Your Human Design profile is another important part of understanding your Human Design and discovering who you are. Your profile is the theme of how you learn, and it illuminates how you will travel on your life path.
When we look at a Human Design chart, it is comprised of three major elements, the Incarnation Cross, the type, and the profile (figures 46 and 47).
Your Incarnation Cross tells you about your life path or the plotline for the story of your life. Imagine that your journey on your life path is kind of like a play or a movie. Much like the role of a butler in a movie, your type is your role in your life story. The profile represents the character or personality of your role. Going back to the movie analogy, the butler can have all kinds of different personalities, such as the grumpy butler or the curious butler or the bungling butler. The personality or character in the Human Design chart is defined in the profile.
Your profile is comprised of two numbers, which represent two kinds of energies that work together to create your experiential learning style—the gate lines in the conscious and unconscious sun. The first number is an aspect of your life role that you are conscious of and that you probably relate to easily. The second number is an aspect of your life role that is unconscious but that is also a strong part of your personality. There are twelve profiles:
Figure 46: The profile is listied on the Keynote section.
1/3 - The Investigating Martyr
1/4 - The Investigating Opportunist
2/4 - The Hermit Opportunist
2/5 - The Hermit Heretic
3/5 - The Martyr Heretic
3/6 - The Martyr Role Model
4/6 - The Opportunistic Role Model
4/1 - The Opportunistic Investigator
5/1 - The Heretic Investigator
5/2 - The Heretic Hermit
6/2 - The Role Model Hermit
6/3 - The Role Model Martyr
The conscious and unconscious parts of your profile work together to create a unique combination of energies that dictate how you approach your life's journey. Sometimes just understanding your profile numbers can be enough to help you understand some of your core inner dilemmas, as well as reveal your ideal way to approach change, relationships, learning, and your energy and influence.
There are six possible lines that are expressed in a profile. Before you can understand the meaning of your profile, it's important to understand the meaning of each of the six lines.
Just as in astrology, your energetic configuration is created at a specific time, depending on where and when you were born. Your moment of birth locks in your personality traits and your unique Human Design.
When we look at a Human Design chart, we are usually only looking at the body graph, the triangle that is the “map” of your energy. The gates and lines that create the definition on your body graph are a snapshot of the positions of the planets and gates at the moment of your birth.
For ease of interpretation, we have taken the body graph out of its full diagram. The full Human Design chart consists of the body graph inside a mandala (figure 48).
Figure 48: The Human Design body graph and mandala
As you can see, the Human Design mandala has two wheels. The inner wheel is the traditional astrological chart with the twelve houses. The outer wheel consists of a ring containing the sixty-four gates. The planetary position of your gates at your birth is measured on these two wheels.
Imagine that each of the two wheels represents a measurement of a moment in time. When you look at a clock, time is measured in minutes and seconds, and every moment has a specific place on the clock “wheel.” In astrology, the movement of time around the astrological “clock” is measured in degrees and minutes. There are thirty astrological degrees and sixty astrological minutes for each sign. Each degree and minute gives an astrologer even deeper insight into the potential of your astrology chart.
On the Human Design “clock,” the movement of time is measured in lines. Each of the sixty-four hexagrams has six lines that mark the progression of time around the mandala (figure 49).
Figure 49: The I Ching hexagram is comprised of six lines that are broken into transpersonal and intrapersonal attributes.
The position of your gates is expressed also in lines, giving you even more insight into how that gate will be expressed in your life.
Each line has a specific energy that will influence how the gate is expressed.
The lines in your profile are derived from the lines of the conscious and unconscious gates in the sun position of your chart (figure 50).
Lines 1/3 in the profiles are intrapersonal lines and are energies that are self-focused and all about personal experience and understanding. Lines 4/6 in the profiles are about transpersonal energy and all about experiences in relationships with others. Some people, by design, are focused more on their own life process, and others are more oriented toward relationships.
Figure 50: The profile marked on the birth chart
Some lines have similar themes, giving certain combinations of lines more inner harmony than others. Some line combinations, on the other hand, contain inherent energetic challenges.
