The Sun in the Gate of Influence · Jupiter Cazimi · Aquarius Full Moon ✨ The Mandala 64 Walk
July 24-30 · Sun in Leo · Gate 31
This article is part of the Mandala 64 Walk, a series following the Sun as it moves around the Zodiac through all 64 Human Design gates.
Thanks for making this journey with me!
Hey y’all,
How did Gate 56: THE STORYTELLER land for you this week? Did you catch yourself telling a story you’ve told a hundred times, or did you find one you’d never put words to before?
Today, Friday July 24, the Sun leaves the wanderer’s fire and jaunts into the first full gate of Leo Season - Gate 31: Influence. This is the gate Jupiter has been sitting in at the top of the Barbault Basket since July 9th, and the Sun is now meeting the expansive gas giant here, ready to call us all into new leadership. Jupiter stays in this influential gate until August 3rd, but this week as the sun lights up the great benefic is when we will really feel it’s effects.
And on Wednesday July 29, Jupiter and the Sun make their exact cazimi, directly across the sky from the moon and Pluto for an intensely transformative full moon in Aquarius.
Another BIG week in the skies, folks….
This week the Sun catches up with Jupiter at 6 degrees of Leo, right in the middle of Gate 31. This is a cazimi, which means Jupiter is not just conjunct the Sun, it’s in the heart of the Sun. It’s so close that the astrologers of old considered a planet in cazimi to be seated “on the throne” of the sun, receiving it’s golden radiance.
Jupiter’s whole cycle empties out and starts over here with this solar cazimi, and this happens in the gate of the leader, of influence. This gate expands our personal sense of what leadership means, how we lead in our own lives, and whose influence is taking center stage in the world’s unfolding play.
On the same day as the cazimi, the Moon becomes full at 6 degrees of Aquarius, directly opposite the sun and Jupiter, and it’s sitting very close to Pluto a couple degrees away at 4 Aquarius. The Full Moon and Pluto are both sitting in Gate 41, the gate of the contractions and anticipation that occur before a new world is born- which is the exact polarity gate of 31. Every line of hexagram 41 is the reverse of every line of hexagram 31; in the Gene Keys they’re known as programming partners. In Human Design, Gate 41 is the start codon, the gate that begins the whole genetic wheel- it’s the inception and origin point of the entire 64 gates.
So on Wednesday morning the sky opens the leader’s throne on one end of the axis and the origin point of a new cycle on the other, and lights both of them at full volume with Pluto bringing the powers of the underworld to the new beginning. The voice that says “I lead” is exactly 180 degrees from the pressure that says “begin”, creating an infinity loop of tension that is sure to usher in new leadership of all kinds. The basket that barbault foresaw is still holding place, with the outer planets Pluto Uranus and Neptune still parked at 4 degrees, and this is the day Jupiters expansive qualities on the top of the basket get a boost from the sun.
So this full moon/Jupiter cazimi packs a punch. If you’ve been waiting for a starting gun to get you off to the races, this is a loud one.
ELA Map is live on the 29th
Which brings me to another reason Wednesday matters to me….
My partner Jackson and I are launching ELA Map on July 29, on the cazimi, in Gate 31.
ELA Map is the astrocartography and Human Design cartography platform we’ve been building- tt maps your planetary lines across the earth AND it maps your Human Design across the earth, which is something no other tool does nearly as cohesively. You can see where your Sun line runs, AND where your gates and channels and incarnation cross activate your sense of place. Where you might feel more like yourself, and where you might feel less.
We picked this launch date on purpose. Gate 31 is the gate of influence that only works when it’s invited, and Wednesday’s cazimi is the moment a whole Jupiter cycle begins again.
👉 ELA Map goes live July 29 — sign up for the waitlist here!
Astrology, Human Design & Astrocartography readings: Get one or give one!
Through the end of July, I’m offering special Barbault Basket readings for half my normal price to talk with you about how this rare astrology is showing up in your chart. Click the button to book!
Gate 31 (Influence, The Leader, Sounding Your Truth): The Story
Gate 31 lives in the Throat Center, and it’s made up of the voice that says “I lead.”
Last week Gate 56 told the stories that were gathered over Cancer season. Now Gate 31 is what happens when the story gathers people behind it. Gate 31 is the feeling when a story and a voice stops being simply interesting and starts being followed.
