"Mine!' "I want!" "Don't!" "I won't!" are some of the earliest expressions of willpower that we have in our lives. As we grow older, we find out that some of our expectations as to what we can and cannot do or have are a bit unrealistic. Nevertheless, there are people who always appear to get what they want. Our life here requires that we engage with the material world and at the same time, maintain in balance with the Spiritual world. In Design, this balance resides in the Heart Center, also described as the Ego and Center of Willpower.

In this article, we examine the nature of willpower as seen through Design. We look at who has consistent access to willpower and what they can do with it, and who lacks consistent access to willpower and the dangers inherent in their trying to assert themselves.

Later in the article, we look at the Designs of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Meg Ryan in terms of their access to willpower.

The Heart Center

In the Design Body Graph, the Heart Center is shown as a small triangular center with potential connections to four other centers. These other Centers are the Throat Center, our place of Manifestation and Expression; the Self Center, our experiencing of connectedness, purpose and Love; The Spleen Center, the Immune system the place of physical health and well-being; and the Emotional, Solar Plexus Center, our feelings Center.

Notice that there is no direct connection between the Heart Center and the Root Center, our Adrenals. Nor is there a direct connection to the Sacral, Sex, Life Force Center. There is also no direct connection from the Ego, Heart Center and the Head Centers. Head and Heart are separated by the Throat Center, so we have much opportunity in this life to confuse ourselves in matching what we want, what our head thinks we want, and what it is that we say and actually end up doing! When one understands one's Design, these confusions evaporate, but in the meantime, we often find ourselves disenchanted when our heart's desire seems to remain continuously out of reach.

Whoever has a defined Heart Center, it is essential that they include rest as a conscious part of their life. The Heart works incredibly hard and efficiently, and it can persevere exerting willpower if it really has to, but sooner or later it reaches exhaustion, and an exhausted heart is one that is prone to disease. Proper, or healthy use of a defined Heart Center is being absolutely clear in one's own heart that something must happen. Without that sure heartfelt clarity........nothing needs to happen. Period.

Connections to the Heart : The Money Channel

The Heart Center has everything to do with relating us to the material plane. The Channel between the Throat and the Heart Center is called the "Money Channel," and anyone who has it defined in their Design chart is living a lifetime in which they have to engage with the Material Plane.

The 21 - 45 is the voice of possession: "Mine!" "I/we have.....!" It is a pure expression of willpower. It is also, in Design terms, a "Manifesting" Channel. This implies that whoever has this channel in their Design, can do anything, in anyway, at any time they want. This can always feel a little disconcerting for other people who have no idea what the manifestor might do next. Consequently, for all manifesting channels, there is the importance for the manifestor to inform others of their imminent actions. It may be the last thing that the manifestor wants to do, but inevitably, it will help them keep others out of their (manifesting) way and can even draw support from others. This is particularly important for the 21 - 45 because it involves the heart.

The 21 is the gate associated with the heart muscle. The 21 needs to have and hold control, and if it is allowed to do so without interruptions from those seeking to stop a manifestor, it stays healthy. The 45 is the gate that eventually only derives satisfaction from being a source of education to others. This education involves pointing out the nature of material responsibility to others, so that they can not only take care of themselves materially, but also benefit the 45.

Materialism is the way of the 21 - 45, and getting money to "work" for it is a most satisfactory situation in life. Thus people with the 21 - 45 are advised to invest in properties, stock and other things which pay back dividends over time.

It is a "difficult" channel to have because providing education and taking control are different extremes in material matters. The balance comes through accepting the nature of form, and recognizing when control is needed, and when education is needed.

The Community Channel

The 40 - 37 is the Channel that relates to everything involving Community., including family, friendship, eating and drinking together, communal projects, sports teams, brand-name businesses (goodwill) and worship. The well-being of individual members of the community is offered in support of the community, with an implied agreement that everyone "does their part."

The 40 Gate represents the willpower in finding a balance between struggle with, and liberation from others, to get what one wants, that often finds relief in aloneness. The 37 is the (Emotional) gate of family and all the relationships that family represents, from parental support, friendship, and leadership, to love and encouragement Community works through heartfelt contributions to common goals. When everyone is felt to pull their weight, the community is balanced.

