Optimizing Your Digestion Using Human Design

What if the reason generic nutrition advice never quite worked for you… is that it was never designed for your body in the first place?

In this episode, I'm exploring something I rarely see talked about in the dietitian space — the connection between your Human Design and the way you're wired to digest. Your chart, generated from your exact birth time, holds a personalized blueprint for how you eat best. And once you understand that language, "what should I eat?" gets so much clearer.

In this episode, we cover:

• What Human Design is and why it's so specific to you
• How to find your digestion type on your chart (look to that top-left arrow)
• Active vs. Passive digestion — what your arrow direction reveals about your ideal eating rhythm
• All 12 digestion archetypes broken into 6 simple pairs
• The personal story behind this episode — how my acid reflux pointed me straight to what my body actually needed (stillness, quiet, and presence)
• Why real nourishment is always inside-out: your nutrition and your nervous system

A gentle reminder: you don't have to have this all figured out. Your body has been talking to you this whole time — this episode is about learning to listen.

Human Design Chart: https://www.thedesignofyou.com/get-your-chart

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:57

Hello, hello, Firefam. I am coming to you from my 85-degree living room today. Um I irresponsibly have not gotten my EC unit fixed, and it is the middle of summer, so it's hot. But nonetheless, the show must go on, so here we are. What came very alive to me today was getting a little bit into combining human design with nutrition. This is something that people definitely do. I've seen it online before, but I don't think it's super common, especially not in the dietitian front, or at least again, not to my awareness. If you're wondering what is human design, human design is essentially something that is based off of astrology. So if, you know, even if this is not your thing, I definitely encourage you to still listen to this episode because it is really unique, even if the shoe doesn't fit exactly when it comes down to this, because this information is very specific to the exact time that you were born. If you do not know it, it is really, it's not possible to get exactly what your digestion type is. But listen up, um, it is still an opportunity for you to experiment because when you are living in alignment with your human design, your general archetype for who you are and the way you operate best, the environments that you're in, the energies that affect you, etc., you will naturally be eating in a way that is in alignment with your digestion type. So this could be cool if you do not know your digestion type. I think it would be nice to listen to the episode first and then maybe take a couple guesses as to which one is yours. When I initially did this, I did take a couple guesses, like, okay, which one could I be? And there were two that I really kind of noticed are very true for me. Um, and yeah, I was actually one of those two. So that's kind of cool to actually have that feedback. And it's a cool test to see how well you know yourself because that's what this is all about. This is about understanding yourself on a deeper level and kind of pulling away from some of the really general advice that we tend to see online. That is one thing that is so, so true with nutrition, as you will find out, as there are like 12 different digestion archetypes, everything should be personal and one-on-one with nutrition because we all naturally eat in different ways. There are definitely different things that you can experiment. And even if you find out your type, I still encourage you to experiment with the other different types and elements of it because it might point you towards something that just feels good to you. It's not to say that if you are one of them, that the other elements of the other things don't matter at all. That's not necessarily true, but it's more about certain things are just going to matter more to you than others. You'll find that you feel better eating, eating in certain ways and controlling certain elements versus other things. So now, I know that was very vague and nonspecific. We'll get into it so that you have a lot more clarity. I will figure out what design chart I will link in the show notes so that you can find your answer. I will likely send you the one that I found today because I like the depth that it went into around this, which is super helpful. I don't think it actually talked specifically about digestion. Maybe it's somewhere on her blog, but I'll give her a shout-out. Um, and yeah, you can take a look and explore. But let's get into it. So, overall with human design, it is really important to first know your general archetype because, again, like I said before, if you're living in alignment with your strategy and your authority, so essentially your general archetype and the way you make decisions, if you are living by that, you will likely naturally find yourself gravitating towards your natural preference in digestion. If you have absolutely no idea, that's a good place to start. But this episode, I'm not gonna get into the archetypes because that could be its own thing. What we are going to focus on when you get your chart done and it gives you a little PDF of what your chart is. On the top, around the head of the chart, there's going to be four sets of arrows. We're going to be looking at the top left arrow. Okay, so there's going to be two on each side, and we're going to look at the top one on the left, which it will either be pointing left or right. If it is pointing left, this means you have active digestion, which further talks about how you want consistent eating. Essentially, your body is always on. So we need fuel to consistently keep that energy flowing. If that arrow is pointing right, this means you have a more passive digestion. This means that your hunger is a little less predictable, you might have more irregular eating patterns, you might do better with small meals and snacks. And it can be helpful to actually prime your digestion prior to the meal. So maybe moving