Is Where You Are, Who You Are? And A Business Study Guide to Using Human Design Environments

Episode 88: Your Human Design Environment , It will Refresh You 

What if your business isn’t stalling because of your strategy but because you’re trying to plug into the wrong outlet? Your Human Design environment is your charging dock. When it fits, your energy replenishes and your business flows. When it doesn’t, you’re basically running on 1% battery and praying for a miracle.

In this episode, Caitlan Siegenthaler (therapist turned biz strategist, 4/6 Splenic Projector, and professional caller-out of burnout) digs into how your Human Design environment shapes your energy, your offers, and your results. From caves to kitchens to mountains and beyond, each environment comes with its own way to recharge and thrive.

Caitlan shares her own stories (why she craved sunshine in Ohio, how Switzerland snuck her into isolation, and what Virginia Beach reawakened) plus a client case study where aligning with the right environment doubled conversions in three months. Consider this your permission slip to stop building your business in places that drain you and start plugging in where your energy actually thrives.

What You'll Learn in This Episode:

• Why your environment is your charging dock, not just your backdrop
• The six Human Design environments and what fuels each one
• A real client story of doubled conversions after shifting into the right setup
• Why forcing yourself into content calendars or constant hustle might actually be misalignment
• Quick, environment-specific tweaks you can use this week to recharge your biz.

Chapters:

• (00:00) Welcome and why place is never casual
• (01:26) Francis Mayes quote and the craving for place
• (03:11) Caitlan’s stories from Ohio, Switzerland, and Virginia Beach
• (04:34) Client breakthrough: environment as the missing 20%
• (06:23) Deep dive into Mountains
• (07:48) Quick tour of Markets, Shores, Valleys, Kitchens, Caves
• (11:42) Reflection: when do you feel most charged
• (14:05) Client transformation: caves and doubled conversions
• (16:08) Adding environment-aligned energy zones to your week
• (17:37) Invitation to The Place to Be workshop

Links & Resources:

• Register for The Place to Be workshop (August 27, 2025 at 12 pm EST): Sign Up Here
• Add a discounted 60-minute one-on-one environment session at checkout
• The Return Episode that breaks down Environments
• Work with Caitlan: Mentorship + Strategy

If this episode charged you up, share it with a friend or snag your spot in The Place to Be. Both help keep the podcast alive and flowing. And don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review so you never miss the next recharge.

