Sacral Authority
You have human design sacral authority when you have a defined sacral centre and you do not have a defined emotional solar plexus. You are designed to make decisions spontaneously in the moment. According to the knowledge downloaded by Ra Ura Hu, if you have sacral authority your sacral motor generates an “uh hu” sound if something is a yes for you, and an uhn uhn sound if it’s a no. In order for your sacral authority to be able to respond, you need to wait for opportunities to present themselves (as per your strategy). Ru Ura Hu was told these sounds come naturally to children with sacral authority but they’re often conditioned out by their parents and society and replaced with words, and that it may take some time and practise to re-connect with these sounds.
Some people with sacral authority in the human design community talk about making sounds, but not the traditional uh huh or uhn uhn. You may have a standard sound that means yes and a standard sound that means no but it’s specific to you rather than the traditional uh hu or uhn uhn. Others in the community talk about having a physical response where their body actually moves towards things they like and away from things they don’t like.
At the end of the day, as someone with sacral authority human design there is something you do naturally that’s an indication if something is right for you or not and through self observation, you can figure out what it is. Some of the ways you may like to do this are:
1. Get someone to ask you yes no answered questions and answer them immediately without thinking about it. Practise answering with aha/ uhn uhn, yes/no or any other sounds that you think might work for you.
2. Record yourself in conversation and play it back to notice any sounds you naturally make in conversation that indicate you’re for or against something. (Also, you can ask your partner or friends to keep an ear out for you to see what you do naturally when not thinking about it).
3. Get a colouring book and each time you finish with one pencil, go through each of the pencils practising your sacral response until you get a clear indication that this is your chosen colour. Ie “I Jules do you want to use the green pencil next?” “uhn uhn” “Jules do you want to use the blue pencile next?” “uhn uhn” and so on. Again just notice how you respond verbally, what your body does etc and see if you can pickup on your natural way of responding.
What I’m learning more and more as I continue to experiment with human design is that above all else, it’s about trusting yourself, so if you have sacral authority watch and observe and trust that you will find your natural way of knowing what is right for you.
Bonus Info** I’d like to offer a little extra piece of information for anyone with gate 34 defined along side their sacral authority. If Gate 34 is defined for you, in any color, the yes/no response is so fast in your system that you may not actually utter the sounds and may instead say a quick Yes or No. This information came from Ra Ura Hu himself but it is not widely shared. As someone with sacral authority who has this line defined in my own chart, I never resonated with the aha and uhn uhn and learning about gate 34 really helped me to lean into what I’ve observed in myself.
My own experience thus far as someone who has sacral authority and gate 34 is that sometimes I just know things. When I tried the pencil coloring exercise suggested above, what I actually found was that there was no space in between colors for me to ask myself the question, I simply put one pencil down and knew immediately, without any conscious consideration, which pencil I wanted to use next. This could be because of the gate 34 in my chart and it could also be because I have a defined spleen in my chart (intuition) which is also influencing my sacral. I’m still early on in my own experimentation so I’m not 100% sure yet how my own sacral responses show up. Keeping in mind that it can take a while for the sacral to re-awaken and for sacral noises to re-emerge I encourage you to really give them a chance. This is an experiment…every day is filled with opportunities for you to observe how you’re responding so just give it time and see what you do naturally.
Splenic Authority Human Design
Splenic human design is all about intuition. It’s about an inner knowing regarding what’s best in any given situation. Splenic authority human design happens instantaneously in response to everything that’s going on around us, much of which we don’t even register consciously. It is a soft still voice that unfortunately can be easily drowned out by societal conditioning and the needs and requests of others. It will only speak to you once in any given set of circumstances and it’s easy to miss.
Operating according to splenic authority or intuition is very different from how most of us have grown up and been taught to make our decisions. It takes experimentation and surrender to trust your inner guidance system and it’s something you will get better at over time as you see that it’s reliable and wise far beyond your conscious mind.
Heart/Ego Center Authority Human Design
This Authority can show up in two different ways…
Heart/Ego Human design manifested authority
Human design manifested authority is also known as heart/ego center manifested authority. For you, your authority is the truth that comes out of your mouth when you speak but only if you speak without trying to control what you say through your mind. It’s the things you just blurt out, without thought.
You need to talk things out with people, not because you need their advice, but because you need to hear what comes out of your own mouth when you’re not pre-planning it. Be careful who you speak to as you’re doing this to hear yourself, not be influenced by others. This is your truth. This is what you should listen to in navigating your life.
Heart/Ego Center Projected Authority
With this authority you need to check in with yourself whenever you’re recognised and presented with an invitation and ask yourself whether it’s something that you personally want to do and will benefit from. With these questions, and answers in mind, notice what you internally feel is the right answer, this is your truth.
Self Projected Authority (G Center Authority)
With Self Projected Authority you often just know things, you may not know how you know but you do and this knowing is something you can learn to trust with time and experience.
It can help you to figure out what you know in the same way as those who have Heart/Ego Manifested authority, that is by talking it out with others not because you want their advice but because you want to hear what you’re saying when you’re talking without pre-planning what you’re going to say. Be careful who you choose to speak with as you’re looking for a chance to hear your own truths, not a chance to be influenced and persuaded by others.
Environmental Authority Human Design
This is an interesting one. Environmental authority requires you to notice how you feel about the environment you’re in. Based on how you feel in that environment, any opportunities presented to you in that environment will be correct/incorrect for you based on how you feel about the environment itself. Note this is an inner feeling, not a mind-based judgement about the environment.
How you feel about your environment is your strongest indication of what is and isn’t correct for you however you can also try talking things through in order to hear your inner truth come out about a decision. Note you are talking to hear your own thoughts and truth come through, not to get advice from others.
Lunar Authority
Similar to Environmental authority, lunar authority is based on how you feel in a given environment and on speaking to multiple people regarding your decision, not for their advice but in order to hear your own inner truth. The difference between environmental and lunar authority is that lunar authority does not aim for clarity in the moment based off of what is said in one discussion, instead as a reflector you need to have many conversations across the course of the lunar cycle (one month) until eventually you receive an inner clarity regarding what is right for you.
There you have it — Human Design Inner Authority explained. Your Human Design Strategy is your first step – Your main filter in knowing what to disregard immediately – and then your human design authority assists you to make more refined choices.
Keep in mind that this is an experiment. How you’ve learnt to navigate the world growing up is likely very different from what’s outlined within human design. It will take time for you to observe and allow what comes to you naturally. Be patient with yourself. Your life will continue to offer you opportunities over and over to refine this so there’s no need to stress or master it all immediately.
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