around, doing something that's going to help you get a little more in touch with your hunger. Sometimes it can also mean that you may be better off being distracted, but again, these are general directions with the arrow. So there's more specifics. Okay. So the direction which the arrow is facing is part one, part two. There's going to be a number next to it, numbers one through six. Each of these different numbers indicates something different. So when we break that down further, essentially in one direction, one through six is one type, in another direction, one through six is another type. So overall, there's 12 total archetypes. So you want to combine the direction of the arrow also with your specific one through six and combining like which direction it is facing. So one through six, the first one, I'll go in in kind of like the general into the more specific of it. Okay. So the first one, if you have a one, this means appetite. Okay, so this is about the complexity of the meals. So how many ingredients and typically wanting to eat a more simplified way is what you are looking to do to optimize your digestion. If you have a number two there, this means taste is really important. So making sure that you like food or you're eating food that you really like. And I know that sounds silly because it's like, okay, well, wouldn't everyone, of course? That is really not true. Trust me, I'm a registered dietitian. I've talked about eating habits of many, many people. There are definitely times where people force themselves to eat a certain way because of what's available, or also they eat a certain way because they think it's better for their body. And so these two different things can sometimes impact the enjoyment of the foods, or maybe our skills aren't where we want them to be, or we feel like we don't know how to cook the things that we actually would like. So we tend to get in a rut with things. But taste, again, for anyone that has a number two there is very crucial. The next number three, if you have a three there, this is thirst. So this has a lot to do with body temperature and hydration levels. So for you, it's really important to acknowledge the temperature of the foods that you eat. And hot versus cold will be differentiated by the direction of the arrow, which again I'll get into in a little bit. If you have a four there, touch is what is key for you. This is how stimulating your environment is on a physical level. Number five is about sound. This is actually what I have, which is really interesting. I'll give you a little backstory to this too. And it's so coincidental that I'm talking about this today because I was talking about this with my mom yesterday. We were listening to music and I was telling her to turn it down because I just do not prefer being in spaces with a lot of noise or loud noise. When we talk about these digestion types, it's also important to remember that not only is this true for you eating, this is also true for how you prefer your environment. So as I go through these, you know, for example, if you have appetite, it's not necessarily the complexity of the meal, it's the complexity of your environment, or the lot of there are a lot of things around you that are overstimulating you. With taste, it's really about like, am I doing things that I actually really like? You're gonna be someone that it's hard for you to force yourself to do things that you don't enjoy versus other people. It's easy for them to just do tasks that don't have any deeper meaning. Thirst, it could really just be like, do you prefer being in a hot environment or a warm environment? Touch, again, how is your environment? How do things feel? The sensation of things around you. Sound, do you make better decisions in silence versus being very stimulated? And the last one is number six, light. So the time of day. Do you make better decisions in the morning or the evening? Do you actually digest better when you're eating earlier in the day, eating bigger meals earlier in the day, or do you find yourself not really hungry and then finding that hunger builds up once the sun comes down? These are all true again with digestion of food and information. So when we really break down each consecutive type, I'm sorry, each type, so the numbers one through six, they actually call them colors, and then the differentiated 12 types. Okay. So number one, we'll get back into it. So this is a little bit of reversing. Number one is consecutive appetite. This means that if you have consecutive appetite, it's better to eat one thing at a time. You might prefer that your foods don't touch, or you might really find that you work better when you eat larger quantities of like one specific item at a time. So you might find yourself like wanting to eat a bunch of blueberries, or you might find yourself just wanting to eat a whole thing of chicken wings. So you're preferring to eat one item at a time. To improve consecutive digestion, I'm sorry, consecutive appetite, we want to eat very simplified meals with minimal number of ingredients. So you might want to shy away from things like casseroles because there could be a lot going on, or very complex meals. So, for example, if you were eating something like a roasted chicken, brown rice, broccoli. I'm sorry, I don't know why this is always my number one example, but it's easy because it's simple, right? And that's the whole point with consecutive appetite. You want your meals to be simple. Simple ingredients, um, sauces, this is where it can sometimes feel a little tricky. You can still incorporate sauces, but maybe less into complex flavors. You might be someone that just tends to go for things that are, again, really simplistic, minimally seasoned, really simple things. It's not to say that you can't use sauces and things of that nature. It's more about just not mixing a lot of complexity into what you're having. You might even like really hate certain types of cuisine because they have so much depth and complexity to their flavors. The second part to that, if you are an alternating appetite, so it's kind of like the opposite of the consecutive appetite, they are similar because it is about simplification of ingredients. But with alternate, it's