WTF Is Human Design? Coach Yvonne Chung Breaks It Down!

Guest Blog by Yvonne Chung

Yvonne is a Purpose & Fulfillment Coach that specializes in empowering creative, impact-driven womxn of color to break the mold, redefine success and happiness for themselves, and carve their own path toward deeply fulfilling and meaningful lives. 

As an Asian American daughter of immigrant parents, Yvonne knows what it’s like to try and fit into a box someone else prescribed - and what it's like to lose touch with her own dreams, desires, and vision for life in the process. A graduate of the Lumia Life Coach Training program, her mission today is to guide and empower other people of color to know themselves, honor themselves, and create the lives that they want - not the ones they have been told to have. You can explore Yvonne’s work on Instagram: @yvonnechung.co.

How Can Understanding Human Design Enhance Your Life?

If you’re into Enneagram, Myers-Briggs, or Astrology, I’m calling it: you’ll probably love the Human Design System. It is a powerful and incredibly accurate tool for self-discovery and empowerment - and it has been a serious game-changer in my work, relationships, and life.

My name is Yvonne. I am a Purpose & Fulfillment Coach for womxn of color and children of immigrants. In short, I use Human Design and Positive Psychology to empower people with the self-knowledge they need to create deeply fulfilling and satisfying lives. From work and career, to love and relationships, to purpose and life satisfaction, I’ve found that the Human Design System can offer insight and wisdom on every step of a client’s journey.

So, WTF is Human Design?

The Human Design System is an empirical system developed by Alan Robert Krakower that synthesizes both modern and ancient sources of knowledge: Astrology, the Chinese i-Ching, the Jewish Kabbalah Tree of Life, the Hindu-Brahmin Chakra system, modern astronomy, and quantum mechanics (whew!).

To my friends I say it’s like Astrology on steroids… but it is so much more than that. 

Unlike subjective personality tests such as the Myer’s Briggs or Enneagram, where your answers to their assessment questions may change from day to day, the Human Design System uses your specific birth information to give you a unique chart. Your chart is like an energetic blueprint, so to speak, mapping out the nature and mechanics of your energy and the specific themes of growth and expansion on your life path. 

At its core, Human Design is a system that provides a framework for exploring and empowering the self. It is a tool for self-optimization and self-acceptance that provides practical tools for learning how to move through the world with less friction and more ease.

And honestly, that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Think of it like an energetic operating manual for this vehicle we call our body, helping us understand how to move with ease, flow, and purpose in our day to day lives. 

How can Human Design help you understand yourself better? 

Human Design has proven to be a valuable tool in my coaching practice, offering insight into how a person can operate in energetic alignment specifically for that individual.

I’ll get to a brief explanation of the Human Design system in a moment, but first let’s talk about what it’s NOT. Human Design won’t tell you your future. And no, it won’t tell you what job to get or who you’ll end up with romantically!

What it will do is teach you about your innate strengths, how you naturally affect and influence others, and where you're most susceptible to conditioning and getting off track.

It will teach you your own personal and reliable way to make decisions that are in alignment with how energy moves through you. It empowers you with explicit strategies and tools to minimize resistance and wasted energy in every area of life.

Human Design is not a faith or belief system. It’s more like a user manual. It does not require you to “believe in” anything, but rather to suspend disbelief and just experiment with the tools to see how they affect your life. I’ve witnessed these tools completely transform people’s lives, including my friends, family and clients, as well as my own.

Try it out and see what happens. Take what resonates and leave the rest.

What are the implications that arise from learning about your Human Design? 

We live in a culture that constantly tells us to:

‍“Go get it!” 

“Make it happen!”

“Just do it!”

“Chase your dreams!” 

… But what if I told you that only 8-9% of the population is actually designed to INITIATE with minimal resistance? 

... And that around 70% of us are designed to WAIT TO RESPOND to something that shows up in our outer world before committing our energy to it? 

... And that 20% of us are designed to WAIT TO BE RECOGNIZED, valued, and invited before engaging? 

