The Projector’s Strategy is a Process: Learn the 4 steps
Waiting for the invitation. That is the Human Design Projectors' strategy for success.
I remember the first time I really thought about those words. I felt confused and disappointed. I worried that waiting for the invitation wasn’t going to work in the real world.
Who would invite me? How long did I have to wait? What should I do while waiting?
Real Talk
It takes time to figure out the Projector strategy. There are no shortcuts, and each Projectors’ journey is different. No one can prepare you for every situation. There is only practice and learning from your experiences.
You have to try it for yourself.
You will have exciting and successful moments and you will have disappointments. There will be some hard lessons.
Every joyful Projector has been through it and survived. You will too.
So how did I come to understand my Projector strategy?
Practice, falling on my face, and never giving up.
I’ve learned that stressing about invitations while waiting for invitations is one of the best ways to block invitations.
The next best way is fatigue and burnout. You won’t get invitations if you’re in no shape to receive them. Facts.
Now I have a fine-tuned system that helps me identify the best invitations for me.
You can have this too.
In this post, I will give you the formula. It will keep you busy while you wait wait gracefully for invitations.
Step #1: Learn what Recognition Feels like
“Wait for Recognition and Invitation.”
That is how Ra Uru Hu, the messenger of the Human Design System, described the Projector strategy for success. It is two separate and distinct things.
Did you know that?
If your Projector strategy is a play in two acts, Act 1 is Recognition. Act 2 is An Invitation.
What is Recognition and how does it feel?
Recognition is an acknowledgment of who you are. It is a deep appreciation for something you do or have done well. You have affected others in a meaningful way, and they want you to know it.
Award season is all about recognition. The spotlight is on, and you are acknowledged for a talent, accomplishment, or contribution. You are bathing in the limelight of recognition from people who understand and appreciate you.
They get you.
Have you ever won an award or received a compliment?
How did it feel? Were you embarrassed?
Did you blush? Did you withdraw a little? — Did you suddenly feel naked?
That is what recognition feels like. It is a whole-body experience.
The best Recognition is the one you don’t see coming.
My client Britney is a Projector. She describes recognition as the tingling you felt when your middle-school crush finally made eye contact or spoke to you. You felt giddy and weak in the knees. You wanted to run and hide. You’re tongue-tied.
That is the essence of genuine recognition. The truth about you has been outed.
You have been seen.
Everyone has experienced this kind of recognition at some point in their life.
Smart Projectors harness the feeling and use it to identify fantastic invitations.
Brilliant Projectors do not ask for recognition. They do not force people to notice them.
If you try to get noticed, you will receive incorrect invitations.
Recognition finds you when you are out in the open, silently going about your life.
It takes you by surprise. It registers in your body and, boy does it feel good.
If you are a Projector, I recommend that you get familiar with how recognition feels in your body.
“Recognition makes me giggly. I might even blush. I feel warm in my heart.”
Step #2: Learn the Language of Invitations
Would you believe me if I said identifying great invitations is like learning to speak a new language?
At first, there are miscommunications and faux pas, but if you stick with it, you will eventually speak it fluently.
So it is with the language of invitations. At first, you will be unsure if you are receiving an invitation. You will walk away from conversations slightly confused.
You will bend yourself into pretzels trying to turn throw-away comments into invitations.
All Projectors do this in the beginning. It’s a necessary experience.
You are becoming familiar with the art of listening for invitations.
However, before you consider any invitation, make sure you have received genuine recognition. The tingly, giddy kind.
Recognition is the gateway to the best invitations.
Genuine invitations comes from people who:
see in you the thing that you want to be recognized for
thoughtfully sees value in having a relationship with you
is serious about investing in you
In the beginning, I practiced listening for the words I invite you. If I didn’t hear those words or words to that effect, I would ask for clarification.
You can do that too. It’s as simple as asking, "Are you inviting me to do ABC?"
With time you won’t have to be so mindful.
You will recognize correct invitations by the way they make you feel.
Step #3: Clarify what you are agreeing to
If an invitation is straightforward enough, skip this step.
I include this step for those who experience doing everything right, but still “fail” at choosing the correct invitations.
For you, there may be other elements of your Design to consider before you accept an invitation. Among them are your Authority and your Profile. You can get a Human Design Specialist to help you understand your influential Design elements.
For example, I have a 3/5 Profile. This Design element affects how I respond to invitations.