This dissonance is not about creating suffering but about helping you master your personal inner challenges so that you can grow and evolve. When you master the dissonance in your own chart, you grow in self-awareness and self-love, and you are better able to live a harmonious life.
Remember that there is no suffering in Human Design. The places where we have inherent energetic challenges are always there for a reason and are powerful catalysts for growth on our life path and for our personal evolution in this lifetime. Ultimately, when you live your type and strategy, a lot of the inner conundrums in the chart soften and become less challenging.
First we'll cover the energies of each of the six lines. Next, we'll combine those six lines to create twelve possible profiles.
Intrapersonal energy is self-focused and all about personal experience and understanding.
If you are a first line profile (1/3, 1/4, 4/1, 5/1), you are very curious by nature. The first line profile needs a foundation of information to feel safe and secure about the world. The Internet was invented for you!
Before you can make a change or shift in your life, you need to investigate and learn everything about what you are about to do. If you go on vacation, you will read all the guide books beforehand so that you will be prepared for your adventure.
As a first line profile, part of your life path is to share what you know with others. Other people likely see you as a resource and a go-to person who knows a lot.
The challenge of being a first line profile is that you don't make change easily and you can feel uncomfortable if you feel as if you don't know enough. You can be overprepared for a situation, and if it doesn't go the way you planned it, can make you very nervous.
In relationships, the first line needs time to “study” their partner. You want to learn everything there is about them and relationships in general.
In its highest expression, you are deeply knowledgeable.
In its lowest expression, you are terrified of the unknown and can miss life experiences because you are too busy questioning them.
If you are a second line profile (2/4, 2/5, 5/2, 6/2) you have a theme of shyness and loneliness in your life. If you are a hermit, you crave alone time and you usually need a lot of it to recharge yourself.
But second line energy is kind of funny. It operates counterintuitively, because the more a hermit hides away, the more it is seen by others. If you have second line energy, you experience a kind of energy vortex that draws others to you if you hide yourself too well. When you hide away, people will find you and recognize you. It is the perfect energy for Generators and Projectors.
In relationships, hermit energy tends to be shy and needs to be called out or recognized to enter the relationship correctly. This can sometimes feel frustrating, because all hermit profiles are paired with transpersonal energy that craves relationships. This can create a push/pull internal conflict for the hermit.
Of course, as a hermit, the ideal relationship is with a partner who needs as much alone time as you and doesn't take your need for solitude personally. You don't want to be away from your partner, you just need some time alone. Or you may also find that as a hermit you love having a partner who enjoys being alone with you. A quiet evening with both of you reading different books on the couch might feel like the perfect date night.
In its highest expression, you wait to be called out into the right experiences and you take time to regenerate and renew yourself.
In its lowest expression, you hide out and miss the joy of life.
If you are a third line profile (1/3, 3/5, 3/6, 6/3), you learn by experimenting. You are here to share what works and what doesn't based on your own experimentation. You have never made a mistake in your life. Everything that you have tried that didn't work out was a crucial step in you mastering what does work. If you ever want to know the best way to do something, ask a third line profile. They've tried everything.
If you're a third line, your life path is experiential. You have to do something to work out all the bugs. But sometimes a third line profile will shut down out of fear of making a mistake or getting it “wrong,” especially if you've been judged or criticized for not getting it right.
It's important to understand that all of your so-called mistakes are part of your learning curve. It doesn't matter how much you know or how much you've prepared, things will go “wrong.” These “mistakes” aren't a reflection of your character. They are a vital part of your experimental process that helps you discover in a practical way what is truly useful and effective.
Around the age of forty, some of your experimentation will settle down. The experiences of your youthful exploration will give you the depth to be truly wise about life. You will always want to try everything, but by forty you'll have a deeper awareness of what needs to be experienced and what doesn't.
In relationships, you need a lot of time to get clear about what you want and need. The third line energy can often make you fall in love at first sight and think that you've found the One. Unfortunately, your third line energy can make you fall out of love as quickly as you fall in love. As a third line profile, you need a lot of space, freedom, and time in a relationship to know whether it is correct for you or not. Take it slow. It helps you avoid disappointment and keeps you from hurting others.
