The Basics of the Bodygraph | pt.2

Overview of the substructure parts of the HD Chart

Just recently I published an article that breaks down and tries to explain the individual aspects in the Human Design bodygraph. In the last article we looked at the symbols, gates, lines, centres, openness and much more. So before you read on, take a look at the first part:

Alright, now we can go ahead and look at the deeper level of the bodygraph. At first glance you may not see this level, but it is there and is only revealed by a few small numbers and arrows. I recommend that you grab your chart for this, because then you can look and internalise directly.

1) The Arrows: Variables

illustration by talis | bodygraph.io

If you look at your Human Design Chart (generated by bodygraph.io), you will see 4 arrows on the top, to the left and right of the head centre. These arrows really tell us a lot, even if it seems very simple. First we have to go back to the basics one more time: There is a conscious side, which we assign to the mind, and there is an unconscious side, which we assign to the body. With this, we can already give more context to these obscure arrows. So the arrows on the right side (black) are in relation to the mind, personality and perhaps psychology. On the other side, namely the red, the arrows are related to the body, the brain and the environment. This is of course a huge difference! If we explore further, we also realise that there are two arrows at the top and two arrows below. The upper arrows are defined by the substructure of the sun/earth. The lower arrows are determined by the substructure of the nodes of the moon. In the diagram I have marked this for you as simply as possible. The upper arrows are called the Dependent Variable and the lower arrows are called the Independent Variable.

Where do the arrows come from?

Of course, the curious wants to know how these arrows come about and then of course what they mean. Let us therefore dive directly into this topic. Each of these arrows can look either to the left or to the right - remember the binary nature of the Human Design System. The substructure, or more precisely the level of tone, decides whether an arrow faces left or right. So the arrow is a shortcut and a general statement about the cognitive architecture beneath the surface - because tone is the level we can't really take personally anymore. They as there are 6 lines, so there are 6 different tones. And to make it a little more complicated, tone and line are connected by an intermediate part which we call color. The color “colours” the surface level of the chart, just as the name suggests. Again, there are 6 different possibilities.

In short, the arrow looks to the left if the tone carries a value of 1, 2 or 3 and looks to the right if it carries a value of 4, 5 or 6. I have attached an audio that gives you more insight into this.

The arrows result in 16 different variables

Since there are 4x4 different possibilities between right and left, this automatically results in 16 different variables, each of which describes something individually, but also provides information about the underlying structure of the person in the overall picture. A person with 4 times left (arrow) - called PLL DLL - is fully strategic, focused, extroverted and active in his substructure. This is the remnant of our 7-centred ancestors. We were all All-Left at one time and the high-time of Ajna (minds) was reached with it. Since about 1781 we have been in a transition (aka mutation) as beings and the "right" was introduced, which represents the future. However, due to the many thousands of years of being Left, it is a great difficulty to truly apply or live the "Rightness". A person who is PRR LRR - i.e. all arrows point to the right - will feel like an alien in this world. Our whole system, the whole economy, is built on strategic propaganda. So it is not easy to just surrender receptively without getting sucked into the daily hustle. With the variables, we can also clearly see whether a person is more active in his environment or prefers to hang out as a couch-potato - we can see this by the lower left arrow, the one defined by the tone beyond the nodal lines. There is a lot to study and learn about the variables, but that should be enough information for now. However, I would like to point out what the typical difference between right and left is, so that you have something practical in hand. Also note that the "Right" aspects do try to be "Left" through social conditioning and rarely act out their passive and receptive nature.

THE LEFT:

• Strategic thinking for survival, well-being, the future.

• Mind rooted in survival.

• Very busy mind seeking security.

• Is very fact oriented.

• Has/Wants Agendas, plots.

• Very narrow focus that jumps to conclusions.

• Depended on by others for development.

• Not designed to grasp “feeling” as an authority.

• How we think Humans are.

• Always seeks for a purpose.

• Measures differences. Understanding the Maia.

• Rooted in interpretation.

• Intelligence is the holy grail.

• Has limited access to brain storage.

• Closed off Capacity — limited in what is taken in.

• Primary influences of intelligence: survival and food, make way through world, and compete on mental plane.

