Episode 185: Exploring Human Design Motor Centers (Root, Solar Plexus, Sacral, Heart)
In Human Design, your Type, Strategy, and Authority are the foundation of your design. But those things are determined by the nine energy centers in your chart and whether they’re defined or undefined.
This episode begins a 4-part mini-series on exploring the nine energy centers in the Human Design chart.
In this episode, we explore the four motor centers: Root, Solar Plexus, Sacral, and Heart centers. You’ll hear me share:
What each center literally and figuratively represents
What each center governs
What it means for each center to be defined or undefined
Listen to the Episode:
Mentioned to this Episode:
Episode 182: Human Design Non-Sacral Types and Their Strategies
Episode 184: Your Human Design Authority - How Do You Best Make Decisions?
Episode 166: A Foundational Breakdown of Your Human Design Chart
Connect with Naomi:
Share the Episode:
“The core foundations of Human Design are Type, Strategy, and Authority. But they’re based upon and determined by the nine energy centers in the Human Design charts, and which of those centers are defined or undefined. This makes understanding the energy centers necessary.”
Read the Transcript:
Hello and welcome back to The Live FAB Life Podcast. I'm your host Naomi Nakamura, and I’m so excited to kick off this next set of episodes with you.
We recently covered the core foundations of Human Design – Type, Strategy, and Authority, but all of those things are based upon and determined by the nine energy centers in our Human Design charts, and which of those centers are defined or undefined.
This makes understanding the energy centers necessary, so we're going to spend the next few episodes on them.
Now if you haven't listened to the past few episodes, go back and listen to them. Because today we're going to talk about what it means to have energy centers that are defined or undefined and those recent episodes will give you context as to what we’re talking about today.
So, when you look at your Human Design chart, there are nine energy centers. If an energy center is shaded, if it’s colored in, it means that it’s a defined center.
Having a center defined that means that the energy of that center is consistent within you. You’re constantly emanating, giving off the energy of that center.
Contrary to that, if an energy center is white, and not shaded in, it means it's either an undefined or opened center. What that means is that those are the areas in your chart where you're vulnerable to absorb, to pick up on that energy from someone else.
For example, in my chart, I have a defined throat center and a defined spleen center. These are the two centers where I’m consistently giving off energy. The other seven energy centers in my chart are undefined, where I’m vulnerable to pick up the energy of those centers from others.
So, say that we’re good friends and we spend a lot of time with each other. And you have a defined Sacral center. You’re consistently giving off Sacral energy. But because it’s a center that’s undefined for me when we're around each other. I'm likely to pick up your Sacral energy that you're emanating and absorb and amplify it. So, I may momentarily experience Sacral energy, it’s not consistent in me and I won’t have it all the time. It’s where I’m vulnerable for conditioning because it’s not a fixed energy in me. Does that make sense? So together, we’re going to go through the nine energy centers, but all of them today.
I thought about doing a laundry list and covering them all in this one episode, but like I did with Types and Strategies, I'm going to group them by the kinds of energy centers they are.
So, today, in the first episode of this series on Human Design energy centers, we're going to be talking about the four motor centers.
The motor centers are essentially where we create energy to sustain life. The four centers are the Root center, which is all about the energy of momentum and forward progress.
Then there’s the Solar Plexus center which is about emotions and the energy of intimacy, awareness, and connection.
The third motor center is the Sacral center where we create lifeforce energy. And that’s all about having the energy to create, build, and to give life to.
And then the fourth motor center is the Heart center. The Heart center is all about will – willpower and ego energy. It’s where our competitive spirit comes from, the will to achieve.
It’s important to know that each energy center is embodied by an organ in the human body. So, let's dive into each of these four motor centers starting the Root center.
The Root center is located at the very bottom of the Human Design chart. It governs our momentum, motivation, drive, ability to make forward progress, and it’s embodied by the adrenal glands.
If you're a longtime listener and familiar with my story, then you know that I’ve had my share of struggles with my adrenals.
I've suffered from massive adrenal dysfunction due to burnout. And with that came stress, tiredness, and fatigue that I’ve never felt before. And it's rooted, pun intended, in the adrenal glands.
So, if your Root center is defined this means that you have the consistent energy to withstand motivation, to move forward and create momentum.
In addition to being a motor center, the Root center is a pressure center, and we’ll cover this in an upcoming episode.
But, if you have a defined Root center, then you’re calm under pressure because you can withstand pressure.
And if your Root center is undefined, as it is for me, then we’re not equipped to hand pressure well. Our inclination is to do whatever we can to make the pressure we feel go away, as soon as possible.
Some of you may be thinking, “Hey, I have an undefined Root center and I do great under pressure!”
And that may be true – sometimes. Even though a center is undefined, that doesn’t mean we’re not able to sustain the energy of an undefined center, it just means it’s not fixed within it – we don’t experience it consistently – it’s not constant in us.
