Episode 238: Human Design + Social Media
I recently noted that I’ve been using social media for over 25 years. It’s undoubtedly become one of the primary ways that we express ourselves and share our truths with the world.
In this episode, I discuss Human Design and social media, reflecting on:
Ways I had already been in alignment with my design in certain ways that I used social media
Parts of my design that I’ve looked to on how to use social media both as a consumer and content creator
How my perspective, mindset, and approach to social media have shifted since learning about Human Design
Listen to the Episode:
Mentioned in the Episode:
Episode 234: How to Align Your Business to Your Human Design
Episode 236: On Having An Ego Authority with Anna Lois Davies
Connect with Naomi:
Share the Episode:
“For a long time, I used to beat myself up for not doing social media the way creators are “supposed” to do it – but now that I know my Human Design, I understand that this is my Splenic Authority, with quick, in-the-moment, instinctual hits. This is another way of aligning my relationship with social media with my Human Design.”
Read the Transcript:
Hey, you, welcome back to The Live FAB Life Podcast. I'm your host Naomi Nakamura.
Before we get to today's episode, I want to remind you that I’m celebrating the 5th anniversary of this show with a code for 20% off a Human Design Reading or Functional Nutrition Assessment with me. The code is 5THPODCAST20, and it's valid until November 9th - one code per customer.
Today we're talking about Human Design and social media.
I always like to give context as to how episodes came about. In theory, this episode is a continuation of Episodes 234 and 235, where I talked about work and business alignment with our Human Designs, and then also Episode 237, where I talked about sharing our voice and speaking our truth through Human Design, especially on how the words that we use and write.
Social media is a huge part of that, whether you’re a personal user or use social media for business, because chances are you're writing a caption that goes along with your post.
That caption and post you share on your social media account is a huge part of how you express yourself. And we all use it to do just that, from the pre-teen just allowed on social for the first time to the seniors in our lives.
Everyone that uses social media expresses themselves and ultimately shares their voice and speaks their truth on it. It’s the quickest way to get your message out there, especially to people who may not even know who you are. Our social media reflects who we are.
A little tidbit about me is that I love to look at someone's social media account. For context, when I say social media, I mean Instagram because it's the only social media platform that I actively use. Still, I like to look at someone’s Instagram profile and try to guess their Human Design based upon what they shared – the imagery and visuals, and the captions that go along with it.
So, my hope with this episode is to encourage all of us, myself included, to rethink how we approach social media as consumers and creators.
Social media has been around for gosh, I mean, I guess for me, it’s been around since the mid-2000s. My first presence on social media was on Myspace; yes, I had a Myspace account in 2004 or 2005.
I was an early adopter of Facebook, as I was with Instagram and Twitter, but not YouTube. To this day, I spend very little time on YouTube as a consumer and none as a creator.
I understand the problems that social media can present, from predators to mental health challenges, and how it influences our feelings. I’ve been fortunate because up until recently, I’d say that, personally, social media has been a positive experience for me.
Back in 2008-2009, before Twitter became a toxic cesspool, I met some cool people on Twitter who became real-life friends that, over a decade later, we’re still real-life friends.
But this year, maybe it’s because I’m becoming more aware of my conditioning and trying to decondition; I honestly feel like Instagram is conditioning me.
In a recent post, I shared how I felt like Instagram was conditioning us as content consumers and creators.
In their efforts to copy TikTok, their algorithm is prioritizing Reels, and they made it so that all we saw in our Instagram feeds were Reels, most of which were by accounts that we don’t even follow.
As a content consumer, I don’t want to consume content from people I haven’t chosen to follow. I’m very particular about curating my feed and wish they’d leave that unsolicited content in the Discover tab.
I also don’t only want to watch Reels. It can be a jolt to my nervous system, and not in a good way, which isn’t something I want, being someone who has a hard time tapping into my parasympathetic system. With its “quick hits” nature, I think it’s also affecting my attention span.
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy a Reel or two, but it's not the ONLY type of post I want to see. I love a still image or a photo with a good caption. I love a vulnerable selfie. I love learning through carousels.
