Human Design Gates
The Present Moment
Throat Center Gates
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Origin 1987
Gate 20 sits in the Throat and carries the system's theme of the present moment: awareness and expression that occur now rather than in reflection. Its number is that of the twentieth hexagram, Contemplation, whose image is wind moving over the earth and whose subject is the ruler who observes and is in turn observed. Human Design keeps contemplation but strips it of distance, making it immediate. Structurally the gate is one of the four Integration gates, connecting to Gates 10, 34 and 57 alone. That closed group of four is a distinctive piece of Ra Uru Hu's architecture and has no counterpart in the I Ching or in the chakra systems he drew on.
Facts
Correspondences
CenterSourced to the subject's own account Channel PartnerSourced to the subject's own accountGate 10 (Channel of Awakening) 1 Channel PartnerSourced to the subject's own accountGate 34 (Channel of Charisma) 1 Channel PartnerSourced to the subject's own accountGate 57 (Channel of The Brainwave) 1 I Ching CorrespondenceSourced to the subject's own accountHexagram 20, Contemplation 1 Origins
Origin Period1987 2Tradition: Human Design (Ra Uru Hu, 1987) Origin PeriodThe Present Moment is gate 20 of the sixty-four gates of the Human Design system, corresponding to Hexagram 20, Contemplation of the I Ching; the system itself was synthesized in 1987 out of the I Ching, the chakra teaching, Kabbalah and astrology. 2 Identity
PositionSourced to the subject's own account Contested Use
Contested or Appropriated Modern UseThe I Ching of China, the chakra teaching of India, Kabbalah and astrology are drawn on here inside a scheme assembled in 1987 and offered as an instrument of psychological counselling. The four traditions it draws on are old; the arrangement that joins them is not, and none of them produced it. 2 Learn More
The Gate and Its I Ching Hexagram
Gate 20 of the Human Design system carries the name "The Present Moment," and this entry describes it as the system itself presents it. Human Design is a modern esoteric system, originated in 1987 by Ra Uru Hu (born Alan Robert Krakower, 1948-2011), who presented its content as received teaching rather than as an inherited tradition. It is roughly four decades old and is best read as a contemporary synthesis, not as ancient wisdom or established fact. Ra Uru Hu combined four older systems that had never before been joined: the I Ching supplies the sixty-four gates, the Hindu chakra model the nine centres, the Kabbalistic Tree of Life the connecting channels, and Western astrology the method of calculation.
The gates take their numbers from the King Wen sequence of the I Ching, so Gate 20 corresponds to hexagram 20, Contemplation. The link is one of numbering and binary structure only: the hexagram belongs to a genuinely ancient Chinese text, while the gate's psychological keynote, here summarised as "The Present Moment", was formulated in the late twentieth century and is not drawn from the classical commentaries. The two meanings are best kept side by side rather than merged.
The Gate in the Bodygraph
Within the bodygraph, the composite body-map at the centre of Human Design, Gate 20 is placed in the Throat centre, one of the nine centres the system maps onto (and expands from) the seven-centre chakra model. Gates do not act alone in the model: each pairs with another gate to complete a channel joining two centres. It participates in the Channel of Awakening (10-20), which it forms with Gate 10 ("Love Of Self"); the Channel of Charisma (20-34), which it forms with Gate 34 ("Great Power"); and the Channel of The Brainwave (20-57), which it forms with Gate 57 ("Intuitive Clarity"). These placements and pairings are features of Ra Uru Hu's 1987 design and describe the system's internal mechanics; they are presented here as the system's own claims, not as verified facts about human beings.
Human Design's own teaching reads Gate 20, the present moment, through its I Ching correspondent, Hexagram 20, Contemplation, whose received image is wind moving over the earth, a ruler observed in turn by the people; the system carries that image into a gate of awareness anchored entirely in the present rather than in reflection on past or future, and like Gate 10 it forms three separate channel partnerships, with Gate 34, Gate 10 and Gate 57.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Corresponds To
Human Design Gate 20, The Present Moment, corresponds to Hexagram 20, Contemplation, per its own iching-correspondence fact.
Human Design Gate 20, The Present Moment, and Gene Key 20, From Superficiality to Presence, are the same wheel position, both keyed to Hexagram 20, Contemplation.
Design Earth in These Crosses
Design Sun in These Crosses
Located in Center
Personality Earth in These Crosses
Personality Sun in These Crosses
Sources
1. The Human Design System
Ra Uru Hu (Alan Robert Krakower), Human Design America, 1992Gate 20, The Present MomentView the Source 2. Über den Tellerrand, ein Blick ins Human Design System (HDS)
Petra Stute, Virineya Würgler and Johnny Würgler, Springer, Journal für Gynäkologische Endokrinologie/Schweiz 24 (2021), pp. 50-51, 2021p. 50: the four systems synthesised, and the use made of the synthesisView the Source The I Ching, or Book of Changes
Richard Wilhelm (trans.); Cary F. Baynes (English trans.), Princeton University Press, 1980The corresponding King Wen hexagram 20View the Source Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)
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