We're vulnerable to absorb the undefined energy from someone who has it defined, so we may pick up Root energy from someone else and feel great under pressure, but it’s not sustainable for the long-term which means that if we don’t manage the energy well, we’ll get tired and burn out.
So, if you’re like me, we're not meant to put a lot of pressure on ourselves, it won’t lead to better results. Not everything is worth “hurrying up” for. It’s okay to take our time doing things and it can yield better results.
So, my undefined Root centers, release the thought and belief that you can't slow down or can't take your time doing things.
And when you feel pressured, ask yourself:
Where is this pressure coming from? Am I around someone who has a defined Root center? How can I release pressure and unwind? How can I plan my day so that I don't feel pressure? How can I plan my week and my month to manage pressure that’s inevitably going to come?
So that’s the Root center. Learning about the Root center was huge for me in helping me understand how I can better manage my stress and avoid burnout, why I process stress the way I do, why I'm so susceptible to burnout, and it really made a lot of sense, especially when I looked at the Human Design charts of the people throughout my entire life who I've spent the most time with.
Most of them have defined Root centers so it's no wonder that I thought I worked well under pressure but in reality, I didn’t.
I don't; my best work doesn't come when I'm under pressure.
The second motor center is the Solar Plexus center. The Solar Plexus center governs our emotions, feelings, sensitivities, and awareness.
It’s embodied by the kidneys, pancreas, and bladder.
So, if your Solar Plexus center is shaded or colored in, it’s defined for you, making you someone who experiences emotional highs and emotional lows. In Human Design, we call those highs and lows emotional waves.
And clarity comes when you're in between the waves – in between feeling emotionally high or low. Essentially, this means spontaneity is not for you. You need to wait for when you feel calm and emotionally stable.
So don’t judge your feelings by thinking some feelings are good and some feelings are bad – it’s innate for you to feel all the things.
Remember that emotions are just energy in motion. They're neither bad, they're neither good. All feelings are legitimate and so you just want to wait for those feelings to bypass, wait for your emotional waves to pass and then that's when you're best suited to make decisions.
We talked about this in the last episode when we talked about Authorities, specifically on what it means to have an Emotional Authority.
Now, if your Solar Plexus center is undefined, as mine is for me, then we’re people who are susceptible and vulnerable to picking up the emotions of others.
We pick up on what others are feeling, and we amplify and magnify them.
And so, when I’m feeling particularly strongly about something, I've learned that I need to pause and ask myself, “Is this really how I'm feeling? Or am I picking up these emotions from someone else?
For those of us with undefined Solar Plexus centers, we’re calm, cool and collected people. We don't experience the emotional waves that those who have defined Solar Plexus centers do.
There have been periods in my life where I thought that I was emotionless, that I was incapable of responding to things “normally” whatever “normal” means, because I didn't feel worked up in certain situations in the way that society or other people expected me to.
I generally don’t bawl my eyes out or show panic when a crisis hits. I've always felt like I'm an even keeled person.
There have been times where I've even been accused of not having any feelings and being a cold person because of how I reacted to some situations.
But now that I understand that I have an undefined Solar Plexus center, it makes sense. I’m here to feel the full range of emotions.
They don't come in waves for me and I'm at my best when I’m cool, calm, and collected.
So, defined Solar Plexus people, remember that negative feelings aren't bad, and wait for your emotional wave to bypass.
And for those of us undefined Solar Plexus centers, be aware of when we might feel overwhelmed and overpowered by other people's feelings.
We tend to want to avoid confrontation because confrontations usually happen when somebody is going through an emotional wave, but what we need to understand is that when we have a confrontation, we're really confronting the truth.
And while it may feel painful, on the other side of pain is pleasure. And while it may feel scary, on the other side of fear is freedom.
I'm not a confrontational person by nature, and this is something I'm still trying to work through. It’s a process and takes time. Growth doesn’t happen overnight.
The third motor center is the Sacral center. We spent A LOT of time talking about the Sacral center in Episodes 183 and 184 so please listen to those if you haven’t done so already.
The Sacral center governs creativity, growth, and pleasure. It’s where we get our lifeforce energy, the energy to sustain life.
So, it makes sense that the Sacral center is embodied by the reproductive organs and the gut.
As discussed in Episode 183, if you have a defined Sacral center, you’re automatically a Generator or Manifesting Generator.
Your life-giving Sacral energy is sustainable, particularly when you're doing something that you love. In Human Design, we tend to talk a lot about this in the context of doing work that's enjoyable for you, but I think it just comes down to doing something that's enjoyable to you.
Because when you do that, you create more Sacral energy. It gives you life and helps you sustain life. You have this vitality that emanates from within you when you do what you love.
You create so much Sacral energy that it might feel hard to burn it off, like having never-ending energy.
And those of us who have undefined Sacral centers are so thankful when that happens because we pick up, absorb, and amplify your Sacral, lifegiving energy – because we don’t make it ourselves. It’s not fixed within us.