more about alternating between the ingredients. So in a consecutive appetite, if you had this meal of chicken, brown rice, and broccoli, you're gonna want to eat the chicken first. Eat that completely and then you'll move on to the rice. Eat that completely and then move on to the vegetable. Versus an alternating appetite, you still want simplistic meals, but you want to hop from item to item. So you might eat a few bites of the chicken and then a few bites of broccoli and then a few bites of rice, and then circle back and go through that cycle until a meal is complete. And that's different than like taking a scoop of chicken with a scoop of rice and eating that in one bite. You might find that that's less preferable. It's alternating one item at a time. All right, so the second pair, open taste and closed taste. Open taste is about sampling new things and deciding what you like. So you might be someone that you again, like if we think it's healthy, we might try to convince ourselves that we should eat it, but it's really not about that. It's all about what you genuinely prefer the taste of. And of course, I'm always going to encourage you to do this in a scope where you're getting all of the nutrients that you need and your body requires to function optimally, but you can absolutely lean into your preferences. Okay, so open taste, you love to try new things, and that's how you kind of like get into an idea of what it is that you prefer. Closed taste is really sticking to what you know. You might find that you get really obsessed with a meal or a food item in general, and you will eat that until you get sick of it, and then move on to the next thing. And that's okay. Some people see that as a bad thing, but it's really not, especially if this is your digestion type. You tend to be someone that likes to cook and prep and be in control of your own food and the ingredients that go into it. You like knowing. Okay. So open lots of variety and then select what you like versus closed. You're gonna be more limited into what you even really desire. You're gonna stick to that, honor it, eat it until you're bored with it, and then move on to your next thing. Okay. The next pair is hot thirst versus cold thirst. Hot thirst means that warm foods are typically better digested than cold foods. It's primarily around temperature, but you know, it can also be around flavors. So things that are warm, like warm spices, if you can think of like turmeric or any kind of like December, November types of spices that you find, you might naturally gravitate towards those types of flavors. If you are eating things that are cold, you typically want to try your best to allow them to warm up before you eat them. So if you pulled like a piece of fruit out of the fridge, you might want to stick it in the microwave or allow it to sit at room temperature, or like even store your fruit, your food slash fruit outside of the refrigerator, you know, as long as it's food safety appropriate. But these things can help. If we have cold thirst, we tend to digest things that are cold better than hot. So you might gravitate towards things like smoothies, yogurt bowls, ice cream, things of that nature. If you like it doesn't mean that you can't eat hot cooked food, but you want the temperature to cool down a bit before you consume it because it's really about complementing. So you might also notice that, you know, if you're really hot, you will want to drink or eat something that is cold to balance out the temperature that's like physically in your body, and vice versa. This is another way to maintain that balance. So even if you are hot thirst or cold thirst, it doesn't mean that you can never eat the opposite again. So it just means that certain things might be better suited for you depending on your physical temperature, and you might naturally gravitate towards certain things. This is with the one that I initially thought I could have been because I am really not into cold foods except for ice cream. That is like the one exception. But I, you know, I initially thought I was this because I'm someone that always wants something warm. When I'm sitting down to eat my meals, I always preferred a hot cooked item. Like I I rarely eat things like yogurt bowls or overnight oats that are cold. It's it's just not in my preference. Um, which again is okay. Like I said, you're gonna maybe tap into some of these different ones and find that they work for you. And that's not wrong. Okay. Again, it's just making certain elements of this a top priority over others, okay. Going into the next pair. So calm touch versus a nervous touch. Calm touch, you tend to digest foods better when you're in relaxing environments. I think this is a little bit true for everyone. You don't really want to be in fight or flight mode when you're going into a meal, but um in some cases, and once I explain nervous touch, it'll make a bit more sense. Calm touch, you're just someone that needs a really relaxing, calm environment, um, maybe being solitary or doing things that relax you. Things that relax you don't always necessarily have to be solitary. They can still be having conversations with other people. Um, it could be watching a show that's relaxing to your nervous system, things of that nature. Nervous touch, you tend to digest better when things are stimulating or energizing. So multitasking while you're eating might actually feel kind of good, which is typically against most advice. You can also like experiment with your food and move before meals to kind of stimulate the body and the mind before going into that meal. Okay. The next pair, high sound and low sound. High sound is having better digestion when there's like more noise, watching TV, being in conversation versus low sound. You really prefer minimal external stimuli, and it's hard for you to digest or understand when your environment's really loud. Again, this is the one that I am, and it makes perfect sense for me because that is so true. I'm very sensitive to sound. I like when things are lower, calmer. I crave silence and quietness. I can't function in being constantly stimulated. Like I think of one of my best friends who, um, you know, when you do like the Spotify