As a creator, it feels like I’m being forced to show up in an inauthentic way. For my posts to be seen and for the sake of engagement, I had to post Reels. Maybe I’m naïve, but it’s the first time I felt like social media was actively trying to condition me and manipulate my brain.
So, I’ve decided that I am not going to do that; I’m not going to bend to the trend. You won’t find me doing skits, dancing, or pointing to places on the screen where texts suddenly appear. That’s not me. I’m not that person. Nor do I want to spend a ton of time figuring out how to create transition Reels, like the kind when one snaps their fingers.
But with the 3rd Line in my Human Design, I’m always down to try new things just for the experience, so I’ve dabbled with Reels and tried ways to create them that don’t include dancing and pointing. And I’ve had fun creating them. I’ve tapped into creative spaces that I would never have before.
But Reels aren’t going to be the only way I share. I’m going to follow my Splenic hits, my Authority, sharing in the moment as a thought or idea comes to me. And it may or may not be a Reel.
I’m not going to show up in an inauthentic way for the sake of engagement because I believe that when I show up authentically in a way that’s meaningful and aligned to who I am, the people who are meant to connect with me will find and engage with me. They’ll be meaningful connections.
I’ve taken a course or two on social media where the entire focus is on getting followers - how to get more followers because if you get more followers, then you’ll have more people to read your blog post or listen to your podcast or book a session with you or buy the product or service that you’re offering.
And I get it, but at the same time, it’s just about the followers; at least, it’s not for me.
Many of these courses and programs teach with Manifestor, Generator, and/or Manifesting Generator energy, meaning with their respective Strategies to “Initiate” or “Respond.” As a Projector whose Strategy is to “Wait for the Invitation,” those strategies don’t work for me.
Additionally, planning and batch creating are also common practices taught in these kinds of programs, but as someone with a Splenic Authority, this isn’t possible for me. I’ve tried it – many, many, many times. Sometimes, I still try it because we’re taught that “consistency is king.”
But even when I do plan out a schedule of what I’m going to post, I never stick to it. When it comes time to create the planned post, I find that I’m not excited about it, I’m not connected to it, and it rarely, if ever, ends up being posted. Rather, I find that what I do end up posting are things that come to me in the moment. I may not post it in real-time, but I’ll quickly capture the thought and the visual I have for how I want to share it.
For a long time, I used to beat myself up for not doing social media the way creators are “supposed” to do it – but now that I know my Human Design, I understand that this is my Splenic Authority, with quick, in-the-moment, instinctual hits. This is another way of aligning my relationship with social media with my Human Design.
So, if I get a Splenic hit to share something with a single image, carousel, or even a Reel, that’s what I’ll do. I’m not going to “bend to the trend” just to follow an algorithm for the sake of engagement.
My Human Design Motivation is Need, not Desire, so my number of followers isn’t important to me. I’d rather have authentic connections with real people.
So, I challenge you to think about how you show up on social media, whether you’re using it for personal use or if you have a product or services business, think about how you show up. Are you being authentic to who you are? Are you showing up in a way that aligns with your Human Design? Do you feel like how you’ve been showing up results from how you’ve been conditioned? Or are you being conditioned to show up in a way that’s not true to who you are because of external influences or how the algorithm wants you to behave?
How else can you align how you show up on social media to your Human Design?
The more I’ve learned about my Human Design, the more I understand why my relationship to things, in this case, social media, is the way they are.
For example, I have Undefined Head and Ajna centers. These centers are about being inspired by things outside, external to us, seeing others’ opinions and points of view, and being able to see all sides of things.
Learning this about myself suddenly made sense that I’m so inspired by what I see on social media. I can see one post, and the ideas start to flow!
So, understanding that undefined centers are where we’re vulnerable to being influenced, and having 7 of 9 centers undefined in my Human Design, I get that I’m easily influenced. So, I’ve become selective about who I choose to follow and who I let into my social media space. Side note: Selectivity and pickiness align with the theme of my External Markets Environment.
I like to think that I've carefully curated my feed for things that are aesthetically pleasing to me. I touched a little on this in my conversation with Anna Lois Davies in Episode 237.
