Human Design How It Works
The calculation runs twice. One set of positions is taken from the moment of birth, called the Personality or conscious side. The other is taken from roughly three months earlier, called the Design or unconscious side. Both are plotted onto the same bodygraph, which is why a Human Design chart carries two columns of numbers rather than one.
Two Charts: Personality and Design
A Human Design chart is built from two separate planetary snapshots. The Personality (conscious) chart uses the exact planetary positions at your birth moment. The Design (unconscious) chart uses the positions from approximately 88 days earlier, the moment the Sun was roughly 88 degrees behind where it stood at your birth. Together they give every gate in your chart a conscious and an unconscious expression.
Gates and Lines
Each of the 13 bodies tracked (Sun, Earth, Moon, the Nodes, and the seven visible planets) lands in one of 64 gates arranged around the chart wheel, and each gate further divides into 6 lines. Every planet in both the Personality and Design charts activates one gate/line pair, so a full chart activates up to 26 gate positions (13 bodies × 2 charts), though many charts share gates between the two.
Channels
Gates come in complementary pairs; when both gates of a pair are active anywhere in your chart (Personality or Design, either side), they form a channel, a fixed line connecting two of the nine energy centers. A channel is what actually defines a center, not an isolated gate on its own.
Centers: Defined vs. Undefined
The chart has nine geometric centers (Head, Ajna, Throat, G, Heart, Sacral, Spleen, Solar Plexus, Root). A center is defined, shown colored in (when at least one complete channel connects into it, giving you consistent, reliable access to that center's theme. A center with no complete channel into it is undefined (open)) you experience that theme inconsistently, amplifying and taking in energy from other people around that center instead.
Type and Strategy
Which specific centers are defined, and which channels connect them, determines your Type: Manifestor, Generator, Manifesting Generator, Projector, or Reflector. Each Type carries its own Strategy, the way it is designed to correctly engage with life and other people, from informing (Manifestor) to waiting to respond (Generator) to waiting for invitation (Projector).
Profile, Definition, and Incarnation Cross
Your Profile pairs the line of your Personality Sun gate with the line of your Design Sun gate (e.g. 1/3) and describes your life role's outer texture. Definition describes how your defined centers group together, a single connected block, or split across two, three, or four separate groups. The Incarnation Cross names the specific life theme carried by the Sun and Earth gates across both charts.