Transcript

Caitlan Siegenthaler (00:00.0)
Hello, hi, hi. Welcome back to another episode of Return. How are we doing? How are we doing out there? I am very excited for this connection point with you for this episode. And in case you're new to this spot, hi, I am Caitlin Seigenthaler. I'm your host here at Return and... 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (00:28.642)
This podcast just helps us tune into what's true for ourselves and to design success that actually feels like us. I'm a therapist, turn, business mindset, extraordinaire. I don't know what to say. I'm constantly changing my title because I decay, you know? I'm a 4'6 splenic projector and I am your guide to blending human design and internal family systems. And this week I'm... 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (00:57.098)
asking a lot of questions. And I'm hoping that we can answer some of them together. But I once read something that said, where you are is who you are. And also I found this quote, the author of this quote. So Francis Mays wrote this in Under the Tuscan Sun. And the full quote is, where you are is who you are. The further inside you the place moves, the more your identity is intertwined with it. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (01:26.73)
Never casual. The choice of place is the choice of something you crave. Today we're going to be talking about place, about environment, about finding inspiration there, about all of the things. And if I'm in the business of helping us return to ourselves, to our most authentic selves, then how does where we are influence who we are? Is where we are actually authentic for us? And how do we even know? 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (01:54.176)
Astrologers might say check your chart or check your astro cartography. Human design says, look at your environment. You have an environment. There are six of them in human design. But what about the people who've never left their hometown or the fact that it's a privilege to even have a choice about where we live? I'm teaching a workshop on August 27th called the place to be. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (02:21.388)
all about human design environments, and it's got me rubbing up against my own questions about place, home, and how they shape us. And so with place comes community, and with community comes connection. And if there's one thing we're lacking on a global scale right now, it's community and connection. So I feel like this workshop couldn't come at a better time. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (02:46.614)
And to quote Demi Moore's character in Now and Then, she either said, you can always go home again or you can never go home again, but I just needed to mention that movie because, ugh, that movie feels like summer. I've always lived like you can go home again, and home being loosely defined more about energy than a physical address. For me, there's been different places that... 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (03:11.374)
hold a different energy. So when I lived in Cincinnati, Ohio, it taught me how much I needed sunshine, but it also gave me space to deepen my relationship with my partner. In Bern, Switzerland, it showed me how isolation can slide into depression, like almost like a coat I didn't know I was wearing. And where I am now in Virginia Beach, I found a return to some spirituality, some safety and connection. And so, 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (03:37.152)
Every place I've lived has helped me discover or remember a different part of myself. And today we're going to explore your human design environment, especially your business environment, and figure out how that can be the key to scaling with more money, flow, joy, you know, the stuff that makes us all feel real good inside. So. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (04:04.618)
Your energy type really is just the foundation and your environment is more the operating terrain, like the place where your energy thrives. It's the difference between your personality and your ideal workspace. They are related, but they are not the same. I have a couple of clients that come to mind when I think about their environment piece. One in particular who is like following everything 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (04:34.316)
to a T and then they were feeling stuck and they were using their energy type pretty well. Like I would say they were probably in 80 % of alignment with their energy type, but they were sort of spinning their wheels. And the moment we dug into their environment as a mountains person, you guys just next level, they then created offers that elevated 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (05:03.394)
their clients, they had one day a week where they called it like mountain day and they went away by themselves when hiking, went to get different perspective. And it was wild to watch just like so much more flow and satisfaction coming in. So today's episode, I'm going to go into a little bit about environments, but if you want the whole thing. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (05:32.814)
and you want to go into what type of environment you should be building your business in because most entrepreneurs unknowingly are building their business in the wrong environment. You want to come to the Place To Be Workshop. It's on Wednesday, August 27th, 2025 at 12 noon Eastern Standard Time. The link to sign up and get your ticket is in the 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (06:02.19)
Show notes. All right, so let's, you're like, okay, Caitlin, I'm with you. I wanna know about my environment, which if you want like a general overview, I did an episode on that. That is linked in the show notes. But let's use the mountains example. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (06:23.768)
We're gonna deep dive into it. So if you are a mountains person, your energy feels like kind of panoramic views, clarity from above, like deep breath that comes from a distance. You wanna do things that are strategic, observant. You thrive on perspective before action. Mountains types in business gain energy from stepping back and seeing the big picture. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (06:51.436)
You work best in concentrated bursts, but not in constant hustle. This could not be more true for me. You want to have like thought leadership, seasonal launches, VIP intensives, things that kill your energy as a mountains person, back to back calls and no white space, constant reactive mode and the pressure to churn content daily. When I tell you as a mountains environment that I was allergic, 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (07:20.312)
to a content calendar and to like a posting schedule, I still to this, can't do it. I like physically cannot do it. And so this is the exact example. Like think about this. Think about how helpful this information is to have to go into to take a look at. So let's rapid fire the other four archetypes, markets. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (07:48.07)
As an entrepreneur, you're the connector. You thrive in the bustle of relationship-based business. The worst thing for a markets person would be to be totally isolated and doing something where they never got to interact with the customer. Shores, you are the bridge builder. You thrive at the threshold between two worlds. You definitely... 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (08:21.806)
like kind of the both and person you know you want liminal spaces you're sort of the portals between two worlds you're sort of merging like you're very fluid and I love that about you and obviously in the workshop we're going to be going so much deeper so I'll be talking about like what kills your energy how you can tap into alignment how you can tap into inspiration 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (08:49.71)
every single thing, so you're gonna walk away from the workshop being like, cool, cool, cool, cool, I know exactly what to do next, and I can't freakin' wait, honestly. I haven't been this excited about a workshop in a while. All right, where were we at? Valleys, oh, Valleys. You're like the village well. You kind of create deep trust and intimacy in these small, loyal communities. If you're a Valleys person, 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (09:17.678)
