Last time, we explored Hexagram 27, learning how to nourish other people and our communities while still looking after our own needs. Now, the sun is moving into Human Design Gateway 24, which we call “Returning,” and which I also call the gateway of Deep Thought.

Here, we are speaking of returning in terms of the mental process, which goes around and around and around. Those of you that have this 24th gateway in your design will know that once you get into something, once you start thinking about something, you just can’t let it go. You roll it around in your mind, examining it from different angles, considering the different possibilities. It’s a refining process in a sense.

If you have the 24th gateway you’ll also know that you are very good at solving other people’s problems, but you’re seldom satisfied with your own solutions. And that’s because this refining process could be never-ending, if you let it. You could always improve upon what you came up with before. You always want another crack at it. So, the most important thing to understand about this 24th gateway is there’s a difference between working for your mind (which is like chasing a runaway train) and letting your mind work for you.

It comes down to recognizing what it is that’s worth thinking about, and how far you’re going to go with it. It’s about being in charge of the process and knowing when thinking about something has outlived its usefulness. And it’s about knowing when something has absolutely nothing to do with you in the first place. It’s not worth your time at all. Ultimately, it all comes down to trusting in your own Type and Authority, your own Human Design.

Let’s see how this works as we look at Human Design Gateway 24 line by line:

First Line: Being Principled

The first line is called “Being principled: a constant need to review what is personally meaningful.” As your mind goes round and round, recognize what is, or is not, personally empowering in your thought process. Are you thinking about junk, or are you thinking about things that are relevant, things that can guide you to that precious space of knowing?

Your mental processes can excuse you from living your own truth for one rationale or another. You can get lost in thoughts that go nowhere, that have no deep relevance for you, and get tangled up in things that are not principled in terms of your growth and appreciation of life.

You have the clear intent to proceed in life while aligning firmly with your principles. And doing this requires dismissing those things that are irrelevant and staying on track with those things that are. It also requires you to recognize that there’s a limit to how far the mind can get you. Sooner or later, it has to let go. Otherwise, you go back over the same old ground over and over, which keeps you stuck in a place of inaction and lack of conviction. You never come to a pure point of view.

Second Line: Renewing

The second line here is called, “Renewing: Attracting a loving environment while under duress.” I think all of us know the consequences of overthinking things. It’s so easy, when we’re beset by problems and difficulties, for the mind to want to jump in and work it all out. And the second line is encouraging you to stick with it, don’t put your head in the sand and pretend there’s no problem, but do attract a loving environment while you’re working through it.

What’s a loving environment? One that makes you feel present and appreciated. All adversity brings growth when you remember who and what truly aids and inspires you. We’re in the Individual Circuitry here. And the Individual Circuitry is full of potential melancholy. The second line is looking to find the knowing, looking to find a way through the depression and elation. And great growth can happen through this, provided you remember who and what really aids and inspires you. Who and what lifts you up? Nature and the natural is a good place to start.

You are constantly reattuning to empowering evolving concepts that bring benefits. But on the other side of it, you easily isolate yourself from common concerns as though you are all alone. Sometimes you just feel like nobody gets you. Nobody understands. And it’s quite easy to get isolated when it looks like there are just too many things to think about and you can’t find a solution. But the whole thing with the second line is renewing. Come back again. Do you really need to be thinking about this? Does this really merit your attention? Perhaps if you consider your Type and Authority, you’ll more quickly find what it is that really brings relief and satisfaction.

Third Line: Being Indecisive

Here, the third line is called, “Being indecisive: trying to think your way through life.” We’ve all been in that space at one time or another where we’re trying to think our way through life and realize how completely ridiculous that is. Life is not logical. Life does not work according to our brains or how our brains have been programmed.

Third lines are always in a place of trial and error. So, when life doesn’t work according to your brain, you figure there’s got to be a way to think it through. There must be an answer somewhere, you just haven’t thought of it yet. And the more energy that goes into trying to think your way through, the more indecisive you become and the harder it is to find a way through.

By softening your mental attitudes, you can be open to other means of being guided. This is a call to get out of your head. Whichever way you choose to do it—sitting in nature, listening to music, exercising, etc.—it’s important to get away from the constantly rotating mental machinery from time to time. Otherwise, you just keep vacillating between many possibilities without conclusions.

Fourth Line: Being Attentive

The fourth line is called, “Being attentive: cultivating mental clarity while in the company of others.” How easy it is to get caught up in other people’s thought processes that distract us from our own knowing. Knowing is a unique process, distinct from knowledge. Everybody’s got knowledge. Knowledge is readily available. Knowing is personal. It happens within, in silence.

The fourth line always wants other people to be involved. It wants to get people on board and bring people together. And that’s all fine and good, but be really clear while in the company of other people. Stay with your own truth.

You need to look for the balance between an easy mental pattern and a personally correct one. The easy mental pattern is just following what you’ve been shown. It’s essentially just going along with how everybody else thinks. But you have your own unique way, your own principled way of recognizing which thought patterns serve you and which do not. Your disciplined review recognizes wrong options and realigns them with personal truth.

Fifth Line: Returning

The fifth line is always the guide, the leader. And here, the line is called “Returning: the resolution to renounce false trails and resume invention.” The fourth line was about staying clear in your own thought process despite the noise around you, and the fifth line echoes that in a way.

Fifth lines are always living in other people’s projections. People project their wants and needs onto you. They expect you to do this and that, to fix this and that for them. And here, while people are insisting you take a certain route, expecting you to solve their problems, you have to be clear and stay with your own inventive process.

Through clarity and determination, you make a clean break with the past and start afresh. There is always that precious moment when you step into something brand new for the first time. That new sensation. The excitement, the nerves. It’s only possible when you’re determined to follow your clarity. You can’t follow old trails to new destinations. But empowering new inspirations is possible when you terminate stale ones. Break out of the projections of others. Forge your own innovative way forward.

Sixth Line: Relenting

The sixth line is called “Relenting: dropping old concepts in the face of life’s new offerings.” Human Design Gateway 24 is all about the present tense. What’s happening right now? What is the thought process that’s really needed in this particular moment in time? And in order to engage with the new, the now, we have to drop the old concepts. Those old concepts might have worked in the past, but are they serving you in this moment?

Past missteps need not limit the range of new choices, if you revisit your own clear Authority. The bottom line is, what does your Authority guide you towards? Does it want you to just think about anything and everything? Or is it pulling your attention into something different?

Meditation is very helpful in recognizing how the mind works. It helps you to stand apart from the mind, to transcend the mind’s activity and really see it from an objective point of view. Your relaxed and rational thought process recognizes and welcomes all of life’s gifts. But obstinacy can cause irrational worries and hinder personal development. When you allow yourself to let go a little bit. To step away from the grinding of the mental gears, you free yourself to enjoy life’s gifts and not get so caught up in the fears and expectations and worries that the mental process can create.

One of the great things we can do for ourselves is to take charge of our mind and our mental process. To realize that we don’t have to be subject to the mind. We don’t have to chase the runaway train. We don’t have to be dragged around and around and around. The answers aren’t there. The answers are in the gaps. In the silence. In the knowing. When you know ….. you know!

So, there we are, that’s Human Design Gateway 24. We’ll check in again soon. In the meantime, if you’d like to learn more about how your own Design informs and shapes your life, get your Free Human Design Report today.