soundtracks at the end of the year, or um Spotify rapped, right? These things, um, when we share them with all of our friend groups and it tells you like how many minutes of music you listen to that year, my best friend will have something like astronomical, and it's very high, and it'll be like 1% of listeners listen to this much music. And I am someone like I drive in my car in silence. I wake up, I need to be in silence. I don't like looking at my phone right away. I don't like seeing other people look at their phone. Even I do this with my fiance where like him looking at his phone is like stimulating me. And I'm like, ah, like I just need absolute silence and quietness. And I crave a lot of that throughout my day. And that's when I feel my best. If I'm constantly stimulated, it's almost like I haven't had any time to hear myself think. Okay. And that's true with food. When I'm sitting down to eat a meal, I do a lot better when I'm just really present with the food that I'm eating and that it's quiet and I'm relaxed. That is so key. And I've noticed so recently I've been in this super busy mode where I'm just like doing, doing, doing, and it's not giving me enough time to like really sit and be in silence when I'm eating or just doing other things. So I'm finding myself really distracted because of how much I'm working or just with how many tasks that I have to do. I don't give, I haven't been giving myself enough of that quiet time. And what I'm noticing as a response to that, which is kind of what set me down this rabbit hole or like thinking about this, I'm experiencing acid reflux and I'm noticing that there are things that make it worse and things that do not make it worse. Initially, in this like irritation phase, I do think it's good to change what you're eating to make sure that certain foods aren't irritating your body while it's inflamed. But overall, what I do notice is that it's more about other things like my nervous system, quietness, stillness, taking proper breaks, not multitasking while I'm eating, not eating while I'm standing, taking my time to like actually cook something or heat it up and have it warm versus just like being on the go, doing lots, being distracted, feeling overstimulated while I'm consuming. I am noticing that the acid reflux is much worse when I don't get that time for peace or to be alone or to have that quietness. Some suggest, like, you know, wearing noise canceling headphones and things like that. I don't think it's necessary. Even with all of these, it's good to keep in mind that you don't have to do this every single time that you eat. It's okay if there are exceptions. It's about maybe trying it for a period of time. Or doing it at least once a day for one meal and seeing how that feels. It's an experiment. All of this is an experiment, and that's good to keep in mind. Okay. The last pair is direct light and indirect light. Direct light is if the sun is up, you tend to want to eat a little bit more during the day, you're hungrier more during the day. Or, you know, if it's a rainy day, it's making sure that the room is lit up, the room is bright when you are consuming. The room is bright when you're making big decisions. And then indirect light, you might find you're more like a night owl. You tend to maybe like eat better meals or crave more, feel hungrier when the sun comes down or in the later hours of the day. You might even be someone that craves a midnight snack. And all of these things are okay. You're naturally going to want to flow with this. And also, you know, on that one, too, again, like making decisions, being in a dimly lit area. If you are someone with indirect light and you're constantly in like a bright office that might feel really overwhelming to you, and you actually find that you don't like it and you work better in the evening. These are all amazing things to keep in mind because there's different ways to think about your digestion, again, with information and your food. And these things, you know, if we can't always have it happen exactly with food, if we still work to make our environment or the spaces that we're predominantly in fall in alignment with whichever one we are, the better off we'll be. Okay. So if I'm hot thirst, being in warm environments might make me feel better. So dressing cozier when I'm in places. If I have open taste, I might need to like experiment with a different variety or different ways of doing things or tap into different options and play them out to see what I really like. Okay, so thinking about it more expansively is going to help you find your center with all of this and feel more balanced. That is the key of all of this, is finding that internal balance for yourself. This is not something that I really teach in any of my programs. It's something that I would really love. Like something I think is really cool is being able to give a person a reading based on what their human design is. You know, again, if you're curious, I would love to walk you through it. I'm not saying I'm an expert. I'm just someone that has really enjoyed learning about it independently. But, you know, if you're one of my clients and you're in a session and you're curious, you can always ask me about it. I'm really happy to walk people through it, explain to them a little bit about how to read their chart because it is a lot of information. This is just one of many, many, many, many things that you can learn from your human design chart. Um, and again, I mean, it's great to experiment and think about it on your own and read different contemplations of this. Everyone's gonna have a little bit of a different take on what these things mean. Even as I say it, you might have your own takeaway from it and how you can apply it to your life specifically. Okay. So, yeah, this is a total mix-up of, you know, different ways to look at things. I mean, if you're curious about human design, let me know. Um, I love to hear your guys' feedback. Please message me. I like to hear people's thoughts. I want to know how this is landing, if it's helpful or if there's topics in this arena that you'd like to learn more about and how they apply to you. So thanks for tuning in this week. I love you guys so much.