• Interpreting sensory keys.

• Awareness more intuitive, instinctual and visual.

• Stores formulas for how sounds react to each other when connected which lead to a formula of interpretation based on memory. Bits & pieces, not a stored whole.

• Obsessed with controlling life.

THE RIGHT:

• Receptive thinker.

• Experiential. Abstractly intelligent.

• Takes in and absorb sensory phenomena of experience.

• Emotional mind. More sensitive and connected to the emotional experiential feeling.

• Doesn’t need proof (not fact driven).

• Allies draw out depth - often LEFTies.

• Receptive is little prepared for their own depth.

• Hard to draw on own memories - hard to remember things actively.

• Moving away from left conditioning/humanness towards point of equilibrium.

• Loses ability to absorb when trying to be focused or acts on thoughts.

• It’s all about frequency — brain stores sound formulas like pixels.

• Right mind can’t be homogenized.

• Stores data but doesn’t interpret, personalize, or identify with conscious penta (yet).

• Struggling to find balance before balancing comes in 2027.

• Parents get nervous and condition child to be strategic.

• Conditioning to left thinking makes you feel insecure.

• Has a special way of dealing with Solar Plexus motor — more comfortable in their own shoes as mind is attuned to the emotional.

• Interested in the other and should only works with others, not alone.

• Cognitive sensory experience that seems to have no purpose or sense of why.

• RIGHTies can sense that when you draw “it” out, it’s true or not.

• Following S&A much more liberating. Different way of applying S&A.

• Genetically connected to theme of surrender and more easily achieved.

• Passenger has no strategy.

• It’s natural to pay attention to the body.

• Mind doesn’t interfere with the thought process, trying to act.

• Has access to non-conceptualized source material.

I think that shows the difference pretty well, because it's huge. It's like two different realities existing in the same world. By the way what's your variable? Oh, you don't know how to write it down yet? We always start on the P-side (black, personality) and begin at the top with the MIND (sun/earth arrow). In the example picture (above) this would be an arrow looking to the left, i.e. PL. Then we add the arrow underneath and get PLR - because the arrow is looking right. Now we look at the design side and see the top arrow (brain) looking to the left. So we get PLR DL. Now we add the last arrow, which also looks to the left, and we have the short form of how to write our variable. In the case of the example it is PLR DLL. I hope this helps.

Photo by Pablo García Saldaña on Unsplash

What about the other data in the substructure?

Of course, the variables are only one aspect of the substructure and there is much more to discover. We have learned that these arrows point to 4 different aspects of human life. We have learned that the direction of the arrow is defined by the tone. But if we go one level higher we come to COLOR and here it becomes a little more concrete - remember from the TONE level it is impersonal and hardly practical. But how an aspect is "colored" can, with a little practice, already be sensed. For example, if someone has a 2nd colour beyond his Sun-Earth line, then this person will be able to confirm it when he is told "You are a hopeful person". His mind will sooner or later be able to recognise this well. Especially if you show him the flip side, because COLOR is not really stable - especially on the personality side. Color transfers! You could also say it swings from one side to the other. From color 2 to colour 5 - from color 1 to color 4 and from color 3 to color 6... The flip side of this hopeful (mental) motivation is called "guilt" and here one is no longer hopeful but wants to put things in order, to fix things. That, of course, is a very different drive.

If you want to know more about the colors behind the personality sun/earth, I recommend this audio of mine. There I’ll talk about all 6 variations. What is your motivation? Let me know in the comments.

And then there is the View

If we stay on the personality side for a short moment, we will see - just as there is an arrow for it - that the lunar nodes naturally also have an underlying "coloring" - that is, a color value. Again, we have 6 different variations. This tells us already, independently of the nodal gates (which define the view in the world), that there are fundamentally 6 different basic ways of seeing.

Here’s a quick overview of those six different Views:

• 1st Color: Survival View

• 2nd Color: Possibility View

• 3rd Color: Power View

• 4th Color: Wanting/Need View

• 5th Color: Probability View

• 6th Color: Personal View

Please remember for a moment that COLOR never is fixed on the personality side. So again we have the matter of the so-called transference. The human being who actually sees the chances of security and survival (1) will suddenly, in distraction, see only needs that have nothing to do with the classical survival but rather with "I want and need this and that".