In its highest expression, you are wise about life based on your own experiments and experiences.
In its lowest expression, you are afraid to try new things because you know there will be a certain amount of trial and error associated with them.
The upper trigram (lines 4 through 6) is about transpersonal energy and relationships with others.
If you are a fourth line profile (1/4, 4/1, 4/6), your relationships are very important to you. You probably have gotten some of your greatest opportunities in life from your social network and your friends. The fourth line energy is gregarious and deeply rooted in relationships. If you are a fourth line, you have a lifetime process of getting to the foundation of what it means to be in relationships. You care, and you care deeply.
The fourth line profile is not a profile that makes changes very easily or even readily. You like things to stay the same, and you want people to accept you as you are and never try to change you.
If you have fourth line energy, you are all about foundations. When you make a change, you move yourself from one foundation to the other; you have to be well-prepared and have your new opportunity ready before you can make a shift. That means you don't leave a job until you have another job lined up. You don't leave a lover until another relationship is available. You don't move until you know where you are going, and the unknown is very, very uncomfortable for you.
To have a great relationship, you have to have a strong foundation of friendship first. If not, you will feel insecure and nervous. There can be a certain platonic quality to your energy, which can be frustrating sometimes because your potential partners don't always realize that you are romantically interested. They think you're just good friends. But as a fourth line profile, you need to always know where you stand. It's normal for your relationships to end in friendship, too. You might have a lot of old lovers who are now dear friends.
In its highest expression, you are consistent, stable, and a good friend.
In its lowest expression, you are afraid to speak your truth and fix things. You simply create an alternative and then move on, sometimes without dealing with the challenges.
If you have a heretic profile (2/5, 5/1, 5/2), your life has a more destined quality than you perhaps realize. As a heretic, you have a life path that is about helping others. But it's not just by your actions that you help others. Energetically you serve as a mirror for others to help them with healing and aligning their energy. This isn't necessarily anything you do consciously. This is simply an artifact of your energy.
This energetic mirroring makes it difficult for people to see you for who you really are. How you appear to others is a projection of their consciousness and what they need to work on to heal. Because of this, you might sometimes find yourself in the wrong place, with the wrong people, being the wrong “mirror.” This is where the heretic name comes from. Sometimes people project inaccurate expectations onto you and if you don't fulfill them, your reputation can suffer.
Of course, the converse is true: If you follow your Human Design strategy, you will find yourself in the right place, with the right people, being of service in a way that is empowering and transformative. It is so important for the heretic to follow their strategy. It can save them a lot of pain and suffering.
Because of the projections of others, as a fifth line profile you can be a master of hiding. No one really knows who you are. (They will think they do, but they don't.) It's not that you are secretive, necessarily. But you will play your cards very close to your chest.
The heretic profile in its highest expression has the capacity to influence great numbers of people and to demonstrate the highest possible energies in their chart. That means that you have seduction as a life theme. You can seduce a room with your personality, your ideas, and even your sexuality, if you choose. The fifth line makes you a great salesperson in many ways.
In relationships you like to be seductive and seduced. People are drawn to you. You can have a lot of power and control in your relationships, and you decide when to turn your charm off or on. Some heretics like the energy of seduction so much that they forget about the other parts of being in a relationship. This can give you a certain Casanova quality if you're not careful. And, of course, because people are projecting ideas and perceptions on to you, they may perceive you as a Casanova, even when you're being faithful. The projection field of others can sometimes make relationships tricky for you. Because of your secretive nature, it can take time for you to feel safe and comfortable in a relationship. Heretics don't always like to be vulnerable or seen. When all is well, you will playfully seduce your partner again and again, slowly revealing your true self to that special someone, keeping the energy and delicious spark of your relationship alive and evolving. The heretic always seeks the highest expression of love.
In its highest expression, you can effectively influence people.
In its lowest expression, you can use your charm for personal gain and sometimes hurt others.
