Emotions Center
Solar Plexus Center
Overview
Located to the right of the Sacral is the Emotions center, responsible for stirring our feelings and swinging life between various emotional states such as happiness and sadness, pain and passion, guilt and forgiveness. Out of all the nine centers, it is the most intense due to the nature of its arousals. The Emotions center is unique as it belongs to both the "awareness centers" and "motor centers," which requires a perpetual balancing act between awareness and the drive to act and achieve.
Here, the center has a significant impact on our pancreas, kidneys, stomach, lungs, and nervous system. Consequently, many people associate heightened emotional problems with a visit to the doctor's office, and emotional situations can cause us to lose our appetite or indulge in binge eating. Pain can also cause issues within the nervous system, and this center is often linked to addictions such as alcohol, food, drugs, and sex.
Although the Emotions center is complex, it is perhaps the easiest to comprehend as emotions lie at the core of human nature. The center is primarily concerned with emotional awareness and determining which emotional experiences are beneficial or detrimental. If Emotions are defined or undefined determines the outcome.
An important principle in Human Design: when the Solar Plexus center is defined, it always becomes your authority, regardless of what other centers are defined. This means that even if you have a defined Sacral, Spleen, or Heart center, your decision-making process must honor the emotional wave first. There is no truth in the moment for Emotional Authority — clarity comes only after riding the full wave.
When Defined
You are a person who experiences a wide range of emotions, and yet you may not fully understand the scope of your feelings. At times, you may be the life of the party, while other times you may feel down in the dumps. This erratic emotional wave is a natural part of your being. Your purpose in life is to experience the full spectrum of emotions, which can sometimes feel chaotic to both yourself and those around you. Emotions are constantly changing, like the restless ocean, rolling in waves that rise and fall, peak and dip. When you feel happy, you want to hold onto that feeling, and when you feel sad, you hope the blues will pass quickly. But emotions are never permanent, and it is important to recognize and allow them to pass through you without becoming attached to any particular feeling.
One valuable lesson to learn is to avoid making emotional decisions in the heat of the moment. Instead, you should let emotions pass through you, disengage from them, and wait for the calm. This is all part of your personal growth and evolution. As someone with a defined emotional center, you are responsible not only for your own moods but also for influencing the moods of those around you. Your Human Design affects people within your aura, and your emotions can be contagious. If you are feeling down, others may also feel down, and if you are feeling joyful, others may feel more exuberant. It is important to learn how to handle, appreciate, and honor your feelings and understand how they impact others.
When Undefined
Although you may consider yourself an emotional person, in reality, you are often influenced by the emotions of others. You tend to laugh and cry along with them, and your emotions are triggered by the emotional impact of those around you. Your natural state is typically calm and collected when you are alone.
However, when you step outside of your personal space, you can easily get caught up in other people's emotional waves. This conditioning influence can be challenging because your design is not built to handle intense feelings. People with an undefined emotional center may have the most difficulty allowing themselves to experience emotions. If you feel uncomfortable in your own skin in certain situations, it can cause confusion, frustration, or even anger. On the positive side, you can also experience the positive emotions of those around you, such as triumph at a football game or the joy of a religious ceremony. It is crucial to be aware of and vigilant about the potential impact of others' emotions, when they are healthy or toxic.
To transform this conditioning influence into a state of wise impassivity, you should learn not to react to emotions that do not belong to you. Instead, reflect back your clear perception of what is happening from an objective perspective. Be a witness, not a participant. To put it another way, if those with a defined emotional center are struggling in the sea of their emotions, you are someone on the shoreline observing. You have a choice: you can either dive in and magnify those emotions, or you can stay on the shore and reflect back to those people what is happening and how they can be responsible for their emotions.
The not-self question for an undefined Solar Plexus is: 'Am I avoiding confrontation and truth?' When you catch yourself in this pattern, it is a signal that you are operating from conditioning instead of your true nature.
Having an undefined Solar Plexus does not mean you are unemotional. You actually experience emotions more intensely than those with it defined, because you amplify every emotional wave around you. The difference is that these emotions are not consistently yours — they come and go based on your environment.
When Both Partners Have This Center Defined
When both partners have a defined Emotions Center, you share a heightened ability to perceive and experience emotions. You may find yourselves in sync with each other's feelings, with waves of joy, sorrow, and excitement echoing powerfully between you.
This resonance creates emotional depth and a strong bond built on a shared emotional language. However, it also brings heightened sensitivity — you may feel your partner's emotions as if they were your own. Start by developing emotional intelligence together and learning to handle your shared emotional world. In turbulent times, return to this shared center as your platform for resolution and growth.
When Centers Differ Between Partners
When one partner has a defined Emotions Center and the other has it undefined, there is a fundamental difference in emotional processing. The defined partner generates their own emotional wave and broadcasts feelings outward, while the undefined partner absorbs and amplifies those emotions like an emotional sponge.
The defined partner may perceive the other as emotionally inconsistent, while the undefined partner may feel overwhelmed or struggle to distinguish their own feelings from borrowed ones. Recognizing this dynamic can help both partners understand each other's emotional needs — the defined partner learns to take ownership of their wave, and the undefined partner learns to observe emotions without being swept away.