We can also see the beauty of diversity in this. Let's say we have 6 people (each with one of these perspectives) observing an accident, it will be the case that each of these people will have a very unique perspective on it. The 1 will see rather what was unsafe. The 2 will see that there is still hope. The 3 will see who screwed up. The 4 will see that the people involved in the accident need help. The 5 will see very clearly what really happened from a pragmatic point of view (therefore they are good witnesses). and the 6 missed the accident completely or didn't want to see it. So ask yourself the next time you are about to judge someone for seeing things differently, if you would like to unintentionally turn that person into yourself instead of appreciating them for that different perspective.

These two color aspects, motivation and perspective, carry the umbrella term "rave psychology" because, after all, this information relates to the mind and its psychology. You might also consider the following: What happens when someone has hope as motivation, and a power view, and then the whole thing is expressed by the Gate and the line... In our example 52.5. 5th line tells us it is heresy and is universal or practical. Gate 52 is the Gate of Stillness - Temporary and self-imposed inaction for the benefit of assessment. Here we have somebody with deep staying power as long as they can find the right outlet through which they can be of service. Gate 52 is energy under pressure that is focused on assessment, the raw power to concentrate. Once the 52nd gate finds something it deeply identifies with, the tension is balanced to keep you moving forward and helps you sit still and concentrate. And because we have the mind here, this is a mind that remains hopefully still and logically concentrated expressing its practical truths - based on the view that recognizes winners and losers. If you manage to keynote something like this, perhaps with more detail, and present it to someone, the person on the receiving end will drop their jaw and ask you how you know.

Before we continue I would like to present you a small Mindfuck. If there are 64 gates and each of them has 6 lines and we add the substructure, namely 6 colors, 6 tones and the 5 different bases... Then we discover that each chart - no matter how similar it looks - is extremely differentiated and therefore unique. That's about 69,120 different possibilities when we add it all up - and then we haven't even included the unconscious and conscious side, or that there are active and sleeping gates, or that the gate can be embedded in 4 different auras... So Human Design is really an aspiring science of differentiation.

Color on the Design Side: Primary Health System

If there are the six different colors on the P-Side, then of course they must also exist on the red side. Here these two values are called Determination (or Dietary Regimen) and Environment. They could also be called Internal PHS and External PHS. This word “PHS” is the abbreviation for "Primary Health System" and also the umbrella term for these two aspects which we can read in the chart on the unconscious side. Again we see numbers sitting next to the arrows. The first number always refers to the color and the second number refers to the tone; also well marked by the decreasing font size.

So we see here very well that these are indications for the body; namely how to "nourish" oneself best - that is, what really nourishes the body and keeps it healthy - and we also see in which environment the body thrives best. I always find it exciting how arrogantly we approach the topic of environment. We humans really think that we can live everywhere equally and hardly ever think about the fact that if something is not flowing or working well it has to do with the environment. Of course I don't mean that the environment is to blame or bad. I mean that we would logically understand if a tropical plant cannot thrive in the desert and we would never think that the desert is the villain in the story.

Anyway, these two aspects in the chart can give a lot of information about how to live a healthy life... BUT of course this cannot be forced by the mind. We are talking here about pre-determined and set positions that will come true as soon as you live out your strategy and authority. The information about it can stimulate and inspire, maybe remind you of how you behaved as a child, but it is not a knowledge which you now simply use actively. It will come by itself, namely when the body has the strength to find its way back.

If you want an example of how to read a specific diet in the human design chart, feel free to check out the following article. There I go pretty deep into the 4th color, Nervous Touch.

So now we come to the end of this really exciting topic. There is, as always, much more to tell about it, but it should be enough at this point. If you want to learn more about yourself, and don't have the capacity to study and understand it yourself, feel free to invite me for a basic reading - or advanced if you want to go deeper. I can record everything important about your chart in an audio file - which you can listen to over and over again.

If you are already in the Human Design Experiment, I wish you continued success, satisfaction, peace or surprise!

Love Love
Talis