Why do these things matter?

Let’s say you’re in that last 20% (like me) and you run around trying to initiate or give your input without being recognized. You’ll usually hit a wall or meet a ton of resistance along the way. Here's the good news: it doesn't have to be that way.

Most of us have been operating against our natural design our entire lives.

There are many reasons for this, including the dense conditioning we have experienced from culture, school, parents and family… even our peers. But here’s what nobody tells us: when we are operating against our natural design, it manifests as resistance and friction (burnout, bitterness, frustration, anger, disappointment). In short, energetic misuse and misalignment. 

Human Design re-acquaints us with our inner guidance system.

It gives us the tools (Strategy and Authority) to minimize that friction and wasted energy. By understanding the mechanics of how you are designed (Should I initiate? Wait to respond? Wait to be recognized?), you minimize the amount of energy you’re wasting on people and opportunities that are not right for you.

With this information, you can start to examine and understand how your decisions are what will bring you ease or resistance on your path. The more you make decisions in alignment with your Authority, the less resistance you’ll face.

The Human Design “Big 3”: Type, Strategy, and Authority

If there is anything you take away from Human Design when you first begin working with it, it should be the following 3 things. You don’t really need to know anything else. If you were to only work toward understanding these three elements of yourself, the rest of your design will unfold as a natural result. 

Your TYPE is your “vehicle”.

It tells us how your energy shows up, how that energy is best used, and the way it interacts with the world and the other people around you.

Your type will tell you: 

• Are you here to initiate and get things started? 
• Are you a slow and steady, masterful builder? 
• Are you a sprinter who’s adept at pivoting? 
• Are you here to sense and guide other peoples’ energy?
• Are you here to evaluate and mirror the state of people, your environment, and the world?

Your type provides a framework (known as your Signature & Not-Self Theme) to inform you of when you are in alignment or out. It is a felt experience. Are you here to experience satisfaction, recognition, peace, or delight? Are you constantly experiencing frustration, bitterness, anger, or disappointment instead? This framework helps you identify when and how you have gotten off track.

Your STRATEGY is your “GPS”.

‍It tells us how you are designed to interact with and navigate through people, opportunities, and experiences in your life in order to minimize friction and maximize ease. Your strategy is your way of understanding and protecting your energy.

• Are you designed to just go for it, initiate, and inform along the way? 
• Are you designed to wait to respond to things that come to you before committing your energy to them? 
• Are you designed to wait to be recognized before sharing your gifts?
• Are you designed to wait a lunar cycle before making big decisions? 

Your AUTHORITY is your innate and reliable decision-making process.

It explains how to make decisions that are in alignment with your energy. Knowing your Authority can clarify:

• Should you be following your first instinct? Your gut?
• Should your decision-making be more spontaneous and in the moment?
• Should you sleep on it and get clarity over time? 
• Do you need to hear yourself talk it out before making a decision? 

Your Authority is how you decide what to actually commit your energy to. It is there to help guide you to those things that you actually have the energy to pursue (instead of all the “shoulds”).

Applying Human Design To Everyday Life 

Discovering Human Design and using it as my own personal, energetic, and psychological operating manual has been absolutely invaluable on my journey over the last three years as an entrepreneur, coach, partner, and human being. 

It’s helped me to understand how I am designed to work, rest, learn, harness my energy, share my gifts, understand others, and help others. But it doesn’t end there!

Here’s what else I’ve gained as a result of following my unique Human Design:

• I’ve stopped chasing opportunities and wasting my energy trying to force things to happen. Instead, I’ve stood tall in my value, remained visible, and allowed the most exciting and aligned opportunities to come to me - and they have! (#projectorlife)

• I’ve discovered that I operate best when in a position to guide other people rather than “doing all the doing”. No more burning out, and no more pushing myself past my natural energetic threshold.
• I’ve learned how to make truly self-honoring decisions (most of the time!) instead of succumbing to mental or peer pressure.
• I’ve learned that people receive my energy, insights, and perspective best when I am first recognized and invited to share them.
• I’ve owned and accepted that I am not designed for a regular 9-5 job. I require a bit more rest than some others types, and that is OK. No more shame here. Bring on the naps!
• I’ve learned that my routines are meant to be somewhat fluid and flexible with options instead of rigid structure. This confirmed how I’ve always felt, but had been told was “wrong”.
• I’ve discovered that I’m here to share my perspective and guide others with powerful questions, but only by those who recognize and value my insight.

