The Emotional Solar Plexus, Grief, and Your Business: A Human Design Guide

 
 

In the world of entrepreneurship, especially in the healing and helping professions, emotions often take a back seat to productivity.

We've been taught that emotions are unprofessional. That we're supposed to show up, even when we're breaking inside. That grief, fear, sadness, or overwhelm are things we manage quietly -- not things we move through openly.

But Human Design offers something radically different: a permission slip to honor your emotional process, not override it.

It shows us that emotions follow patterns. That our emotional experiences are part of our design, not a flaw in our ability to lead or create. That grief isn't something to be handled -- it's something to be with.

The Grief Gap in Entrepreneurship

In Western culture, grief is expected to be short, tidy, and invisible. Lose a loved one, experience a breakup, miss a milestone, or walk away from a version of yourself -- and be back online posting within a week.

But the truth is grief doesn't follow a timeline. It doesn't play by the rules of the algorithm. And in business, grief doesn't just come from death or loss. It comes from:

  • Ending a client relationship

  • Closing a program or offer you once loved

  • Hitting a milestone that doesn't feel like you thought it would

  • Losing momentum in your work

  • Realizing a version of your identity no longer fits

Grief isn't just about people. It's about parts of ourselves. Roles. Dreams. Expectations.

Human Design gives us a map -- not a shortcut. When you understand your Emotional Solar Plexus, you can begin to see the emotional territory of your business and your life with more clarity, compassion, and rhythm.

If You Have a Defined Emotional Solar Plexus

You experience emotional waves all the time. These waves are chemical, cyclical, and part of how your energy processes life.

In grief, your wave may feel deeper, more pronounced, or harder to make sense of. You may find yourself searching for a cause that isn't there. You may want to make decisions quickly to get out of the feelings -- but that's not your truth speaking. That's your discomfort.

What helps:

  • Wait. Breathe. Ride the wave.

  • Ask yourself what you're feeling and what you need -- not what you should do about it.

  • Give yourself solitude, movement, art, journaling, or energy work.

  • Let that be enough.

If You Have an Undefined Emotional Solar Plexus

You're not only feeling your own emotional energy -- you're amplifying the emotional energy of everyone around you.

In grief, this can feel like emotional whiplash, hyper-responsiveness to clients and family, or an urge to help others so you don't have to sit with your own pain.

You need space. Not to isolate -- but to differentiate.

What helps:

  • Step out of other people's energy fields when you can.

  • Turn off notifications. Leave the Zoom room early.

  • Ask yourself: is this emotion mine? Do I need to release something that was never mine to hold?

  • Let your body lead -- move it, feel it, cry it out.

Grieving While Leading

You are not doing it wrong. You are not weak. You are not unqualified.

You're becoming something deeper.

Every wave you allow, every emotion you meet with kindness, every truth you name creates a more honest, human business. One that holds others better because you know how to hold yourself.

You don't need to be better before you can serve. But you do need to be honest about where you are. And give yourself the same compassion you offer others so freely.

Your emotions are not a disruption to your purpose. They are part of it. Especially if you're here to support others in theirs.

You can feel grief and run a business. You can be a guide and still be in process. You can hold others and still need holding, too. And you're allowed to let all of that be true at once.

Want to understand how your emotional design is shaping your business?

The Heretical Heart in Business Report is a personalized Human Design report covering your type, strategy, authority, centers, and channels -- including your Emotional Solar Plexus -- written specifically for heart-led entrepreneurs. It's a foundational entry point for understanding why you feel the way you do in your work, and how to stop leading against your own design.

Get the Heretical Heart in Business Report

Or if you're ready for a live, personalized experience that goes deeper into where you've been trying to show up as someone you're not, the Manifesting Without the "Good Vibes Only" Bullshit bundle meets you exactly where you are -- grief, waves, and all.

Explore the Manifesting Bundle

Aypril Porter

Hi, I'm Aypril (she/her) — Human Design Guide, ICF-certified coach, death doula, and author of Parenting the Child You Have. I'm a 5/2 Emotional Projector and I work with heart-led entrepreneurs who are done performing a version of themselves that was never really theirs. My work lives at the intersection of Human Design, identity, and the kind of honest self-knowledge that actually changes things.

Read more about Aypril

https://www.ayprilporter.com
Previous
Previous

The Day I Stopped Apologizing for My Rates

Next
Next

Anticipatory Grief in Business: Grieving the Pivot Before It Happens