The Not-Self & The Deconditioning Journey

During the Big Bang, Source energy 'shattered' into infinite crystals. These crystals are a fragment of Source energy from where they once came. They are the core of our life force and are present in all living things.

These crystals hold our unique energetic blueprint and are key to understanding how the information from planetary transits is downloaded into our being. They carry information from all our incarnations and are also where our "new" experiences are stored.

Imprinting The Personality and Design Crystals

Humans carry two primary crystals that reflect the energies of our bodies and mind. 

These crystals are imprinted with a snapshot of our solar system and star fields at that precise moment.

This imprint lasts throughout our lives, shaping our experience, perception, and understanding of the world.

• Design Crystal: Imprinted 88 days before birth, the design crystal houses our unconscious energy that shows up in our forms, which we call our vehicle.  It is the channel that guides our human form towards the purpose of being in this particular incarnation. This energy also reflects our biological and animalistic reactions. The Design Crystal influences how our form interacts with the world on a cellular level. All life forms have a Design Crystal. It comes from the Earth and returns to Earth when we die. 

• Personality Crystal: Imprinted at birth, the personality crystal contains the mechanics of how our conscious mind operates. It reflects how we observe the world through our awareness, which we call our passenger. It is the energy that has carried with us through lifetimes, acting as the observer of all lifetimes, and is our direct connection to Source. Beings (like humans) that have self-reflection capabilities have a personality crystal.

Human Design Decodes Our Energetic Imprints

To understand our unique energies, Human Design calculates 26 imprints—13 from the planets that imprint our Personality Crystal and 13 from the planets that imprint our Design Crystal. These imprints are shown on the BodyGraph. The Design Crystal imprints are represented in red and reflect unconscious traits, while the Personality Crystal imprints are shown in black and represent our conscious mind.

These two crystals, and their associated imprints, work in tandem, shaping who we are and how we experience life. They are captured in the BodyGraph and define our unique energetic makeup, which we call our definition. This is the foundation of who we are—who we are meant to be before conditioning sets in.

The Aura: Holding Our Energy in Quantum

The energy of our Personality and Design Crystals is held together in quantum within our aura. The aura, in essence, is our soul. It is through this auric field that we can receive and transmit energy.

The aura is a toroidal field connected to the magnetic monopole, generated from the G Center. The magnetic monopole is the axis of rotation from the torus field which holds our body and mind in quantum.

Our higher self communicates with our body and mind via the aura, guiding us with insights, direction, and intuitive wisdom. Following our strategy and authority helps us to interpret this guidance. I've written more about how this works in a previous blog.

The Personality Crystal

The Personality Crystal governs our consciousness. It is responsible for how we perceive ourselves and the world around us. It is how we organize information, thoughts, and experiences into coherent patterns.

Our mind observes the world, and our mind interprets these external observations as itself. Because we are taught to rely on our minds to make decisions, and our mind observes our external reality, we often seek external guidance.

This is the root of our conditioning that we experience from societal norms, family expectations, and external influences which distorts our ability to observe with clarity.

This conditioning can create a deep misalignment, causing us to make decisions based on the world around us, rather than our authentic Self. This can lead to misalignment with our true nature and is the foundation of the Not-Self.

The Design Crystal

The Design Crystal is our form. It operates at the unconscious level and governs the body's natural rhythms and responses, such as heartbeat, digestion, and breathing.

Like a bird knows where to migrate, or a flower knows where to bloom, the Design Crystal is the conduit of guidance for our forms. It is the reception portal for the deep wisdom that comes from our magnetic monopole.

The conditioning forces influencing the mind can easily hijack the body's natural wisdom, creating a conflict between the body and mind. 

The mind is conditioned to control the body’s wisdom, which can lead to traumatic experiences and repeated unhealthy patterns, creating automated animalistic reactions that we may not realize we are engaging in until it's too late.

Over time, this misalignment between the body and mind becomes noticeable as the Not-Self is out of alignment with our true design. These conflicts begin to shape our neural pathways and engrain the Not-Self into our being.

The Mechanics of Not Self

The Not-Self is the result of the mind and body being at odds. This happens because the mind is conditioned to believe that it 'knows better' than the body, and in doing so, it creates resistance and misalignment.

The largest part of our Not-Self conditioning is seen in our openness.

Our openness in Human Design refers to the undefined 'white' centers, channels, and gates in the BodyGraph. These areas are the receptors for the energies around us, the specific energetic layers that are sensing the world around us.