The hexagram is Xián, usually translated as Influence… and also or Wooing or Conjoining. The image the two trigrams, lake over mountain, make is of a lake resting in a hollow at the top of a mountain. The mountain doesn’t reach for the water. It makes a shape that water can settle into, and the water gathers there because the shape is right. That’s the whole teaching of this gate. Influence here works by attraction and gravity rather than by pushing or pulling. The old commentaries of the I’Ching talk about courtship, about the responsiveness between two things that recognize each other. The guidance here is always to stay open and receptive so that what wants to come can come through.
In Human Design, this gate is projected, which means the energy in it doesn’t work until someone asks for it. Ra Uru Hu called the channel it forms “a design of leadership for good or bad,” which is about as blunt as he ever got. Gate 31 is the elected leader, handed the seat by the people who trust their voice. Take the seat before it’s offered up and the whole thing curdles.
This is exactly what the Gene Keys says, too. The shadow of 31 is arrogance. Richard Rudd frames it as using language to manipulate, acting without thinking of the karma or consequences- usually based on an insecurity or blindness to a deeper truth, trying to control our lives with arrogant behavior.
The gift of 31 is leadership, which is the voice that speaks for the collective because the collective elected it to do so. And the siddhi is humility, which in this key means that the chosen leader finally stops experiencing themselves as the author of anything, and the words come through clean and true because theyre not trying to be impressive anymore.
The further the leader appears from being fallable, from being human, the closer they usually are to the shadow of arrogance. Oftentimes this appears with spiritual leaders who are captivated by the siddhis, the spiritual frequencies, and forget to live in the human realm with their feet on the ground. Find your blind spots and be patient in order to become a true leader.
Gate 31 in the Body
Gate 31 sits in the Throat Center, at the front of the neck, wrapped around the thyroid and parathyroid glands. This is our third week running with the Sun moving through a Throat center gate, and the progression has been pretty exact. Gate 62 (Details) was the voice that says “I think.” Gate 56 (The Storyteller) was the voice that says “I believe.” Gate 31 (Influence) is the voice that says “I lead.”
The thyroid is the body’s pacing gland. It sets metabolic rate, how fast you burn, how much heat you make, and how quickly you move through a day. So this gate is physically wired to the question of tempo, and the shadow of arrogance often shows up in the body as a tempo problem before it shows up as a personality problem. The arrogant voice is one that talks over people, with an urge to answer before the question finishes. It’s a pace that outruns the room and then wonders why the room goes quiet or stops listening.
This gate belongs to the collective Understanding circuit, which is the logical, future-facing part of the bodygraph. It works by watching patterns over time and then saying out loud where those patterns are heading. That’s slow work, and the voice that comes out of it is meant to be slow too.
There’s a particular tension that lives in the front of the neck and the underside of the jaw when someone has been performing authority they haven’t been given. It tends to come with a shallow breath and a habit of clearing the throat before speaking. The body knows the seat wasn’t offered even when the mind has talked itself into taking it. Met with deeper awareness, this gate becomes a voice that the room settles around, one that’s willing to wait and with nothing to prove.
Season, Channel & Polarity
Season: We’re still in the season of Mountain, the series of eight hexagrams built on the lower Gen trigram that began at the summer solstice. Earth sat above mountain in 15 (Extremes), the mountain doubled itself in 52 (Stillness), Water pressed against it in 39 (Provocation), Wind shaped it in 53 (Beginnings), Thunder rolled over it in 62 (Details), Fire crossed it in 56 (Storytelling/Stimulation), and now Lake comes to rest on it in 31: Leadership. Only Gate 33 is left before the wheel turns at Lammas/Lughnasadh and the Sun reaches Gate 7 in the G Center.
Mercury also stationed direct on July 23rd, so we come into this Leo gate with our minds moving forward again, right as the Sun gets to the leader’s chair.
Channel: Gate 31 completes its channel with Gate 7, the Role of the Self, down in the G Center. Together they make the Channel of the Alpha, a design of leadership for good or bad. Gate 7 knows what direction to take direction, and Gate 31 has the influential voice to speak it. Without 7, the leader is a mouthpiece with no idea where they’re going, and without 31, the sense of direction stays private and never reaches anybody.
What I love about this chanel is that Gate 7 is also in Leo, at 15 degrees, which means the Sun moves through it in about two weeks. The whole Alpha channel lives inside this season of the Lion. The Sun moves through the influential voice first and the direction second, which is a little backwards- but honestly that’s how it usually goes for most of us.
