A Beginner’s Guide to Energy Types & Human Design

You’ve likely heard of Myers-Briggs, personality frameworks such as The Enneagram and love languages, but have you heard of Human Design? Prepare to feel seen. 

Created by Alan Krakower, who published a book in 1992 on the subject under the pseudonym Ra Uru Hu, Human Design combines astrology, the I Ching, Kabbalah, quantum physics, and Vedic philosophy to offer a toolkit for self-awareness based on both modern science and ancient wisdoms.

Calculated by your exact time, date and place of birth, it offers a unique system for living in alignment with your innate self and who you were always meant to be, instead of chasing something you are not. 

From how you are wired to make decisions to what role you’re meant to play in the world, and how you exert and exchange energy with those around you, it helps you understand who you are and how you function, so you can reconnect with your core self and start living according to your Human Design.

Dana Stiles and Shayna Cornelius are Human Design experts, spiritual teachers, and the podcast hosts behind DayLuna. As co-founders of their company, they are on a mission to empower the collective towards self-love, personal freedom, and radical authenticity through the tool that is Human Design. The pair feel passionately called to help spread the complex and life-changing science of Human Design to a wider community in a grounded and approachable way. 

Intrigued? Here, Dana and Shayna provide a beginner’s guide to Human Design and how you can start applying its magic to your life. Limiting beliefs – you can see yourselves out!

Human Design is a hot topic right now, and for good reason! It really is the all-in-one modality that can not only tell you what alignment looks like for you, it also sheds light on your unique individual life purpose, what your gifts are, how you can best connect with others, and how you can show up in the world with complete authenticity.

If you’re just now hearing about this system, Human Design is the science of differentiation. It is a modality that shows us how we are all uniquely designed, how we are all meant to use our energy in different ways than other people, including what our unique gifts, diet, mindset, and life purpose is. Some refer to it as “the new astrology.” Human Design is a synthesis of modern science mixed with Western Astrology, the Chinese I Ching, The Hindu-Brahmin Chakra System, and The Kabbalah Tree of Life. By generating your free Human Design chart using your birth details, you can see the complete blueprint of your energy and soul’s purpose, as well as the owner’s manual of how to operate in alignment with your design.

Every day, thousands of people are discovering Human Design and when first hearing about it, it can be extremely tempting to gather as much information as you possibly can about your chart. While this leads to a great knowledge of your design, a lot of times it also leads to mental overwhelm with little to no results in how you are optimizing your energy each day to really change your life. The power with this system truly only comes from grounding down what you’ve learned into your physical body and daily life. Here are our top 9 things you can start doing every day to live by your Human Design:

Hone your self-awareness

Start being the observer of your own life. Observe how you react to things, when you feel triggered, when you feel the most exhausted or energized, when you are fascinated or excited by something. Having this kind of awareness and self-observation can help you to understand yourself better without judgment. It can also help you to take responsibility for your energy and create healthy boundaries that support your personal energy levels. Books we love that can help you better hone your awareness are The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle and The Four Agreements by don Miguel Ruiz.

Tune into your body

How is it feeling in this moment? Is there any tightness or tension? Does it feel energized by what you are doing or contracted in any way? Human Design teaches us that our bodies are connected to a higher plane of consciousness and divine timing. Try to get out of your mind and check in with your body at least twice a day. This simple act can majorly start to increase your magnetism, and by listening to the signals your body is giving you; you will start to notice beautiful synchronicities in your life.

Learn your Authority and exercise it every day.

Your Authority is your unique decision-making center in your body that is a consistent way for you to make decisions that are energetically correct for you. We are conditioned to believe that it is best to make big decisions with our minds and with what “makes sense”. Human Design is reframing this to show us how to make decisions with our bodies instead of our minds. Our minds are here to observe, process data, create, and inspire, but they are not here to make our major life decisions. There are 8 different Authorities in Human Design and your chart will tell you which one you have. One of the most powerful things you can do is to learn your Authority and start experimenting with making decisions that are of medium importance to you. You will be blown away at how natural it feels and how when you release mental pressure to figure things out, your Authority leads you to less resistance and more ease.

Practice your Strategy

Your Strategy tells you the best way your aura interacts with others and the world around you based on your energy Type. With awareness of this, you can start to really lean into it one day at a time. While we won’t get into the daily practice and Strategy for each Type, here are some of our favourite quick tips:

Manifestors – Start talking out loud every day (to yourself, the Universe, the people around you…etc.).

Generators – Focus on getting present and listening to what your body is telling you (what do your energy levels say about what is directly in front of you?).

Manifesting Generators – Prioritize being present with all of the many things you have going on in your day and make sure to inform the people in your life about what you are wanting to do next (before you do it).

Projectors – Start focusing more on how you perceive yourself instead of how others may be perceiving you (what is interesting to you right now? Spend time doing that and try to get more rest).

Reflectors – Prioritize alone time at the end of the day and let each new morning surprise you with what comes up for the day.

Start saying “no” more

How many things are you saying yes to each day out of guilt, obligation, FOMO, or because you “should”, or you feel they will make other people happy? As a rule of thumb, if it doesn’t fully light you up, excite you, make you happy, or just feel right… say “no” to that thing for now if you can. This small act will help you take some of your energy back where you may be leaking it. Saying “yes” to small things you want to say “no” to, actually put you (and that person you are saying yes to when you don’t want to be) out of alignment.

Cleanse your energy

Regardless of your energy Type, you likely have areas of your energy where you are empathetic to the world and people around you. This is where you can pick up conditioning and hold onto emotions, ideas, needs, fears, desires, and pressure from others. Doing a simple energy cleanse (5 mins is all you typically need) each evening can make a huge difference in how you feel. Some of our favorite ways to cleanse are with palo santo, sage or smoke, taking a bath or shower with the intention of “emptying out”, or connecting in nature for a few minutes alone.

Actively release judgment and comparison

When we compare ourselves to others, we sacrifice our own self-love a little bit and we keep ourselves playing small. Also, when we judge others, we energetically welcome judgment upon ourselves. Human Design is powerful in that it can liberate you from this judgment/comparison conditioning that we have been taught to accept as “normal.” By having awareness of how you operate differently than other people, you can then begin to have acceptance about how others are different from you, and the need for everyone to be the same dissipates. Start to notice when you feel the inclination to compare or judge, and just take note. In that moment, choose to release this tightness from your being. It is a small energetic shift that builds up over time and leads to you actively living your design more each day.

Trust yourself

Human Design is an experiment, but it starts with tuning into what your body is telling you, and then taking aligned action to listen to what it says. Self-trust is HUGE and it starts one step at a time. Start small and build up from there. For example, if you felt something, you felt something. Instead of questioning whether you did or not, own it! It’s as simple as that.

Be honest with yourself

You are the only one who can know if something is right for you or not, if you are making a decision out of fear or not, if something is resonating for you or not, if you need a boundary or not, or if you are doing something because you want to or because you “should”.  Be real with yourself and hold yourself accountable to be honest with how you feel. Raising your vibration and living your design starts with awareness and is honed with self-honesty and trust.

Human Design is a complex system, but the power comes from experimenting with it. We have seen this modality transform the lives of thousands of people and we cannot wait to see how it does the same for you. You can learn more about your design by generating your free chart, listening to our many podcasts or learning more on our website daylunalife.com.