As a sixth line profile (3/6, 4/6, 6/2, 6/3), you have three distinct life phases. Ultimately, your life path leads you to becoming a role model for others. The six line profile may be a late bloomer, but each step of your journey is crucial for the role you will serve later in life.
The first phase is from birth until the age of 28.6 years. During this first stage, your life is all about experiences and experimentation. You act very similarly to a third line profile.
The second phase goes from 28.6 years until approximately fifty years of age. Most people don't really feel this phase until they are about thirty-five years old. During this second phase, you may notice that life isn't as “edgy” and sharp as it was in your twenties. You may feel that it takes a lot of energy and effort to do things like you used to. Answering the phone and emails, and making small talk and light-hearted banter may not interest you as much. You are more interested in studying, or even just resting. Part of the purpose of this phase is to help you heal from the first part of your life and to watch other people to see what they are doing and how they are mastering life. This second phase is often referred to as “being on the roof.”
When you're on the roof, it's a great time to build a business or focus on yourself. Because so much of this phase is about inner work, it can often be a hard time to initiate any kind of relationship. Even parenting can be difficult during this time, especially if you don't understand what's happening to you. Sometimes when sixth line profiles go through this phase, they think they're depressed.
The final phase starts around the age of fifty and lasts for the rest of your life. When you “come off the roof,” it can sometimes be a cataclysmic descent. The themes of the first part of your life can come back with newfound wisdom and maturity. It's not unusual for you to experience dramatic life changes during this time as you move toward creating a life that is a full manifestation of your authentic self.
The final phase, called the role model phase, is a time when you have tried everything, figured out what works, and are now living true to yourself. As a role model, there isn't much you need to do except be yourself. Others are watching you now to see how to make the best of their lives.
The sixth line has somewhat of a destiny or fixed fate. As a sixth line profile, you usually are pretty clear about your life purpose and can feel it pushing on you to manifest it. If, for some reason, you're still unclear or out of sync with your destiny, your outer reality will push on you pretty hard to get your attention. It can feel very uncomfortable, as a sixth line profile, to be unclear of your life direction.
In relationships, you need and deeply desire a soul mate. This can be a long and desperate journey for the sixth line profile, especially if you are still looking for a soul while you are on the roof, when it is hard to initiate relationships. You may have to kiss a few frogs, but your search will be worth it in the end, and you'll forget how long it took when you finally find yourself in the arms of your beloved.
In its highest expression, you are a role model who inspires others.
In its lowest expression, you get stuck in your aloofness and struggle to get out into the world.
The six lines can combine the conscious and unconscious to create twelve different profiles:
The first number in your profile will always be the conscious energy; the energy that you follow first and that you are more aware of. The second line in your profile will be the unconscious energy; it is more subtle and follows the energy of the first number. The conscious energy always precedes the unconscious in the profiles.
For example, if you are a 1/3 profile (Investigative Martyr), you have a life pattern of needing to investigate things and then experiment with them to see if they work. The first number is the conscious line of the profile and is the investigative energy. The second number is the unconscious line of the profile and is the experimental part of the profile. The 1/3 has to investigate first and then experiment, and always in that order.
While we won't cover each of the twelve profiles in detail here, I think you can figure out your profile on your own by reading about the relevant lines that make up your profile. You can also check out a two-hour bonus audio with in-depth descriptions of each profile on my website, www.understandinghumandesign.com.
Understanding your definition and openness gives you a tremendous amount of information about how you operate, what energetic experiences might be keeping you stuck, and what relationship dynamics you have been taking personally. Knowing which energies are consistent and which have variety also gives you clues about who you are, what you are here to do, and where you can grow in your wisdom about others.
Your profile gives you another layer of awareness and understanding about your life and life experiences. Now you understand your energy, your learning style, and even a bit about your life purpose and role.
Remember that in spite of the fact that you are gaining more depth and self-awareness from your Human Design chart, the way to maximize the expression of your true self is very simple. Follow your Human Design strategy according to your type, and the magic of life unfolds easily.