The Line 5 profile places me in a “savior” projection and illusion minefield. Before I understood my Design, Line 5 was a source of misunderstanding and great pain.
Because I am aware of Line 5’s effect on people, I always clarify what is being asked of me verbally or in writing. It breaks the Line 5 messiah tractor beam, and everyone snaps back into reality.
Basically, I remove as much Profile Line 5 illusion, delusion, and projection as I can before I accept an invitation. If you are a Line 5 Projector, you might to try this suggestion. See if it changes your experience of invitations.
FYI, it’s been almost 20 years since I learned my Design, and I still clarify the details of invitations. I’ve come to think of invitations as contracts where clarifying the deliverables, responsibilities, and exchange are expected.
Step #4: Verify an Energy Exchange
With time, you won’t have to wonder if an invitation is correct. You will recognize it by the energy it transfers to you.
What is an energy transfer?
When Projectors receive invitations that are correct for them, they light up. They become energized and excited.
It happens because:
Someone has voluntarily recognized and invited them.
Someone has given the Projector access to their energy supply.
What does this mean?
Projectors do not have consistent sustainable energy of their own. They need to plug into outside sources to receive bumps of sustainable energy. This energy sustains them through their invitations. It helps them complete the tasks of the invitation they have accepted.
In exchange for a Projector’s guidance, Manifestors and Generators offer Projectors free use of their energy resources.
Manifestors who invite Projectors provide access to their defined motor centers and influential initiating ability.
Generators who invite Projectors offer the use of their powerful Sacral Center.
In fact, Ra Uru Hu introduced us to the symbiotic relationship between Generators and Projectors. One cannot do without the other. To carry out their Human Design purpose, each one needs what the other has.
Every Generator needs a Projector and vice versa.
Projectors know they have been granted access to these energy resources because, while listening to the invitation, they suddenly feel excited, alive, emboldened, alert, and energized. They are on fire and ready to go.
Have you experienced this yet? Or, have you experienced heaviness and lethargy?
Projectors who feel exhausted while listening to an invitation have not been granted access to the energy sources of the Manifestor or Generator.
If you accept an invitation that is fatiguing when you consider it, you will not receive the energy you need to be successful. You will have to pull from your limited energy supply to move through your resistance and the resistance from others.
Before you know it, you will be resentful and frustrated. You will be running on fumes and at risk for burnout.
Bitterness, fatigue, depression, and energy depletion are signs that a Projector has accepted an incorrect invitation or did not wait for an invitation in the first place.
It’s far better to wait for invitations that energize you.
conclusion
If you are new to Human Design, you may feel relief and confusion. This is normal. It’s early days and you’ve never heard of “being recognized and waiting for an invitation before.” Give yourself a break. You have many years of experimentation ahead of you.
Keep it Simple, Sam!
When you feel uncertain about an invitation or feel bitter about a difficult relationship or situation, step back and answer these questions:
1. Do/Did I feel recognized?
2. Do/Did I hear a formal invitation or words to that effect?
3. Am/Was I clear about the details? (Optional, but not really)
4, Do/Did I feel energized?
If you can answer yes to all of these questions, then it is/was a promising invitation.
If you answer no to most of these questions, you should reconsider, and if it’s not life or death, say no.
It takes time and many successes to train and trust your nose for invitations.
It took me many years to notice that I no longer think in terms of steps. I’m a Splenic Authority Projector, and I trust the instant messages from my strategy-trained intuition. It almost feels like what I imagine a Generator “sacral” is like.
Intuition helps me choose invitations that are energizing and fun. It protects me from accepting invitations that will drain my energy.
If you are skeptical of the 4-step process, please try it anyway. Trust that it will positively shift the energy around you.
At first, your efforts will be shaky, but you have conquered hard things before, right? Keep at it. Your successes will remind you it’s worth the effort.
My burnout recovery story proves that the Projector strategy is a game changer. You can do it too.
Trust the process, commit, and execute.
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Brigitte Knight is a Human Design educator and mentor as well as a Human Design informed counselor. She loves teaching people to use their Designs to improve their relationships.
She helps former Mormons, Seventh-Day Adventists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and others manage religious trauma, anxiety, guilt, loneliness, and depression.
Her life’s experience as a Registered Nurse, therapist, ex-Jehovah’s Witness, and Human Design practitioner since 2006 can help you start living your best life.