“But are you in a cult?” …my mom asked me, her furrowed-brow of consternation and unconcealed fear irritating me. 

 

Four years ago, I had recently divorced and moved to Sedona, the New Age mecca of alien-sightings and frequency healing. 

 

Over dinner, she asked me about my involvement with Human Design. She had Googled it. And of course it made no sense to her Chinese immigrant sensibilities. 

 

My body tensed into the shape of teenage rebellion: my eyes widened and rolled, an “ugh, please” formed in my throat, my system braced in protection. No, of course not, I countered, offended. 

 

How dare she assume such a ridiculous thing?! She doesn’t get me at all, I fumed.  

 

The examination of cults has been peaking in my sphere all year. An examination of alternative healing modalities and the delusional power of belief. Friends deep in human design have left or taken a step back.

 

In Human Design, we conceptualize the spread of information (trends, memes, the evolution of consciousness) as traveling through the fractal. The line that the One original crystal of consciousness sheared down is our fractal line — at the beginning and forevermore, allegedly. One person gets it (whatever “it” is) and passes their understanding to those around them. 

 

In my fractal, that is, the people I know both IRL and online, those whose work I follow - seem to be examining their understanding of cults in a deeper and more nuanced way.

 

Rather than look at cults as cult-or-not, bad/crazy/fringe-or-not, for the purposes of this writing, it’s more fun if we think about cultishness on a spectrum. The desire to fit in with a group, have shared beliefs/world views/ideologies, and break bread or have fun customs or celebrate in shared ways…is natural. Cultishness can span from harmless/benign to harmful/devastating, from sharing inside jokes to adopting an extreme lifestyle and giving up personal sovereignty to belong to the group.

 

 

I say this having examined the cultishness of groups I’ve belonged to…the startup I worked at that where employees wore slippers in the office as a nod to the company’s origin story, the sorority in college with secret handshakes and matching outfits, the edicts that were law in my family of origin, the systems of politics and medicine that presume to know what's best for me - even as it went against my lived experience. All of them with their own norms and expectations of how to act, a belief-set about how the world worked, and what I must do to stay in the group.

 

The frequency of the cult (again, not always bad!) can be found in the tribal circuit. More specifically, the 19-49 and 37-40 are home to community, the God trip, and traditions around sex, marriage, family and food. It’s something that has to be left behind on the differentiation journey, towards the 10-20 of awakening.

 

 

Before I scare you off, I’m not saying you can’t or won't have community. I’m not here to demonize the tribe (though full disclosure: I have no tribal circuitry 🙃). As a 6th line profile, with my personality sun in a tribal gate, you could say I’m here to look over the entire tribal circuit and become wise about it.

 

As one of my mentors reminded me: Alone isn’t lonely.

 

Unpacking that further: understanding how to stand alone as your own authority doesn’t mean you’re doomed to feel or be lonely.

 

But it does mean taking a hard look at things.

 

 

It means no one can know what’s right for you. It means no external validation is possible (not even from Human Design!). It means standing alone on the hill of your Self, come what may.

 

That can be a terribly shaky place to be, if you’re defending it from the mind. If you have to explain yourself with logic and reason. But it’s the inevitable place you land, and an unshakable foundation, when it’s lived from the body. The only reasoning that can be defended defenselessly is What Is. The body is nothing, if not simply that which is living. Existence is a fact.

 

Of course external validation still might come sometimes, but it no longer offers the warm comfort it once did, because there is nothing in you that is seeking to fill the hole of “am I doing it right? Will this make me whole? This must be the right way bc everyone says so…” or whatever your version of not-self dialogue looks like.

 

There are things we all agree upon as humans. Basic-decency things, actions and norms and behaviors that beget approval and love, like being well-groomed or not pushing a stranger in front of a bus. We all want to be thought of as a good person, whatever that means to you.

 

But you only have to look out at the world and see all the different ways of existing, the people on side A vs the people on side B, to see that such beliefs aren’t hard truths. One human could be acting in the highest accordance with their group-cult, convinced they are honorable, sacrificing, and benefiting others, while someone on the other side is sure they’re the absolute worst and part of an agenda that is based on centuries of violence.

 

 

And what happens then?

 

When you are no longer adhering to someone or something’s rules, regardless of how well-intentioned they are?

 

Well, you only end up in the position of asking this question if the cult is no longer serving you. Something isn’t working, and so you hear whispered in the promise of human design, There is another way. You can be yourself, which is something you might not even fully understand or know yet, at least not consciously.

 

And step by step, you begin to leave the cult. 

 

The cult of your conditioning, the cult of deference, the cult of the mind resisting reality. And for many - even, or especially, those of us who have been in Human Design a long time! - the cult of Human Design. (I know, I said what I said). 

 

Ra might say you leave, “correct” decision by “correct” decision. But in my experience, it feels more like non-decision after non-decision. Surrender after surrender.

 

And this is how you arrive at being surrendered as a passenger to the magnificence of your life.

 

Where do you go after you leave everyone else's beliefs behind but your own?

 

The real answer is a paradox and can’t be explained.

 

And only those who have left the cult know.

 

 

Come join a special Not-a-Cult (but Maybe-a-Cult?) 

 

It's been several years since I've run a group offering. While I was negotiating my own relationship with “leaving the cult," I only did 1:1 work. 

 

But I’m on Team Human Design as much as ever, because, in the playful spirit of paradox, there is no real leaving.  

And becoming your own authority doesn't mean having to do it all by yourself. 

 

• Niggling HD question? 

• Want a tune-up as you move through your process? 

• Not even sure what your question is, but craving a little Projector attention? 😉

 

Cozy up in this intimate group setting.

What you will always get from me is the conviction and integrity that support your unique truth. Not HD dogma. You’ll get a curiosity about your experience, and also pointed, impeccable Projector penetration around not letting your BS (aka mind) run the show - plus whatever fun HD nerd details come up.

 

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