Polarity: The gate directly across the wheel is Gate 41, Contraction, down in the Root Center. While the Sun moves through 31, the Earth sits in 41, and this week the Full Moon and Pluto are there too.
Hexagram 41 is known as Decrease or Contraction, and it’s trigrams are Mountain over Lake, the exact inversion of this week’s Lake over Mountain. Gate 41 is the start codon, the gate that begins the whole wheel of the Human Design Mandala. It’s the pressure of a fresh feeling with no experience attached to it yet. Its Gene Key runs from the shadow of fantasy through the gift of anticipation to the siddhi of emanation.
Gate 41 is the pressure to begin, the utarine contractions before birth is possible, sitting in the Root with no idea what the next cycle holds. Gate 31 is the voice at the of influence that pulls the cycle where it’s going. A beginning with no voice stays a private ache in the belly, and a voice with no beginning underneath it is a person standing at a podium with nothing to say.
Wednesday has a Full Moon and Pluto on the new beginnings end of that axis and a Jupiter cazimi on the leadership end. A tension, a tightrope, an infinity sign integrating the two.
A Somatic Practice for Gate 31
Sit somewhere you won’t be overheard and put one hand across the front of your throat, thumb and fingers resting on either side of the windpipe, right over the thyroid. Just let the weight of the hand be there, softly. Breathe for a while and feel how much of your breath you can feel moving under your palm.
Then, out loud, say one sentence you believe to be true. Something ordinary, like “I’m tired” or “I want to finish that painting.” Say it at whatever volume comes, and keep your hand where it is, and feel the sentence leave. Notice the impulse that shows up right after, wanting to explain it or make it more convincing. Let that impulse just be there without following it.
Say the same sentence three or four more times, and each time let it come a little slower and a little lower in your body, until you’re speaking from somewhere under the collarbone instead of from the throat itself. Notice if there’s any bracing in your jaw or the floor of your mouth. Then stop talking and sit with your hand on your throat for another minute in the quiet, and feel what a voice feels like when it isn’t trying to move anybody.
That gap between the voice that tries to persuade and the voice that just speaks the truth, is where this gate of influence does its work.
Creativity Prompts
Pull out your favorite notebook, your paints, your colored pencils, whatever calls to you, and give yourself 15 uninterrupted minutes with one of these:
Write about a time you were handed a seat you didn’t ask for. A group project, a family crisis, or anything else where people turned to you as a leader without you offering it up. Free write about what your voice did in the first ten seconds. Then write about a time you wanted the seat and didn’t get it, and what your voice did then. Look at the two of them next to each other on the page and see which one sounds more like you.
Draw or paint a lake resting in a hollow at the top of a mountain, with the whole sky held in the still water, held in reflective stillness by the solid ground below.
With your Mandala 64 deck, pull the Gate 31 card and sit with both sides. Notice where you’ve been reaching for a seat this week and where you’ve been waiting to be asked. Let your hand move from there.
Next up: Gate 33 · Retreat, or Privacy. The final gate of the Mountain season, where the voice that just learned to lead decides to be quiet on purpose and takes the whole story of Mountain season underground to settle, right before the cross quarter day of Lammas/Lughnasadh arrives.
See you soon, Alison
One more reminder:
ELA Map: Your Energy Location Atlas goes live July 29, on the Jupiter cazimi, in the gate of influence.
Get a Mandala 64 Human Design deck:
If you’d like to have a physical, IRL way to deepen your learnings of Human Design, the I’Ching & the Gene Keys- and how they fit into the Zodiac Wheel and the Bodygraph, you can order a copy of my Mandala 64 deck!
I’ve been selling a lot lately, so only have TWO decks left in hand, so get yours while it’s hot! <3
Mandala 64 is a learning and oracle deck I created last year, with one card for each gate, plus 14 cards for each of the planets and luminaries that transit through the gates.
My favorite practice is to pull the card for the current gate and place it on your altar for the week. Let it sit in your field. It’s one of the most embodied ways I know to learn the gates - not through study but through slow, repeated encounter.
And, if your curious about what gates light up your chart or how the transits are influencing you right now, book a reading!
Thanks for reading! Let me know how y’all are doing this week in the comments!
xo
Alison