Last time, we explored the Life Themes with the Sun in Gateway 27, the Gateway of “Nourishing”. Now, we move on into Gateway 24, the Gateway known as “Returning”. Gate 24 is in the Mind Center and is deeply involved in the mental process of refinement. It’s the process of going round and round with a thought or a concept until there’s a resolution of some sort. Truth arrives in moments of silence.
With that in mind, let’s have a look at the Human Design Life Themes associated with Gateway 24:
The Personal Life Theme: The Four Directions
With the Conscious Sun in Gate 24, we find ourselves in the Personal Life Theme of “The Four Directions”. What are the directions in question? Well, in this case, two of the directions are outgoing and two of them are ingoing. Gate 24 is ingoing as it’s all about the internal processes of the mind. On the Earth side, we have Gate 44, known as “Coming to Meet”. It’s an outgoing movement. It’s the Gateway of instinct. It’s the Gateway I sometimes call “Patterns”, because from a single thread you can make out the whole tapestry.
Gate 24 – Returning – Cycles of deep thought give way to innovation and transformation.
Gate 44 – Coming to Meet – Acceptance and mutual tolerance are essential in any meeting of likes or opposites.
Gate 19 – Approach – Reaching out to find what we need for life to connect us all.
Gate 33 – Retreat – Recharging and assimilating life experiences by withdrawing.
The Unconscious Sun is in Gate 19, the Gateway of “Approach”. It’s the other outwardly directed Gateway in this Life Theme. Its journey is to reach out and discover what it is that people need in order to reconnect and find a sense of unity in life. And finally, Gate 33, the Gateway of “Retreat”, is going inwards to assimilate everything that they pick up from the world around them. So, you can see that this very aptly named Life Theme is about exploring the world, going out to see and experience life, and then going home to sit with it and work it all out.
Notable people with this Life Theme: Jessica Alba, Daniel Day-Lewis, Bernie Madoff, Michelle Pfeiffer, Uma Thurman, David Beckham
The Fixed Life Theme: Rationalization
The Sun moves on into the fourth line of Gates 24 and 28, and we enter the Fixed Life Theme of “Rationalization”. Now, the Unconscious Sun has gone into Gate 13. Gate 13 is “The Listener”. And people with the 13th Gateway in their Design have the empathic ability to tune into what’s going on with other people. On the Unconscious Earth side, we’ve gone into Gate 7, which is sometimes called “Army”, but which I like to call “Uniformity”. It’s very much concerned with getting people on the same page and moving together in common accord.
Gate 24 – Returning – Cycles of deep thought give way to innovation and transformation.
Gate 44 – Coming to Meet – Acceptance and mutual tolerance are essential in any meeting of likes or opposites.
Gate 13 – The Listener – Pursuing common goals to expand all varieties of human experience.
Gate 7 – Uniformity – Finding common intent and promoting shared future interests.
So, the Fixed Life Theme of Rationalization is completely focused on getting to the truth. Again, if we think about the refining mental process of Gate 24, that’s essentially what it’s aiming towards. The whole refinement process is supposed to get us closer to the truth, the real essence of things. But here, with the influence of the fourth line, it’s also wanting to get people on board and working together to find the best way forward. How do we move together towards something that is as perfect as can be? There’s a degree of perfectionism in this Life Theme in that it’s looking to refine things to the closest possible attunement to what’s going on around us at any moment in time.
The Interpersonal Life Theme: Incarnation
The Sun then moves into the fifth and sixth lines of Gates 24 and 44, and we find ourselves in the Interpersonal Life Theme of “Incarnation”. It’s an interesting word, and indeed an interesting Life Theme. The word incarnation means “coming into the flesh”, or “coming into a physical form”.
My experience of people with this Life Theme is that they’re all living a slightly different life than other people. They come from another form of consciousness. It’s almost like they’re visiting. They may have existed in some other life form before, and now they’re here checking things out in this physical form. And they have to deal with everything that comes with that. And they have to deal with the physicality of it, how to engage with the body and health and wellbeing, the ways of a 3-dimensional world, and all these things that are essential to life as we know it. It’s fascinating, and I’m always delighted when I meet somebody with this Life Theme because they’re often having a very different experience than the rest of us. They’re trying out life on the physical plane. That’s what they’re here for. They’re constantly examining what their life story is all about. And as a result, they’re necessarily wise and able to give a very particular guidance.
Other notable people with this Life Theme: Audrey Hepburn, Randy Travis, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Lily Allen, Donatella Versace
That’s the essence of the Life Themes associated with the 24th Gateway. If you want to learn more about Life Themes, you’ll find them all in the Book of Destinies, part of the Human Design Trilogy which is available in all good bookstores and audiobook platforms.
If you want to find out more about Gate 24, we encourage you to dive into our blog series on the Book of Lines.
And if you’d like to learn more about how your Human Design informs and shapes your life, get your Free Human Design Report today.