Learning about my Human Design has helped me relax into my natural way of being. It has given me tools to understand my energy and its best uses. It has confirmed for me things that I’ve always known and felt about myself, but had been conditioned to not accept.

I no longer feel like I’m swimming upstream. These days, I am flowing with the river.

Human Design is a system that helps you uncover your path of least resistance so that you can move through life with greater ease.

‍And it is completely unique to YOU. Instead of swimming against your natural current, you learn how to surrender to the flow of your personal river.

I like to describe learning your Human Design as the permission you’ve always wanted, but never needed in the first place, to be exactly who you are.  - Yvonne Chung

After human design sessions, my clients report feeling seen and validated in a way that is comforting and empowering. It’s an affirmation of who they are and how they have always shown up in the world. It’s confirmation of their natural way of being in a world that tells us every day to be different than who we are.

What's the benefit of having someone read and interpret your Human Design for you? 

If you’ve looked at your own Human Design chart, you might have noticed that there is a LOT of information in there. (And if you haven’t but would like to, you can run yours for free at Human Design America.) Having a reader interpret your chart for you will help you quickly get at the key aspects discussed above without getting lost in the weeds. 

A reader will also be able to examine your full chart in context, and provide you with powerful questions and guidance for wherever you are on your path. They can use your chart as a reference point for alignment, and help keep you on track throughout your journey.

Human Design & Life Coaching

As a Purpose & Fulfillment Coach, I use Human Design analysis in tandem with Positive Psychology to help my clients create lives and careers that are deeply fulfilling, meaningful, and energetically sustainable.

Positive Psychology offers the framework for understanding what everyone needs to thrive.

Human Design is a tool for understanding what you, personally, need to thrive.

Positive Psychology gives us general tools for goal setting, accomplishment, and productivity.

Human Design shows how to accomplish your goals in an energetically sustainable way for you.

Some would say it’s energetic alignment. Others call it thriving or flourishing. Both frameworks offer a different set of tools to help get you there.

I use the two intuitively and synergistically to provide a client with practical tools and deep de-conditioning work. Together, we help them take their power back, honor their own energy, and navigate the world, their goals, and their lives confidently and with ease.

‍When people gain a deeper sense of self-understanding, higher fulfillment is a natural byproduct. 

As a reader, I love doing Human Design Breakthrough Sessions (they’re my fav!). They allow me to really dive into a client's current situation through the lens of Human Design and teach them how to use the practical tools of this system to visualize and plan for their future, define energetically aligned goals, make self-honoring decisions, and move through blocks, resistance, and conditioning. 

Human Design is a new system of self-knowledge, and a framework for deeper self-understanding. Through it, you begin to understand your needs, your shadows, your thresholds, and your dreams more clearly. With this newfound clarity, you begin to make truly self-honoring decisions and start showing up unapologetically for yourself. From there, it’s easier to create the life you truly want: of even greater purpose, satisfaction, and ease.

Interested in exploring a Human Design reading with Yvonne? You can check out her current offerings on Instagram: @yvnchng.

Ready To Be A Coach?

One of our values at Lumia is that we dare to be different. Our coaches like Yvonne ignore the expectations society tries to impose on them, and seek to live from their own truth instead. If you are ready to step into your power and you’d like some partners in the process, come check out Lumia Life Coach Training. Grounded in science, our ICF accredited program features authentic instructors, a robust curriculum, and business instruction to prepare you for liftoff.

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