In Design terms, the 40 - 37 is a Projected channel, and therefore operates through recognition and invitation. Those who have this channel defined in their Design chart, find themselves continually relating to others on a familial level, whether this be through a marriage, or close as well as universal friendships, or business associations with an ever-expanding clientele. The 40 -37 is very tactile in nature, and people with this channel generally give very good hugs, or at the least, memorable handshakes.

The Entrepreneurial Channel

The 44 - 26 is the Channel called Surrender, the Design of a Transmitter and it connects between the Spleen (Physical well-being) and the Ego (Willpower) Centers. Both the 44 and the 26 are memory Gates, the 44 is oldest instinctual memory that resides "in the bones," and the 26 is a manipulator of memory for the sake of "improvements. "

The channel is a "projector" channel, like the 40 - 37, the Community Channel, and consequently needs recognition and invitation to be able to interact with others........however, as with all projected channels, the invitation only needs to come once for the Surrender/Transmission to take place thereafter. The surrender is "willingly giving up on the old," and the transmission to Society is that it offers protection through continual improvements and updates.

Surrender comes about through the combination of a fear of the old past held in the 44 ,interacting with a willingness for improvement in the 26. This channel is creative in replacing the old standards with new ones. It brings an improvement to old concepts, particularly on the material level. All channels connecting to the Ego Center have an inherent need to be rewarded for services rendered, and this channel can create art that is directly marketed for financial reward. E.g. Advertising, fashion design, sitcoms, etc.

It is often found that people with the 44 - 26 channel are natural peacemakers in that they are not afraid of showing people what they are really wanting out of life. This can happen in many arenas, but a simple perspective is the one in which one is glad to have a car salesperson make it easy for one to have a newer model car. You may end up with a color that was not your first choice, the car may be almost identical to the one it replaced, but it brings such a sense of peace into your life that it was all presented to you so nicely. Easy terms, too!

When one studies the Heart Center in Design, one realizes that the vast majority of people do not have a defined Heart Center, and consequently do not have any consistency in what they want in life. This is where those with defined Heart Centers can assist, particularly the 40 - 37's, offering community support to feel included in what the (world) community wants, and the 44 - 26 offering the "latest and improved" merchandise, so that everyone can feel safely up to date and be "cool!"

The Initiation Channel

The 51 - 25 is the channel of Initiation , with a great wishing "to be first." It brings the power of the Heart/Ego/Willpower Center into direct contact with the Self Center. It directs Heart energy and willfulness, to our sense of Self and our place of purpose and connectedness. Initiation can happen on many levels, both mundane and Spiritual, but it is highly mutative, in that it really changes people's realities and experiencing of themselves. It is the shock of willpower that can take one out of the material realms into a direct contact with one's Higher Self. In best of circumstances, it can literally be the Initiation that is given by the Spiritual adept.

The 51 - 25 is, like the 26 - 44 and the 40 - 37, a projector Channel, so Initiation only happens satisfactorily by acknowledgment and invitation. Not everyone feels ready for initiation, so people who have this channel in their Design need to be careful that they are getting a clear invitation from another before they engage in turning their life around! The great creativity of the 25 -51 is in taking others into entirely new realms of consciousness within themselves.

In its highest sense, Initiation brings the Creative evolution towards a unified Spirituality of attuned Individuals. It is all about empowering others to find their own true Self. Although it is a very potent channel, it is an access to the Self through cool, Universal love in the 25. It brings such a shocking change that it is often experienced by others as highly competitive, but even so, it is never violent.

The 51 - 25 bridges the worlds of the marketplace (The Ego) and the world of meditation (The Higher Self) or, as the Enlightened Mystic, Osho, (who has the 25 -51 in his Design) says, gives a place in the world for Zorba the Buddha, the one who lives life to the maximum and who always remains meditative.

Willpower in Design

Meg Ryan was born on November 19, 1961, in Bridgport, CT. She is born with an incarnation to have intense and intimate experiences in life, and to transform the lives of others by passing on the quality of her experiences through being true to her own feeling nature.