This really resonated with me when recalling times that I suffered from adrenal depletion, fatigue and burnout, particularly when I suffered through the effects of overtraining.
I spent years training for long distance endurance events - marathons and half marathons. And when I think about it, while I loved being in those moments, I really don't think I had the energy to sustain it and perform in a way that I desperately wanted to.
As I’ve said, I’ve spent much of my life surrounded by Generators and Manifesting Generators – those who have defined Sacral centers.
I picked up on their energy, but it's not fixed in me, so I wasn’t able to sustain it for long periods of time.
Related to this, defined Sacral centers have the gift of an internal moderation system. They know when enough is enough for them.
They know when they've had enough to eat, enough sleep, enough exercise. They're able to self-moderate themselves.
Those of us who have undefined Sacral centers can’t do this.
So, while we can get a taste of it, it's not innate to us.
So, it’s challenging for us undefined Sacral Types, to manage our energy this way.
Therefore, I personally don’t have a problem with using apps and devices like my Oura ring or MyFitnessPal to help me moderate myself.
There's a reason why I overtrained - I couldn't tell when my body had reached its peak for exercise. I had to learn the hard way, over the period of many years and in some ways, I’m still recovering and healing from it, while trying to learn ways to self-moderate moving forward.
And it's the same thing when it comes to eating. There is a reason why it’s best for me to not have any treats in my house because I'm not someone who can just open a bag of potato chips and eat a few pieces and then put it away.
I’m going to eat the whole thing in one sitting. I’ve been this way my whole life and I’ve beaten myself up over it time and time again. Because I'm not one of these people who can follow an 80/20 rule.
If you're familiar with the work of Gretchen Rubin, in her book, “Better Than Before,” she talks about people who are Moderators, who have the ability to moderate themselves, and people who don't, who she calls “Abstainers.”
I'm an Abstainer and learning that I have an undefined Sacral center put this into context and made so much sense for me. It explained so much about why I'm able to do the things that I'm able to do, and why I'm unable to do the things that I'm not able to do.
It’s helped me to accept myself for what I am and have more grace with myself for what I’m not.
The fourth and final motor center is the Heart center.
The Heart center governs our will, ego, sense of worthiness, our self-esteem, how we feel valued and what we value.
It’s governed by our gallbladder and thymus gland.
If you have a defined Heart center, you're strong-willed. You know what you want, and you have this consistent desire and the energy to go out and make it happen. And when you do that, you create more Heart center energy in you.
You have a sense of the value of things.
Those of us, yes again me included, who don't have a defined Heart center, don’t have this energy consistent in us.
Our willpower comes when we're around someone who has this energy. We absorb and amplify it, but it comes and goes. We don't feel it all the time.
So, we’re not competitive people. We’re not driven by achievement.
But this also makes us vulnerable to the conditioning of comparisons like, “Oh I really could be doing that” or “I really should be doing that.”
And this is where we undefined Heart centers want to be careful because it can have a direct impact on our self-esteem, how we feel about ourselves, how we value ourselves.
We can be vulnerable to having a low sense of self-worth because we may not be living up to the expectations of other people, particularly if we have parents or a manager, or people in authoritative positions have defined Heart centers, who are driven by competition and achievement.
And so, if this is you, you have an undefined Heart center, it’s okay to be okay with accepting less - less money, less fame, less achievement.
This is where being conscious of where we might be susceptible to conditioning is huge.
I’ve spent well over a decade therapy trying to work through a number of things, and I absolutely advocate therapy. I think the world would be a lot happier if more people were in therapy.
But I equally feel the same about Human Design. Knowing my Human Design helps me to have more grace with myself, understanding why I am the way that I am, why I feel the way I do, and where I’m prone to being I'm conditioned, and what I can do to kind of work through it.
So, if you have an undefined Heart center, understand that your success doesn't need to be defined by achievements. There's nothing wrong with being defined by achievement, but it’s not the only way to define success. So that is the four motor centers.
I feel like I could spend so much time going into each one even more in depth, but that’s what we do in the Human Design readings that I do with my clients.
In the next few episodes, we're going to cover the other centers - the pressure centers, the awareness centers and then the manifestation centers.
If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment on the show notes for this episode at www.livefablife.com/185 for Episode 185, or come on over and find me on Instagram at @livefablifewithnaomi.
If you want to dive into your Human Design chart visit www.livefablife.com/services and book a session with me. So that's it for this week, as always thank you so much for listening, and spending your time with me. Until next time, bye for now!
Naomi Nakamura is a Health x Human Design coach who’s creating a healthier society through aligned energy.
She blends a bespoke mix of Functional Nutrition and Human Design to help others shift into alignment to leverage and correctly manage their energy to support their body, mind, and spirit.
She believes that when we embrace our authenticity and lean into our bio-individuality, we naturally live a life of freedom, empowerment, and optimal health.
Naomi resides in the San Francisco Bay Area and can often be found exploring the area with her puppy girl, Coco Pop!
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