Before I’m questioned on this, yes, some of the accounts I follow are people I know in real life, but I also find what they post interesting and aesthetically pleasing. But mostly, what I’m referencing here more are brands that I choose to follow.
There are a couple where I haven’t used any of their products before, but I love the way the brand curates their feed. It speaks to Outer Vision Cognition, Cognition being our strongest sense. So, what I pay attention to, is what catches my eye. I'll link to some of the accounts I personally find aesthetically pleasing in the show notes for this episode which you’ll find at www.livefablife.com/238, for Episode 238.
I just mentioned Anna Louise Davis. I didn’t know who she was before our interview. We’d never met before, and as far as I know, we don’t have any mutual acquaintances. But her Instagram account showed up on my Discovery tab on Instagram, and her visual branding stood out to me.
I love the simplicity of it in her use of neutral colors, but the typography and images are bold. I asked her about this in our chat, and she explained that because she has red hair, she uses neutral tones to make it stand out. It’s rememberable. I think it’s so brilliant.
Coming back to my Head and Ajna centers because they’re undefined, and I’m externally influenced. More susceptible to conditioning in these areas, I’m also careful not to follow other people who do what I do - other health coaches, Human Design practitioners, and many of you know that I’m also a Beautycounter consultant, so not following other Beautycounter consultants either.
I follow those I have personal relationships with and/or genuinely enjoy what they share, but it’s my conscious decision not to follow many others who do what I do. It’s nothing personal to anyone else, but it's personal to me because I don’t want their words unconsciously to become my words or their ideas to become my ideas.
I chose to do this long before I knew what Human Design was, but it's another one of those things that, as I learned my design, it made sense – “oh, no wonder I do this – Undefined Head, Undefined Ajna.
Another way that Human Design has shifted my relationship with social media is learning my Strategy. As a Projector, my Strategy is to “Wait for the invitation.”
So, how I show up to “promote my offerings” is different from “traditional” ways, with “traditional” ways being “initiating” and “responding” – the Strategies of Manifestors and Generators and Manifesting Generators.
“Their” way, widely practiced, is not “my” way. As a Projector, “my way” is to share in a way that others know what I do, but to wait for that “energetic invitation” – knowing there’s an interest and receptivity to what I’m offering.
I discussed the Projector Strategy in Episodes 225 and Episodes 234 and 235. This is something that I experiment with and learn more about every day.
Earlier, I talked about the Motivation Variable, which is the correct motivation for us to act. There are six kinds of Motivation, and when I learned about Desire Motivation, I first thought of social media.
Those who have the Desire Motivation are motivated by their desire to lead people – they’re natural leaders! But to lead people, they need people to lead. So having people “follow” them, I suppose the word “followers” is what made me think that social media is important to them. Followers matter!
So, when it comes to social media, they’re motivated when their audience – their number of followers – grows!
I don’t have a Desire Motivation, so my number of followers has never really mattered to me much. It’s not a motivating factor for me to show up on social consistently.
I find that connections rather than followers compel me. I compare it to being at a big party. I’m not interested in that. I don’t enjoy loud crowds and hate mingling and small talk.
To me, the number of followers is merely a number.
I’m interested in connecting – having conversations and engagements with people on a more meaningful level.
Learning about this part of my design put social media into perspective. Again, much of what I’ve seen taught about “how to do social media” has been about acquiring followers – growing your audience.
But to me, with a Need Motivation, what good is a large audience if they’re not engaged?
Okay, as much as I try to organize my thoughts, I feel like I’ve just been rambling, so let me close here.
When I had the idea to dedicate an episode to social media and Human Design, I’m pretty sure I had a lot more insightful thoughts, but I didn’t follow my Splenic Authority and write them down. So as quickly as those thoughts came, they went, and they haven’t come back, as hard as I’ve tried to recall them.
So, if you have a Splenic Authority, let this be a lesson to you – when you get that instinctive, Splenic, in-the-moment hit – capture the thought!
Don’t forget, the code, 5THPODCAST20, is available until November 9th for 20% off a session with me.
Thank you for listening, and I'll see you again next time.
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!
Connect with Naomi on: Instagram
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