Your openness is where you are receiving the frequency of other people or transits. It matches their frequency and you experience it as yourself. Therefore, our openness is where we are most susceptible to conditioning.

We absorb and amplify the energies of others through our openness, often mistaking them for our own. This is why it is called Not-Self—habits, patterns, and behaviors we have acquired that came from outside of ourselves.

When there is a mismatch that layer of your auric field feels irritated and wants to return to homeostasis. Luckily, the channeled guidance from our body has a mechanism to let the mind know when it is off track.

This red flag energy is tied to our aura type and is called frustration (generators), bitterness (projectors), anger (manifestors), or disappointment (reflectors). This is the alert system for our minds when we are not in alignment and it’s time to return to our natural state through self-reflection.

The Purpose of Conditioning

The Not-Self is not inherently bad. In fact, it serves a purpose: helping us understand who we are not.

It highlights areas of misalignment, helping us learn about ourselves through contrast. Just as we cannot know light without knowing dark, the Not-Self exists so that we can learn about our True Self.

Through the mechanism of the Not-Self, we can have self-reflected consciousness. By embracing the Not-Self, we can begin to understand and embody our True Self. This is the process of gaining wisdom.

Therefore, conditioning plays a crucial role in our personal growth and evolution. By experiencing what we are not, we can better understand and appreciate who we are.

Deconditioning is shedding layers of conditioning and reveals our true nature. While conditioning and deconditioning can be uncomfortable, it is through this process that we fully discover and embrace our True Self.

How Deconditioning Works

Conditioning shapes neural pathways, creating habitual responses to external stimuli. This conditioning is stored on a cellular level via Personality and Design Crystals. 

Human cells undergo a natural process of renewal, where old cells die and are replaced by new ones. Over seven years, this renewal touches every part of the body. This provides us an opportunity to shed patterns of conditioning.

We can initiate this process by aligning our minds back to the original wisdom of our aura, in two steps: 

1. Allow your mind to comprehend the complexities of your uniqueness by getting a human design reading.
2. Give your mind permission to think differently by experimenting with your unique auric Strategy and Authority.

By experimenting with S&A, the brain rewires itself, forming new pathways that support authentic decision-making and reactions. Then we release the imprint of conditioning, allowing new, healthier patterns to take root.

Deconditioning can feel like an "energetic detox," as stored fears, insecurities, and behaviors rooted in conditioning are brought to the surface to be seen and released by making correct decisions.

Each time you make decisions based on your Authority, you strengthen your alignment, creating ripple effects that influence your cells and energy centers over time.

The Seven-Year Deconditioning Process

The deconditioning process unfolds over seven years, during which our body and mind undergo significant transformation. Richard Rudd broke down the 7-year deconditioning process according to the 64 gates, and it's profound if you start tracking it.

Each year represents a different phase in the journey, summed up as follows:

• Year 1-2: Awareness and Resistance—We begin recognizing the Not-Self and resist old patterns.
• Year 3-4: Detox and Realignment—Old conditioning is released, and new patterns emerge.
• Year 5-6: Integration and Stabilization—New ways of being become more natural and stable.
• Year 7: Embodiment—By the seventh year, we are fully aligned with our True Self.

Strategy and Authority is a simple way to learn how to make decisions from a place of alignment. This helps us move away from mental patterns and return to the body’s natural wisdom. Over time, we strengthen our connection to our True Self, allowing us to embody our unique design.

The Clear Water Analogy: Recognizing the True Self

Our True Self is like a glass of clear water—pure and transparent. The Not-Self is like dirt swirling in the water, clouding its clarity. The clean water has not disappeared. The dirt has been introduced as a separate agent, creating something new.

To truly know ourselves, focus on the clear water.

• The Dirt (Not-Self): Represents the noise of conditioning—the behaviors that are not truly ours.
• The Clear Water (True Self): Represents our natural frequency, the essence of who we are.

Observing the dirt allows us to gain insights into what doesn’t belong to us. However, the key is to focus on our true essence. Then it is easier to recognize and release the dirt.

Focus on your clear water while adding more loving kindness to your interaction with the dirt. Sitting in silence and clearing the mind of external noise allows us to experience our true frequency. This practice helps us observe the Not-Self more quickly when trapped in its patterns.

And each time you are caught in the Not-Self pattern, gently remind your mind to keep experimenting with Strategy and Authority. There is no shame or blame here.

Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

Blooming Your Design

To dive deeper into Human Design’s practical applications, watch this condensed version of my somatic Living Your Design course "Blooming Your Design":