In her Design chart, she has 4 Centers defined by 2 channels. The defined centers are the Root Center, which is the Adrenal, Stress Center, connected to the Emotional Center, through the 41 - 30, the Channel of Focused Energy. Having this definition implies that when she is emotionally clear about to whom and to what she want to commit, she is unfailing in her efforts to have every possible feeling experience in the duration of the commitment She is totally focused on the experience. The other definition she has is in the 29 - 46, the channel of "Succeeding where others fail." This channel is completely unconscious, connecting between the Sacral, Life Force Center and the Self Center. This channel is one of the Tantric Channels in Design, where Sex energy in its highest realization transforms into a higher expression of Self. Provided Meg is emotionally clear in her responses to life, success is assured.

Meg has 5 centers undefined, meaning that in these centers, which are colored in white, she reflects back or absorbs the energies of the people around her who have those centers defined. She has an open mental center, implying that she can be very flexible with her mind to the point of being a bit spacey when it comes to addressing mental problems. (Meg's whole journey through life is one of feeling her way, not trying to work things out mentally). Meg has an undefined Throat Center, which means that she can express in many different ways. She will probably realize that everyone hears exactly what they want to hear from her, rather than what she might feel she has told them. She has an undefined Spleen Center, into which she feels inclined to absorb all the pains of the world, to a point sometimes where she feels completely overwhelmed, even to the place of making herself ill.

She has an undefined Heart Center, implying that she does not have consistent access to willpower in this lifetime. Every time that she tries to assert herself, she is compromised by whomever she is relating to. When she finds herself compromised, her first reaction is to deny all relationships and isolate herself. An undefined Heart Center is never a handicap so long as one does not feel obliged to have control over one's life by willpower. Meg's way through life is always to follow her feelings, so that life can present her with the natural successes she needs to experience.

Arnold Schwartzenegger was born in Austria on July 30, 1947. He was born to lead.

He is a great example of the Alpha Male who resolves things for others through mental acuity and also impacts the lives of others by indicating practical aspects of life to them from a personal association with the patterns played out in life on earth. He was born to have influence on everyone who meets him, without anyone necessarily comprehending who he is.

He has the 21 - 45, Money Channel, defined between the Heart Center and the Throat Center, giving him the design of an Ego Manifestor, which implies that he can do or have anything he wants at anytime he wants. He also has definition between the Sacral Center and the Throat Center, through the 20 - 34, the channel of Charisma, the design where concepts must be enacted, or in other words, "Busy, busy, busy!" For anyone who has the Sacral and Heart Centers defined in a single connection, there is the likelihood that they will be almost permanently in motion, either fulfilling their own projects or those of others.

Ego Maifestors are a sight to behold in the scope of their achievements. People with the Charisma channel are unflagging in their continuing efforts. When the two channels are combined in a single chart, as in Arnold's, there is a formula for perpetual motion, and/or an exhausted heart. What must be counseled to Arnold, is that he only ever do something if and when he feels like he really wants to! Otherwise there are good chances for him to damage his heart from never having arrived at a place that he can call for himself an achievement.

With undefined Crown and Root Centers, there is never a need for Arnold to get stressed out. An undefined Spleen, as with Meg Ryan's chart, indicates the nature of one who feels the pains of the world by constantly attuning to other people's upsets. An open Emotional Center gives Arnold a "Cool" emotional nature, and the potential to be very effective playing the part of the "Terminator," when he looks out at the world through eyes that see way beyond the craziness possible in the human emotional sphere!

In Conclusion

Our heart needs our care, cooperation and support. It can achieve the impossible for us without our even asking. When we assert willpower, we put an enormous load on our heart. If, in our Design, the Heart Center is defined, we have to make quite sure that we are engaging in something we really want. If, in our Design, the Heart Center is undefined, we have no business committing willfully to something unless we have clarity from another part of our being to do so. Attempting to assert oneself with an undefined Heart Center, not only brings the possibility of straining our heart and heart disease (the world's most common ailment,) it also brings confrontations in life that often lead to personal humiliation. With an undefined Heart Center, there is no need to prove anything, to anyone, at anytime, ever. And this includes trying to prove something to oneself too! There is no need! Satisfactions in life come from another side of you.

Next Month: Stress! As seen through Design.

© Chetan Parkyn, March 2002