You want to consider that when you're crafting your offers. And I'm going to talk more about what I would recommend for valleys folks. Kitchens. My son is a kitchen's environment and like he is. Okay. Funny story. So I was cooking him breakfast and he kept asking for eggs, but he was saying them in Swiss German. So he was saying, I ate, I ate, I ate. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (09:45.198)
He kept asking for them and I was like, okay, if I make you eggs, are you gonna eat them? Which like says every toddler parent everywhere. It's like, please eat what I make for you because it's so frustrating when you don't. So I get out the eggs, I crack them and he's like loving it. He's so enthralled. He's so into it. I scramble the eggs, I've got them in the pan and he's so happy and I was like, okay, are you ready to eat your eggs? And he was like, no, no. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (10:15.18)
And this is so Kitchens' environment. He just loved the process of me creating the thing, right? So Kitchens, you are the innovator. You are where transformation and reinvention are constant. You would really thrive in a lab-type space or in creating containers where you explore creativity. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (10:42.346)
And I can't wait for the workshop, because we'll talk a lot more about what that might look like. Like an innovation lab, maybe. And I just want to make sure that I didn't miss anything. Caves. So, caves environments. You are, think like curated sanctuary, selective access. The metaphor here is like a luxury retreat. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (11:12.342)
isn't this exciting? Like now you know where you can get some inspiration from. And here's what really blew my mind. Your human design energy type might say one thing, but your business energy, your business like archetype of environment could be completely different. So we want to try to hold both of those things. And remember human design is like, you know, she's very complex and very nuanced. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (11:42.562)
But when we're using these different aspects, I love to use them for like the experiment of it all, right? Because remember that human design is in fact an experiment and we wanna play around with this. We wanna see what's going on. So I want to invite you on this little experiment with me. If you're driving, like wait till you're paused or in a place where you can listen. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (12:11.938)
But I'm going to invite you to think about when you felt most energized in your business. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (12:24.622)
when you felt most energized in your business, what were you offering? Like what kind of work were you doing? 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (12:39.118)
Where were you physically? I know for me, if I'm not near a window where I can see a view, like again, mountains, perspective, I go cuckoo bananas. Cuckoo bananas. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (12:54.582)
Okay, and as you've been thinking about this, were you connecting with people? Were you going deep and solo? 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (13:05.101)
Were you creating something new or perfecting something that's already existing? Were you in community or were you in your sanctuary? 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (13:23.864)
The point of this reflection is that your environment tells you everything you need to know about the energy and the way you show up to your current business and where you can get inspiration and a little bit of strategy too. And this is again what we're gonna deep dive on in the workshop. So can't wait for that. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (13:52.918)
And I really, think what gets my goat is that most people are building businesses that drain them. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (14:05.598)
Just remember that your environment is your business blueprint. The more you align, the more your energy and your results expand. And that's what I'm in the business of, Okay, let's talk about some transformations that I've seen using environments. One was someone had... 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (14:30.14)
lower conversions and really scattered messaging. And so what did we do? We sat down and looked at their environment, which happened to be caves. And first of all, we got them set up in the actual like physical environment that was going to be most nurturing for them. So they were working in a coworking space some of the time and their energy was spread out because then at home they had like a... 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (14:56.382)
desk that was like in the mix of everything and as a caves you need to be like away, you know, in your cave. So we changed their physical setup and they ended up getting to rent an office space where they like had a closed door and really could cave like go into the cave. And actually what's really funny is they did some work from their car. but they found a lot of inspiration in that. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (15:25.81)
And so I'm always open to what we need to do. And then we really got very selective about their messaging. So for CAVES, there is a real selection process and we sort of narrowed things down for them and got super specific. And you guys, this led to them doubling their conversion in about three and a half months. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (15:55.208)
We started this back in February and by May, they'd really doubled everything. So this is what I'm talking about. Like this is really how powerful this stuff is. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (16:08.466)
Okay, so we've done our reflecting. I wanna give you all a tip that you can all use right away today. I want you to think about adding energy to zones to your week that match your environment. So for mountains, that would be like solo CEO days. For markets, that would be collaboration sprints. For shores, that would be 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (16:37.534)
like connecting with two different groups maybe. like if you're a shores person, maybe you meet with your IFS group and then you meet with your human design group and kind of just like holding both of those things. For valleys, that would be going to your favorite community, gathering like once a week. For kitchens, that might be like letting yourself participate in a creative lab or a creative project or something. whatever comes up, you wanna 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (17:07.33)
add that in. And I'm so excited for this. So remember that your energy type and human design is your foundation and your environment is like the walls and the structure to your house that we're metaphorically building. I would also invite you to notice this week when your energy feels most alive and when it flatlines, right? We want to kind of 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (17:37.034)
take into account how our energy is already flowing throughout the day. The next thing I want you to do is come to the live workshop, the place to be, Wednesday, August 27th, 2025 at 12 noon EST. That's 6 p.m. in Paris. That's 9 a.m. in LA. And you can sign up using the link in the show notes. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (18:05.682)
There's also an opportunity to get a one-on-one. You can book this in deeply discounted one-on-one 60 minute session with me where I will guide you using my projector energy and walk you through how to integrate your environment. One-on-one, baby. You cannot book me one-on-one for this price anywhere on the internet. So. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (18:32.7)
It is a perk of signing up for the workshop and you can add that on at checkout when you check out for the workshop. I can't wait. I adore you. Thank you for listening. Thank you for being here. If you love this episode, please share it with a friend or register for the place to be. Both of those would be such a gift from you to me for creating this content and for really putting my heart and soul into this podcast. 

Caitlan Siegenthaler (19:03.298)
I adore you, I can't wait to see you next week and until then, take care, bye.