Gate 28: Awareness that flirts with Death
Some people are natural risk-takers. We take chances others would consider reckless, dangerous, or even downright foolhardy. However, some of us know how to push the envelope safely. It’s like we have a sixth sense, an awareness that tells us where the edge is and how to walk it without actually dying.
In Human Design, this is Gate 28, the Gate of the Game Player. Like a video game, we play with life as if our avatars have multiple chances to stay alive. Gate 28 represents an ever-alert, high-stakes frequency that whispers real-time information about our immediate safety and wellbeing.
In the Bodygraph
Unsurprisingly found in the primal and intuitive Splenic Center, Gate 28 points to Gate 38 in the Root. Together they form the potent, Individual 28-38 (the Channel of Struggle).
Those with this definition are driven by a restless need to make sense of life, to struggle in search of a purpose in life or something that proves that our existence is not futile.
The quintessential Individual
This trait is the hallmark of the Individual, who strikes out on their own, breaking Tribal tradition and the Collective status quo. In the context of the Channel of Struggle, Gate 28 provides the instinctive awareness to know what is worth fighting for, and what is worth letting be. Gate 38, its harmonic, is called the Gate of the Fighter, and it provides the fuel and pressure to fight.
This craving for meaning is what prods these Individuals to seek intense experiences again and again. It is energy that, like all Individual Circuitry, empowers others by demonstrating that it is okay to boldly seek one’s own authentic meaning in life. This one-person-at-a-time transformation is the basis of societal mutation and thus human evolution in general.
Fear keeps us alive
All the gates of the Spleen keep us alive – by keeping us on our toes through very specific and valid fears. In the case of the Gate of the Game Player, it is said that the fear is of death itself. However, it makes more sense to say that these Individuals fear dying a meaningless life.
If you have the hanging Gate 28, it’s likely you’ll have a sense of what is worth fighting for, but you might not have the fuel to fight that fight. You have a tendency to just give up. This can lead to nihilism – a sense of what’s the point?
If you have the Gate of the Game Player in an undefined Spleen, extra caution should be taken. Be mindful of risk-taking and use your Strategy and Authority to make the safest, most aligned choices.
Evolution works in mysterious ways. It seems to try everything in hopes of better. On a genetic level this means reproductive success, but in one’s lived life, it means experiencing more joy, vitality, and satisfaction.
Paradoxically, Gate 28 represents the potential to actually survive through risk taking. The Individual is the great Game Player. It is up to us to say, let’s play this game of life differently. And if it works, others will follow.
