← Encyclopedia of Embodied Energy · lesson 26/164
The sounding self
The sounding self is the inner compass the tradition calls "self-projected" authority. It belongs to charts in which the Self centre ("G centre") is defined and connected to the Throat, while the Feeling, Vitality, Instinct and Will centres are all open. Every chart with this compass is a Projector. It is among the rarer compasses. In one line: hearing your direction as you say it.
How the chart arrives at it
Going down the ladder, the first four rungs must not apply. Then the Self must be defined and reach the Throat. Four channels join the two directly:
If the Will were defined and joined to the Self as well, its energy would reach the Throat through the Self, and the chart would be a Manifestor with the heart's promise instead. So in practice the Will is open in every chart with this compass.
The condition "connected to the Throat" is not a formality. A Self that is defined but has no route to the Throat — for instance one defined only by its link to the Will — does not receive this compass, because the compass works through speaking. We test the connection on this rung exactly as on the one above.
How it is said to work
The defined Self centre is read as a fixed sense of identity and direction — who one is and where one is going, largely independent of company. Joined to the Throat, that sense is said to become clear in speech. A person with this compass may not know what they think about a decision until they hear themselves talk about it. The words that come out, and especially the ones that surprise them, are the compass.
The tradition's practice is to talk decisions through with someone who will listen, not advise. The listener's job is to be a mirror for the speaker's own voice. Advice, however well meant, tends to pull the speaker towards someone else's direction, which an open-minded Projector can easily take on.
Some ways this is often put:
- Talk it through out loud, ideally to more than one trusted person, at different times.
- Listen for what you say about who you are and where you want to go, not only what you say about the options.
- Notice when a choice sounds like yourself, and when it sounds like someone you are trying to please.
How it is read
Because the Self is concerned with direction and with love of one's own path, the sounding self is often described as a compass that knows where a person belongs: which places, people and work feel like the right direction. Decisions made against that sense are said to leave a Projector feeling lost or, in time, bitter — the not-self theme of the type.
None of this is a rule, and none of it is a measure of anyone. It is a way of noticing whether a decision came from your own voice.
In your chart
Look at the Self centre, in the middle of the figure below the Throat: in a chart with this compass it is filled and joined to the filled Throat by at least one of the four channels above, while the Will to its right and the three centres low in the figure are unfilled. A reading names the compass near its start.